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diff --git a/old/1040.txt b/old/1040.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..761b6ca --- /dev/null +++ b/old/1040.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3535 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Three Taverns, by Edwin Arlington Robinson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + +Title: The Three Taverns + +Author: Edwin Arlington Robinson + +Posting Date: December 12, 2014 [EBook #1040] +Release Date: September, 1997 +First Posted: September 20, 1997 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE TAVERNS *** + + + + +Produced by Alan R. Light. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + + + + +[Note on text: Italicized words or phrases are CAPITALIZED. +Lines longer than 78 characters are broken and the continuation +is indented two spaces. Some obvious errors may have been corrected.] + + + + + + The Three Taverns + + A Book of Poems + + By Edwin Arlington Robinson + + Author of "The Man Against the Sky", "Merlin, A Poem", etc. + + [American (Maine) Poet. 1869-1935.] + + + + + To THOMAS SERGEANT PERRY and LILLA CABOT PERRY + + + + + Contents + + + + The Valley of the Shadow + The Wandering Jew + Neighbors + The Mill + The Dark Hills + The Three Taverns + Demos I + Demos II + The Flying Dutchman + Tact + On the Way + John Brown + The False Gods + Archibald's Example + London Bridge + Tasker Norcross + A Song at Shannon's + Souvenir + Discovery + Firelight + The New Tenants + Inferential + The Rat + Rahel to Varnhagen + Nimmo + Peace on Earth + Late Summer + An Evangelist's Wife + The Old King's New Jester + Lazarus + + +Several poems included in this book appeared originally +in American periodicals, as follows: The Three Taverns, London Bridge, +A Song at Shannon's, The New Tenants, Discovery, John Brown; +Archibald's Example, The Valley of the Shadow; Nimmo; The Wandering Jew, +Souvenir; Neighbors, Tact; Demos; The Mill, An Evangelist's Wife; +Firelight; Late Summer; Inferential; The Flying Dutchman; +On the Way, The False Gods; Peace on Earth; The Old King's New Jester. + + + + + + ------------------- + The Three Taverns + ------------------- + + + + + + The Valley of the Shadow + + There were faces to remember in the Valley of the Shadow, + There were faces unregarded, there were faces to forget; + There were fires of grief and fear that are a few forgotten ashes, + There were sparks of recognition that are not forgotten yet. + For at first, with an amazed and overwhelming indignation + At a measureless malfeasance that obscurely willed it thus, + They were lost and unacquainted -- till they found themselves in others, + Who had groped as they were groping where dim ways were perilous. + + There were lives that were as dark as are the fears and intuitions + Of a child who knows himself and is alone with what he knows; + There were pensioners of dreams and there were debtors of illusions, + All to fail before the triumph of a weed that only grows. + There were thirsting heirs of golden sieves that held not wine or water, + And had no names in traffic or more value there than toys: + There were blighted sons of wonder in the Valley of the Shadow, + Where they suffered and still wondered why their wonder made no noise. + + There were slaves who dragged the shackles of a precedent unbroken, + Demonstrating the fulfilment of unalterable schemes, + Which had been, before the cradle, Time's inexorable tenants + Of what were now the dusty ruins of their father's dreams. + There were these, and there were many who had stumbled up to manhood, + Where they saw too late the road they should have taken long ago: + There were thwarted clerks and fiddlers in the Valley of the Shadow, + The commemorative wreckage of what others did not know. + + And there were daughters older than the mothers who had borne them, + Being older in their wisdom, which is older than the earth; + And they were going forward only farther into darkness, + Unrelieved as were the blasting obligations of their birth; + And among them, giving always what was not for their possession, + There were maidens, very quiet, with no quiet in their eyes: + There were daughters of the silence in the Valley of the Shadow, + Each an isolated item in the family sacrifice. + + There were creepers among catacombs where dull regrets were torches, + Giving light enough to show them what was there upon the shelves -- + Where there was more for them to see than pleasure would remember + Of something that had been alive and once had been themselves. + There were some who stirred the ruins with a solid imprecation, + While as many fled repentance for the promise of despair: + There were drinkers of wrong waters in the Valley of the Shadow, + And all the sparkling ways were dust that once had led them there. + + There were some who knew the steps of Age incredibly beside them, + And his fingers upon shoulders that had never felt the wheel; + And their last of empty trophies was a gilded cup of nothing, + Which a contemplating vagabond would not have come to steal. + Long and often had they figured for a larger valuation, + But the size of their addition was the balance of a doubt: + There were gentlemen of leisure in the Valley of the Shadow, + Not allured by retrospection, disenchanted, and played out. + + And among the dark endurances of unavowed reprisals + There were silent eyes of envy that saw little but saw well; + And over beauty's aftermath of hazardous ambitions + There were tears for what had vanished as they vanished where they fell. + Not assured of what was theirs, and always hungry for the nameless, + There were some whose only passion was for Time who made them cold: + There were numerous fair women in the Valley of the Shadow, + Dreaming rather less of heaven than of hell when they were old. + + Now and then, as if to scorn the common touch of common sorrow, + There were some who gave a few the distant pity of a smile; + And another cloaked a soul as with an ash of human embers, + Having covered thus a treasure that would last him for a while. + There were many by the presence of the many disaffected, + Whose exemption was included in the weight that others bore: + There were seekers after darkness in the Valley of the Shadow, + And they alone were there to find what they were looking for. + + So they were, and so they are; and as they came are coming others, + And among them are the fearless and the meek and the unborn; + And a question that has held us heretofore without an answer + May abide without an answer until all have ceased to mourn. + For the children of the dark are more to name than are the wretched, + Or the broken, or the weary, or the baffled, or the shamed: + There are builders of new mansions in the Valley of the Shadow, + And among them are the dying and the blinded and the maimed. + + + + + The Wandering Jew + + I saw by looking in his eyes + That they remembered everything; + And this was how I came to know + That he was here, still wandering. + For though the figure and the scene + Were never to be reconciled, + I knew the man as I had known + His image when I was a child. + + With evidence at every turn, + I should have held it safe to guess + That all the newness of New York + Had nothing new in loneliness; + Yet here was one who might be Noah, + Or Nathan, or Abimelech, + Or Lamech, out of ages lost, -- + Or, more than all, Melchizedek. + + Assured that he was none of these, + I gave them back their names again, + To scan once more those endless eyes + Where all my questions ended then. + I found in them what they revealed + That I shall not live to forget, + And wondered if they found in mine + Compassion that I might regret. + + Pity, I learned, was not the least + Of time's offending benefits + That had now for so long impugned + The conservation of his wits: + Rather it was that I should yield, + Alone, the fealty that presents + The tribute of a tempered ear + To an untempered eloquence. + + Before I pondered long enough + On whence he came and who he was, + I trembled at his ringing wealth + Of manifold anathemas; + I wondered, while he seared the world, + What new defection ailed the race, + And if it mattered how remote + Our fathers were from such a place. + + Before there was an hour for me + To contemplate with less concern + The crumbling realm awaiting us + Than his that was beyond return, + A dawning on the dust of years + Had shaped with an elusive light + Mirages of remembered scenes + That were no longer for the sight. + + For now the gloom that hid the man + Became a daylight on his wrath, + And one wherein my fancy viewed + New lions ramping in his path. + The old were dead and had no fangs, + Wherefore he loved them -- seeing not + They were the same that in their time + Had eaten everything they caught. + + The world around him was a gift + Of anguish to his eyes and ears, + And one that he had long reviled + As fit for devils, not for seers. + Where, then, was there a place for him + That on this other side of death + Saw nothing good, as he had seen + No good come out of Nazareth? + + Yet here there was a reticence, + And I believe his only one, + That hushed him as if he beheld + A Presence that would not be gone. + In such a silence he confessed + How much there was to be denied; + And he would look at me and live, + As others might have looked and died. + + As if at last he knew again + That he had always known, his eyes + Were like to those of one who gazed + On those of One who never dies. + For such a moment he revealed + What life has in it to be lost; + And I could ask if what I saw, + Before me there, was man or ghost. + + He may have died so many times + That all there was of him to see + Was pride, that kept itself alive + As too rebellious to be free; + He may have told, when more than once + Humility seemed imminent, + How many a lonely time in vain + The Second Coming came and went. + + Whether he still defies or not + The failure of an angry task + That relegates him out of time + To chaos, I can only ask. + But as I knew him, so he was; + And somewhere among men to-day + Those old, unyielding eyes may flash, + And flinch -- and look the other way. + + + + + Neighbors + + As often as we thought of her, + We thought of a gray life + That made a quaint economist + Of a wolf-haunted wife; + We made the best of all she bore + That was not ours to bear, + And honored her for wearing things + That were not things to wear. + + There was a distance in her look + That made us look again; + And if she smiled, we might believe + That we had looked in vain. + Rarely she came inside our doors, + And had not long to stay; + And when she left, it seemed somehow + That she was far away. + + At last, when we had all forgot + That all is here to change, + A shadow on the commonplace + Was for a moment strange. + Yet there was nothing for surprise, + Nor much that need be told: + Love, with his gift of pain, had given + More than one heart could hold. + + + + + The Mill + + The miller's wife had waited long, + The tea was cold, the fire was dead; + And there might yet be nothing wrong + In how he went and what he said: + "There are no millers any more," + Was all that she had heard him say; + And he had lingered at the door + So long that it seemed yesterday. + + Sick with a fear that had no form + She knew that she was there at last; + And in the mill there was a warm + And mealy fragrance of the past. + What else there was would only seem + To say again what he had meant; + And what was hanging from a beam + Would not have heeded where she went. + + And if she thought it followed her, + She may have reasoned in the dark + That one way of the few there were + Would hide her and would leave no mark: + Black water, smooth above the weir + Like starry velvet in the night, + Though ruffled once, would soon appear + The same as ever to the sight. + + + + + The Dark Hills + + Dark hills at evening in the west, + Where sunset hovers like a sound + Of golden horns that sang to rest + Old bones of warriors under ground, + Far now from all the bannered ways + Where flash the legions of the sun, + You fade -- as if the last of days + Were fading, and all wars were done. + + + + + The Three Taverns + + When the brethren heard of us, they came to meet us + as far as Appii Forum, and The Three Taverns. + (Acts 28:15) + + Herodion, Apelles, Amplias, + And Andronicus? Is it you I see -- + At last? And is it you now that are gazing + As if in doubt of me? Was I not saying + That I should come to Rome? I did say that; + And I said furthermore that I should go + On westward, where the gateway of the world + Lets in the central sea. I did say that, + But I say only, now, that I am Paul -- + A prisoner of the Law, and of the Lord + A voice made free. If there be time enough + To live, I may have more to tell you then + Of western matters. I go now to Rome, + Where Caesar waits for me, and I shall wait, + And Caesar knows how long. In Caesarea + There was a legend of Agrippa saying + In a light way to Festus, having heard + My deposition, that I might be free, + Had I stayed free of Caesar; but the word + Of God would have it as you see it is -- + And here I am. The cup that I shall drink + Is mine to drink -- the moment or the place + Not mine to say. If it be now in Rome, + Be it now in Rome; and if your faith exceed + The shadow cast of hope, say not of me + Too surely or too soon that years and shipwreck, + And all the many deserts I have crossed + That are not named or regioned, have undone + Beyond the brevities of our mortal healing + The part of me that is the least of me. + You see an older man than he who fell + Prone to the earth when he was nigh Damascus, + Where the great light came down; yet I am he + That fell, and he that saw, and he that heard. + And I am here, at last; and if at last + I give myself to make another crumb + For this pernicious feast of time and men -- + Well, I have seen too much of time and men + To fear the ravening or the wrath of either. + + Yes, it is Paul you see -- the Saul of Tarsus + That was a fiery Jew, and had men slain + For saying Something was beyond the Law, + And in ourselves. I fed my suffering soul + Upon the Law till I went famishing, + Not knowing that I starved. How should I know, + More then than any, that the food I had -- + What else it may have been -- was not for me? + My fathers and their fathers and their fathers + Had found it good, and said there was no other, + And I was of the line. When Stephen fell, + Among the stones that crushed his life away, + There was no place alive that I could see + For such a man. Why should a man be given + To live beyond the Law? So I said then, + As men say now to me. How then do I + Persist in living? Is that what you ask? + If so, let my appearance be for you + No living answer; for Time writes of death + On men before they die, and what you see + Is not the man. The man that you see not -- + The man within the man -- is most alive; + Though hatred would have ended, long ago, + The bane of his activities. I have lived, + Because the faith within me that is life + Endures to live, and shall, till soon or late, + Death, like a friend unseen, shall say to me + My toil is over and my work begun. + + How often, and how many a time again, + Have I said I should be with you in Rome! + He who is always coming never comes, + Or comes too late, you may have told yourselves; + And I may tell you now that after me, + Whether I stay for little or for long, + The wolves are coming. Have an eye for them, + And a more careful ear for their confusion + Than you need have much longer for the sound + Of what I tell you -- should I live to say + More than I say to Caesar. What I know + Is down for you to read in what is written; + And if I cloud a little with my own + Mortality the gleam that is immortal, + I do it only because I am I -- + Being on earth and of it, in so far + As time flays yet the remnant. This you know; + And if I sting men, as I do sometimes, + With a sharp word that hurts, it is because + Man's habit is to feel before he sees; + And I am of a race that feels. Moreover, + The world is here for what is not yet here + For more than are a few; and even in Rome, + Where men are so enamored of the Cross + That fame has echoed, and increasingly, + The music of your love and of your faith + To foreign ears that are as far away + As Antioch and Haran, yet I wonder + How much of love you know, and if your faith + Be the shut fruit of words. If so, remember + Words are but shells unfilled. Jews have at least + A Law to make them sorry they were born + If they go long without it; and these Gentiles, + For the first time in shrieking history, + Have love and law together, if so they will, + For their defense and their immunity + In these last days. Rome, if I know the name, + Will have anon a crown of thorns and fire + Made ready for the wreathing of new masters, + Of whom we are appointed, you and I, -- + And you are still to be when I am gone, + Should I go presently. Let the word fall, + Meanwhile, upon the dragon-ridden field + Of circumstance, either to live or die; + Concerning which there is a parable, + Made easy for the comfort and attention + Of those who preach, fearing they preach in vain. + You are to plant, and then to plant again + Where you have gathered, gathering as you go; + For you are in the fields that are eternal, + And you have not the burden of the Lord + Upon your mortal shoulders. What you have + Is a light yoke, made lighter by the wearing, + Till it shall have the wonder and the weight + Of a clear jewel, shining with a light + Wherein the sun and all the fiery stars + May soon be fading. When Gamaliel said + That if they be of men these things are nothing, + But if they be of God they are for none + To overthrow, he spoke as a good Jew, + And one who stayed a Jew; and he said all. + And you know, by the temper of your faith, + How far the fire is in you that I felt + Before I knew Damascus. A word here, + Or there, or not there, or not anywhere, + Is not the Word that lives and is the life; + And you, therefore, need weary not yourselves + With jealous aches of others. If the world + Were not a world of aches and innovations, + Attainment would have no more joy of it. + There will be creeds and schisms, creeds in creeds, + And schisms in schisms; myriads will be done + To death because a farthing has two sides, + And is at last a farthing. Telling you this, + I, who bid men to live, appeal to Caesar. + Once I had said the ways of God were dark, + Meaning by that the dark ways of the Law. + Such is the glory of our tribulations; + For the Law kills the flesh that kills the Law, + And we are then alive. We have eyes then; + And we have then the Cross between two worlds -- + To guide us, or to blind us for a time, + Till we have eyes indeed. The fire that smites + A few on highways, changing all at once, + Is not for all. The power that holds the world + Away from God that holds himself away -- + Farther away than all your works and words + Are like to fly without the wings of faith -- + Was not, nor ever shall be, a small hazard + Enlivening the ways of easy leisure + Or the cold road of knowledge. When our eyes + Have wisdom, we see more than we remember; + And the old world of our captivities + May then become a smitten glimpse of ruin, + Like one where vanished hewers have had their day + Of wrath on Lebanon. Before we see, + Meanwhile, we suffer; and I come to you, + At last, through many storms and through much night. + + Yet whatsoever I have undergone, + My keepers in this instance are not hard. + But for the chance of an ingratitude, + I might indeed be curious of their mercy, + And fearful of their leisure while I wait, + A few leagues out of Rome. Men go to Rome, + Not always to return -- but not that now. + Meanwhile, I seem to think you look at me + With eyes that are at last more credulous + Of my identity. You remark in me + No sort of leaping giant, though some words + Of mine to you from Corinth may have leapt + A little through your eyes into your soul. + I trust they were alive, and are alive + Today; for there be none that shall indite + So much of nothing as the man of words + Who writes in the Lord's name for his name's sake + And has not in his blood the fire of time + To warm eternity. Let such a man -- + If once the light is in him and endures -- + Content himself to be the general man, + Set free to sift the decencies and thereby + To learn, except he be one set aside + For sorrow, more of pleasure than of pain; + Though if his light be not the light indeed, + But a brief shine that never really was, + And fails, leaving him worse than where he was, + Then shall he be of all men destitute. + And here were not an issue for much ink, + Or much offending faction among scribes. + + The Kingdom is within us, we are told; + And when I say to you that we possess it + In such a measure as faith makes it ours, + I say it with a sinner's privilege + Of having seen and heard, and seen again, + After a darkness; and if I affirm + To the last hour that faith affords alone + The Kingdom entrance and an entertainment, + I do not see myself as one who says + To man that he shall sit with folded hands + Against the Coming. If I be anything, + I move a driven agent among my kind, + Establishing by the faith of Abraham, + And by the grace of their necessities, + The clamoring word that is the word of life + Nearer than heretofore to the solution + Of their tomb-serving doubts. If I have loosed + A shaft of language that has flown sometimes + A little higher than the hearts and heads + Of nature's minions, it will yet be heard, + Like a new song that waits for distant ears. + I cannot be the man that I am not; + And while I own that earth is my affliction, + I am a man of earth, who says not all + To all alike. That were impossible, + Even as it were so that He should plant + A larger garden first. But you today + Are for the larger sowing; and your seed, + A little mixed, will have, as He foresaw, + The foreign harvest of a wider growth, + And one without an end. Many there are, + And are to be, that shall partake of it, + Though none may share it with an understanding + That is not his alone. We are all alone; + And yet we are all parcelled of one order -- + Jew, Gentile, or barbarian in the dark + Of wildernesses that are not so much + As names yet in a book. And there are many, + Finding at last that words are not the Word, + And finding only that, will flourish aloft, + Like heads of captured Pharisees on pikes, + Our contradictions and discrepancies; + And there are many more will hang themselves + Upon the letter, seeing not in the Word + The friend of all who fail, and in their faith + A sword of excellence to cut them down. + + As long as there are glasses that are dark -- + And there are many -- we see darkly through them; + All which have I conceded and set down + In words that have no shadow. What is dark + Is dark, and we may not say otherwise; + Yet what may be as dark as a lost fire + For one of us, may still be for another + A coming gleam across the gulf of ages, + And a way home from shipwreck to the shore; + And so, through pangs and ills and desperations, + There may be light for all. There shall be light. + As much as that, you know. You cannot say + This woman or that man will be the next + On whom it falls; you are not here for that. + Your ministration is to be for others + The firing of a rush that may for them + Be soon the fire itself. The few at first + Are fighting for the multitude at last; + Therefore remember what Gamaliel said + Before you, when the sick were lying down + In streets all night for Peter's passing shadow. + Fight, and say what you feel; say more than words. + Give men to know that even their days of earth + To come are more than ages that are gone. + Say what you feel, while you have time to say it. + Eternity will answer for itself, + Without your intercession; yet the way + For many is a long one, and as dark, + Meanwhile, as dreams of hell. See not your toil + Too much, and if I be away from you, + Think of me as a brother to yourselves, + Of many blemishes. Beware of stoics, + And give your left hand to grammarians; + And when you seem, as many a time you may, + To have no other friend than hope, remember + That you are not the first, or yet the last. + + The best of life, until we see beyond + The shadows of ourselves (and they are less + Than even the blindest of indignant eyes + Would have them) is in what we do not know. + Make, then, for all your fears a place to sleep + With all your faded sins; nor think yourselves + Egregious and alone for your defects + Of youth and yesterday. I was young once; + And there's a question if you played the fool + With a more fervid and inherent zeal + Than I have in my story to remember, + Or gave your necks to folly's conquering foot, + Or flung yourselves with an unstudied aim, + Less frequently than I. Never mind that. + Man's little house of days will hold enough, + Sometimes, to make him wish it were not his, + But it will not hold all. Things that are dead + Are best without it, and they own their death + By virtue of their dying. Let them go, -- + But think you not the world is ashes yet, + And you have all the fire. The world is here + Today, and it may not be gone tomorrow; + For there are millions, and there may be more, + To make in turn a various estimation + Of its old ills and ashes, and the traps + Of its apparent wrath. Many with ears + That hear not yet, shall have ears given to them, + And then they shall hear strangely. Many with eyes + That are incredulous of the Mystery + Shall yet be driven to feel, and then to read + Where language has an end and is a veil, + Not woven of our words. Many that hate + Their kind are soon to know that without love + Their faith is but the perjured name of nothing. + I that have done some hating in my time + See now no time for hate; I that have left, + Fading behind me like familiar lights + That are to shine no more for my returning, + Home, friends, and honors, -- I that have lost all else + For wisdom, and the wealth of it, say now + To you that out of wisdom has come love, + That measures and is of itself the measure + Of works and hope and faith. Your longest hours + Are not so long that you may torture them + And harass not yourselves; and the last days + Are on the way that you prepare for them, + And was prepared for you, here in a world + Where you have sinned and suffered, striven and seen. + If you be not so hot for counting them + Before they come that you consume yourselves, + Peace may attend you all in these last days -- + And me, as well as you. Yes, even in Rome. + Well, I have talked and rested, though I fear + My rest has not been yours; in which event, + Forgive one who is only seven leagues + From Caesar. When I told you I should come, + I did not see myself the criminal + You contemplate, for seeing beyond the Law + That which the Law saw not. But this, indeed, + Was good of you, and I shall not forget; + No, I shall not forget you came so far + To meet a man so dangerous. Well, farewell. + They come to tell me I am going now -- + With them. I hope that we shall meet again, + But none may say what he shall find in Rome. + + + + + Demos I + + All you that are enamored of my name + And least intent on what most I require, + Beware; for my design and your desire, + Deplorably, are not as yet the same. + Beware, I say, the failure and the shame + Of losing that for which you now aspire + So blindly, and of hazarding entire + The gift that I was bringing when I came. + + Give as I will, I cannot give you sight + Whereby to see that with you there are some + To lead you, and be led. But they are dumb + Before the wrangling and the shrill delight + Of your deliverance that has not come, + And shall not, if I fail you -- as I might. + + + + + Demos II + + So little have you seen of what awaits + Your fevered glimpse of a democracy + Confused and foiled with an equality + Not equal to the envy it creates, + That you see not how near you are the gates + Of an old king who listens fearfully + To you that are outside and are to be + The noisy lords of imminent estates. + + Rather be then your prayer that you shall have + Your kingdom undishonored. Having all, + See not the great among you for the small, + But hear their silence; for the few shall save + The many, or the many are to fall -- + Still to be wrangling in a noisy grave. + + + + + The Flying Dutchman + + Unyielding in the pride of his defiance, + Afloat with none to serve or to command, + Lord of himself at last, and all by Science, + He seeks the Vanished Land. + + Alone, by the one light of his one thought, + He steers to find the shore from which we came, -- + Fearless of in what coil he may be caught + On seas that have no name. + + Into the night he sails; and after night + There is a dawning, though there be no sun; + Wherefore, with nothing but himself in sight, + Unsighted, he sails on. + + At last there is a lifting of the cloud + Between the flood before him and the sky; + And then -- though he may curse the Power aloud + That has no power to die -- + + He steers himself away from what is haunted + By the old ghost of what has been before, -- + Abandoning, as always, and undaunted, + One fog-walled island more. + + + + + Tact + + Observant of the way she told + So much of what was true, + No vanity could long withhold + Regard that was her due: + She spared him the familiar guile, + So easily achieved, + That only made a man to smile + And left him undeceived. + + Aware that all imagining + Of more than what she meant + Would urge an end of everything, + He stayed; and when he went, + They parted with a merry word + That was to him as light + As any that was ever heard + Upon a starry night. + + She smiled a little, knowing well + That he would not remark + The ruins of a day that fell + Around her in the dark: + He saw no ruins anywhere, + Nor fancied there were scars + On anyone who lingered there, + Alone below the stars. + + + + + On the Way + + (Philadelphia, 1794) + +Note. -- The following imaginary dialogue between Alexander Hamilton +and Aaron Burr, which is not based upon any specific incident +in American history, may be supposed to have occurred a few months previous +to Hamilton's retirement from Washington's Cabinet in 1795 +and a few years before the political ingenuities of Burr -- +who has been characterized, without much exaggeration, +as the inventor of American politics -- began to be conspicuously formidable +to the Federalists. These activities on the part of Burr resulted, +as the reader will remember, in the Burr-Jefferson tie for the Presidency +in 1800, and finally in the Burr-Hamilton duel at Weehawken in 1804. + + + + BURR + + Hamilton, if he rides you down, remember + That I was here to speak, and so to save + Your fabric from catastrophe. That's good; + For I perceive that you observe him also. + A President, a-riding of his horse, + May dust a General and be forgiven; + But why be dusted -- when we're all alike, + All equal, and all happy. Here he comes -- + And there he goes. And we, by your new patent, + Would seem to be two kings here by the wayside, + With our two hats off to his Excellency. + Why not his Majesty, and done with it? + Forgive me if I shook your meditation, + But you that weld our credit should have eyes + To see what's coming. Bury me first if -I- do. + + + HAMILTON + + There's always in some pocket of your brain + A care for me; wherefore my gratitude + For your attention is commensurate + With your concern. Yes, Burr, we are two kings; + We are as royal as two ditch-diggers; + But owe me not your sceptre. These are the days + When first a few seem all; but if we live, + We may again be seen to be the few + That we have always been. These are the days + When men forget the stars, and are forgotten. + + + BURR + + But why forget them? They're the same that winked + Upon the world when Alcibiades + Cut off his dog's tail to induce distinction. + There are dogs yet, and Alcibiades + Is not forgotten. + + + HAMILTON + + Yes, there are dogs enough, + God knows; and I can hear them in my dreams. + + + BURR + + Never a doubt. But what you hear the most + Is your new music, something out of tune + With your intention. How in the name of Cain, + I seem to hear you ask, are men to dance, + When all men are musicians. Tell me that, + I hear you saying, and I'll tell you the name + Of Samson's mother. But why shroud yourself + Before the coffin comes? For all you know, + The tree that is to fall for your last house + Is now a sapling. You may have to wait + So long as to be sorry; though I doubt it, + For you are not at home in your new Eden + Where chilly whispers of a likely frost + Accumulate already in the air. + I think a touch of ermine, Hamilton, + Would be for you in your autumnal mood + A pleasant sort of warmth along the shoulders. + + + HAMILTON + + If so it is you think, you may as well + Give over thinking. We are done with ermine. + What I fear most is not the multitude, + But those who are to loop it with a string + That has one end in France and one end here. + I'm not so fortified with observation + That I could swear that more than half a score + Among us who see lightning see that ruin + Is not the work of thunder. Since the world + Was ordered, there was never a long pause + For caution between doing and undoing. + + + BURR + + Go on, sir; my attention is a trap + Set for the catching of all compliments + To Monticello, and all else abroad + That has a name or an identity. + + + HAMILTON + + I leave to you the names -- there are too many; + Yet one there is to sift and hold apart, + As now I see. There comes at last a glimmer + That is not always clouded, or too late. + But I was near and young, and had the reins + To play with while he manned a team so raw + That only God knows where the end had been + Of all that riding without Washington. + There was a nation in the man who passed us, + If there was not a world. I may have driven + Since then some restive horses, and alone, + And through a splashing of abundant mud; + But he who made the dust that sets you on + To coughing, made the road. Now it seems dry, + And in a measure safe. + + + BURR + + Here's a new tune + From Hamilton. Has your caution all at once, + And over night, grown till it wrecks the cradle? + I have forgotten what my father said + When I was born, but there's a rustling of it + Among my memories, and it makes a noise + About as loud as all that I have held + And fondled heretofore of your same caution. + But that's affairs, not feelings. If our friends + Guessed half we say of them, our enemies + Would itch in our friends' jackets. Howsoever, + The world is of a sudden on its head, + And all are spilled -- unless you cling alone + With Washington. Ask Adams about that. + + + HAMILTON + + We'll not ask Adams about anything. + We fish for lizards when we choose to ask + For what we know already is not coming, + And we must eat the answer. Where's the use + Of asking when this man says everything, + With all his tongues of silence? + + + BURR + + I dare say. + I dare say, but I won't. One of those tongues + I'll borrow for the nonce. He'll never miss it. + We mean his Western Majesty, King George. + + + HAMILTON + + I mean the man who rode by on his horse. + I'll beg of you the meed of your indulgence + If I should say this planet may have done + A deal of weary whirling when at last, + If ever, Time shall aggregate again + A majesty like his that has no name. + + + BURR + + Then you concede his Majesty? That's good, + And what of yours? Here are two majesties. + Favor the Left a little, Hamilton, + Or you'll be floundering in the ditch that waits + For riders who forget where they are riding. + If we and France, as you anticipate, + Must eat each other, what Caesar, if not yourself, + Do you see for the master of the feast? + There may be a place waiting on your head + For laurel thick as Nero's. You don't know. + I have not crossed your glory, though I might + If I saw thrones at auction. + + + HAMILTON + + Yes, you might. + If war is on the way, I shall be -- here; + And I've no vision of your distant heels. + + + BURR + + I see that I shall take an inference + To bed with me to-night to keep me warm. + I thank you, Hamilton, and I approve + Your fealty to the aggregated greatness + Of him you lean on while he leans on you. + + + HAMILTON + + This easy phrasing is a game of yours + That you may win to lose. I beg your pardon, + But you that have the sight will not employ + The will to see with it. If you did so, + There might be fewer ditches dug for others + In your perspective; and there might be fewer + Contemporary motes of prejudice + Between you and the man who made the dust. + Call him a genius or a gentleman, + A prophet or a builder, or what not, + But hold your disposition off the balance, + And weigh him in the light. Once (I believe + I tell you nothing new to your surmise, + Or to the tongues of towns and villages) + I nourished with an adolescent fancy -- + Surely forgivable to you, my friend -- + An innocent and amiable conviction + That I was, by the grace of honest fortune, + A savior at his elbow through the war, + Where I might have observed, more than I did, + Patience and wholesome passion. I was there, + And for such honor I gave nothing worse + Than some advice at which he may have smiled. + I must have given a modicum besides, + Or the rough interval between those days + And these would never have made for me my friends, + Or enemies. I should be something somewhere -- + I say not what -- but I should not be here + If he had not been there. Possibly, too, + You might not -- or that Quaker with his cane. + + + BURR + + Possibly, too, I should. When the Almighty + Rides a white horse, I fancy we shall know it. + + + HAMILTON + + It was a man, Burr, that was in my mind; + No god, or ghost, or demon -- only a man: + A man whose occupation is the need + Of those who would not feel it if it bit them; + And one who shapes an age while he endures + The pin pricks of inferiorities; + A cautious man, because he is but one; + A lonely man, because he is a thousand. + No marvel you are slow to find in him + The genius that is one spark or is nothing: + His genius is a flame that he must hold + So far above the common heads of men + That they may view him only through the mist + Of their defect, and wonder what he is. + It seems to me the mystery that is in him + That makes him only more to me a man + Than any other I have ever known. + + + BURR + + I grant you that his worship is a man. + I'm not so much at home with mysteries, + May be, as you -- so leave him with his fire: + God knows that I shall never put it out. + He has not made a cripple of himself + In his pursuit of me, though I have heard + His condescension honors me with parts. + Parts make a whole, if we've enough of them; + And once I figured a sufficiency + To be at least an atom in the annals + Of your republic. But I must have erred. + + + HAMILTON + + You smile as if your spirit lived at ease + With error. I should not have named it so, + Failing assent from you; nor, if I did, + Should I be so complacent in my skill + To comb the tangled language of the people + As to be sure of anything in these days. + Put that much in account with modesty. + + + BURR + + What in the name of Ahab, Hamilton, + Have you, in the last region of your dreaming, + To do with "people"? You may be the devil + In your dead-reckoning of what reefs and shoals + Are waiting on the progress of our ship + Unless you steer it, but you'll find it irksome + Alone there in the stern; and some warm day + There'll be an inland music in the rigging, + And afterwards on deck. I'm not affined + Or favored overmuch at Monticello, + But there's a mighty swarming of new bees + About the premises, and all have wings. + If you hear something buzzing before long, + Be thoughtful how you strike, remembering also + There was a fellow Naboth had a vineyard, + And Ahab cut his hair off and went softly. + + + HAMILTON + + I don't remember that he cut his hair off. + + + BURR + + Somehow I rather fancy that he did. + If so, it's in the Book; and if not so, + He did the rest, and did it handsomely. + + + HAMILTON + + Commend yourself to Ahab and his ways + If they inveigle you to emulation; + But where, if I may ask it, are you tending + With your invidious wielding of the Scriptures? + You call to mind an eminent archangel + Who fell to make him famous. Would you fall + So far as he, to be so far remembered? + + + BURR + + Before I fall or rise, or am an angel, + I shall acquaint myself a little further + With our new land's new language, which is not -- + Peace to your dreams -- an idiom to your liking. + I'm wondering if a man may always know + How old a man may be at thirty-seven; + I wonder likewise if a prettier time + Could be decreed for a good man to vanish + Than about now for you, before you fade, + And even your friends are seeing that you have had + Your cup too full for longer mortal triumph. + Well, you have had enough, and had it young; + And the old wine is nearer to the lees + Than you are to the work that you are doing. + + + HAMILTON + + When does this philological excursion + Into new lands and languages begin? + + + BURR + + Anon -- that is, already. Only Fortune + Gave me this afternoon the benefaction + Of your blue back, which I for love pursued, + And in pursuing may have saved your life -- + Also the world a pounding piece of news: + Hamilton bites the dust of Washington, + Or rather of his horse. For you alone, + Or for your fame, I'd wish it might have been so. + + + HAMILTON + + Not every man among us has a friend + So jealous for the other's fame. How long + Are you to diagnose the doubtful case + Of Demos -- and what for? Have you a sword + For some new Damocles? If it's for me, + I have lost all official appetite, + And shall have faded, after January, + Into the law. I'm going to New York. + + + BURR + + No matter where you are, one of these days + I shall come back to you and tell you something. + This Demos, I have heard, has in his wrist + A pulse that no two doctors have as yet + Counted and found the same, and in his mouth + A tongue that has the like alacrity + For saying or not for saying what most it is + That pullulates in his ignoble mind. + One of these days I shall appear again, + To tell you more of him and his opinions; + I shall not be so long out of your sight, + Or take myself so far, that I may not, + Like Alcibiades, come back again. + He went away to Phrygia, and fared ill. + + + HAMILTON + + There's an example in Themistocles: + He went away to Persia, and fared well. + + + BURR + + So? Must I go so far? And if so, why so? + I had not planned it so. Is this the road + I take? If so, farewell. + + + HAMILTON + + Quite so. Farewell. + + + + + John Brown + + Though for your sake I would not have you now + So near to me tonight as now you are, + God knows how much a stranger to my heart + Was any cold word that I may have written; + And you, poor woman that I made my wife, + You have had more of loneliness, I fear, + Than I -- though I have been the most alone, + Even when the most attended. So it was + God set the mark of his inscrutable + Necessity on one that was to grope, + And serve, and suffer, and withal be glad + For what was his, and is, and is to be, + When his old bones, that are a burden now, + Are saying what the man who carried them + Had not the power to say. Bones in a grave, + Cover them as they will with choking earth, + May shout the truth to men who put them there, + More than all orators. And so, my dear, + Since you have cheated wisdom for the sake + Of sorrow, let your sorrow be for you, + This last of nights before the last of days, + The lying ghost of what there is of me + That is the most alive. There is no death + For me in what they do. Their death it is + They should heed most when the sun comes again + To make them solemn. There are some I know + Whose eyes will hardly see their occupation, + For tears in them -- and all for one old man; + For some of them will pity this old man, + Who took upon himself the work of God + Because he pitied millions. That will be + For them, I fancy, their compassionate + Best way of saying what is best in them + To say; for they can say no more than that, + And they can do no more than what the dawn + Of one more day shall give them light enough + To do. But there are many days to be, + And there are many men to give their blood, + As I gave mine for them. May they come soon! + + May they come soon, I say. And when they come, + May all that I have said unheard be heard, + Proving at last, or maybe not -- no matter -- + What sort of madness was the part of me + That made me strike, whether I found the mark + Or missed it. Meanwhile, I've a strange content, + A patience, and a vast indifference + To what men say of me and what men fear + To say. There was a work to be begun, + And when the Voice, that I have heard so long, + Announced as in a thousand silences + An end of preparation, I began + The coming work of death which is to be, + That life may be. There is no other way + Than the old way of war for a new land + That will not know itself and is tonight + A stranger to itself, and to the world + A more prodigious upstart among states + Than I was among men, and so shall be + Till they are told and told, and told again; + For men are children, waiting to be told, + And most of them are children all their lives. + The good God in his wisdom had them so, + That now and then a madman or a seer + May shake them out of their complacency + And shame them into deeds. The major file + See only what their fathers may have seen, + Or may have said they saw when they saw nothing. + I do not say it matters what they saw. + Now and again to some lone soul or other + God speaks, and there is hanging to be done, -- + As once there was a burning of our bodies + Alive, albeit our souls were sorry fuel. + But now the fires are few, and we are poised + Accordingly, for the state's benefit, + A few still minutes between heaven and earth. + The purpose is, when they have seen enough + Of what it is that they are not to see, + To pluck me as an unripe fruit of treason, + And then to fling me back to the same earth + Of which they are, as I suppose, the flower -- + Not given to know the riper fruit that waits + For a more comprehensive harvesting. + + Yes, may they come, and soon. Again I say, + May they come soon! -- before too many of them + Shall be the bloody cost of our defection. + When hell waits on the dawn of a new state, + Better it were that hell should not wait long, -- + Or so it is I see it who should see + As far or farther into time tonight + Than they who talk and tremble for me now, + Or wish me to those everlasting fires + That are for me no fear. Too many fires + Have sought me out and seared me to the bone -- + Thereby, for all I know, to temper me + For what was mine to do. If I did ill + What I did well, let men say I was mad; + Or let my name for ever be a question + That will not sleep in history. What men say + I was will cool no cannon, dull no sword, + Invalidate no truth. Meanwhile, I was; + And the long train is lighted that shall burn, + Though floods of wrath may drench it, and hot feet + May stamp it for a slight time into smoke + That shall blaze up again with growing speed, + Until at last a fiery crash will come + To cleanse and shake a wounded hemisphere, + And heal it of a long malignity + That angry time discredits and disowns. + Tonight there are men saying many things; + And some who see life in the last of me + Will answer first the coming call to death; + For death is what is coming, and then life. + I do not say again for the dull sake + Of speech what you have heard me say before, + But rather for the sake of all I am, + And all God made of me. A man to die + As I do must have done some other work + Than man's alone. I was not after glory, + But there was glory with me, like a friend, + Throughout those crippling years when friends were few, + And fearful to be known by their own names + When mine was vilified for their approval. + Yet friends they are, and they did what was given + Their will to do; they could have done no more. + I was the one man mad enough, it seems, + To do my work; and now my work is over. + And you, my dear, are not to mourn for me, + Or for your sons, more than a soul should mourn + In Paradise, done with evil and with earth. + There is not much of earth in what remains + For you; and what there may be left of it + For your endurance you shall have at last + In peace, without the twinge of any fear + For my condition; for I shall be done + With plans and actions that have heretofore + Made your days long and your nights ominous + With darkness and the many distances + That were between us. When the silence comes, + I shall in faith be nearer to you then + Than I am now in fact. What you see now + Is only the outside of an old man, + Older than years have made him. Let him die, + And let him be a thing for little grief. + There was a time for service, and he served; + And there is no more time for anything + But a short gratefulness to those who gave + Their scared allegiance to an enterprise + That has the name of treason -- which will serve + As well as any other for the present. + There are some deeds of men that have no names, + And mine may like as not be one of them. + I am not looking far for names tonight. + The King of Glory was without a name + Until men gave him one; yet there He was, + Before we found Him and affronted Him + With numerous ingenuities of evil, + Of which one, with His aid, is to be swept + And washed out of the world with fire and blood. + + Once I believed it might have come to pass + With a small cost of blood; but I was dreaming -- + Dreaming that I believed. The Voice I heard + When I left you behind me in the north, -- + To wait there and to wonder and grow old + Of loneliness, -- told only what was best, + And with a saving vagueness, I should know + Till I knew more. And had I known even then -- + After grim years of search and suffering, + So many of them to end as they began -- + After my sickening doubts and estimations + Of plans abandoned and of new plans vain -- + After a weary delving everywhere + For men with every virtue but the Vision -- + Could I have known, I say, before I left you + That summer morning, all there was to know -- + Even unto the last consuming word + That would have blasted every mortal answer + As lightning would annihilate a leaf, + I might have trembled on that summer morning; + I might have wavered; and I might have failed. + + And there are many among men today + To say of me that I had best have wavered. + So has it been, so shall it always be, + For those of us who give ourselves to die + Before we are so parcelled and approved + As to be slaughtered by authority. + We do not make so much of what they say + As they of what our folly says of us; + They give us hardly time enough for that, + And thereby we gain much by losing little. + Few are alive to-day with less to lose + Than I who tell you this, or more to gain; + And whether I speak as one to be destroyed + For no good end outside his own destruction, + Time shall have more to say than men shall hear + Between now and the coming of that harvest + Which is to come. Before it comes, I go -- + By the short road that mystery makes long + For man's endurance of accomplishment. + I shall have more to say when I am dead. + + + + + The False Gods + + "We are false and evanescent, and aware of our deceit, + From the straw that is our vitals to the clay that is our feet. + You may serve us if you must, and you shall have your wage of ashes, -- + Though arrears due thereafter may be hard for you to meet. + + "You may swear that we are solid, you may say that we are strong, + But we know that we are neither and we say that you are wrong; + You may find an easy worship in acclaiming our indulgence, + But your large admiration of us now is not for long. + + "If your doom is to adore us with a doubt that's never still, + And you pray to see our faces -- pray in earnest, and you will. + You may gaze at us and live, and live assured of our confusion: + For the False Gods are mortal, and are made for you to kill. + + "And you may as well observe, while apprehensively at ease + With an Art that's inorganic and is anything you please, + That anon your newest ruin may lie crumbling unregarded, + Like an old shrine forgotten in a forest of new trees. + + "Howsoever like no other be the mode you may employ, + There's an order in the ages for the ages to enjoy; + Though the temples you are shaping and the passions you are singing + Are a long way from Athens and a longer way from Troy. + + "When we promise more than ever of what never shall arrive, + And you seem a little more than ordinarily alive, + Make a note that you are sure you understand our obligations -- + For there's grief always auditing where two and two are five. + + "There was this for us to say and there was this for you to know, + Though it humbles and it hurts us when we have to tell you so. + If you doubt the only truth in all our perjured composition, + May the True Gods attend you and forget us when we go." + + + + + Archibald's Example + + Old Archibald, in his eternal chair, + Where trespassers, whatever their degree, + Were soon frowned out again, was looking off + Across the clover when he said to me: + + "My green hill yonder, where the sun goes down + Without a scratch, was once inhabited + By trees that injured him -- an evil trash + That made a cage, and held him while he bled. + + "Gone fifty years, I see them as they were + Before they fell. They were a crooked lot + To spoil my sunset, and I saw no time + In fifty years for crooked things to rot. + + "Trees, yes; but not a service or a joy + To God or man, for they were thieves of light. + So down they came. Nature and I looked on, + And we were glad when they were out of sight. + + "Trees are like men, sometimes; and that being so, + So much for that." He twinkled in his chair, + And looked across the clover to the place + That he remembered when the trees were there. + + + + + London Bridge + + "Do I hear them? Yes, I hear the children singing -- and what of it? + Have you come with eyes afire to find me now and ask me that? + If I were not their father and if you were not their mother, + We might believe they made a noise. . . . What are you -- driving at!" + + "Well, be glad that you can hear them, and be glad they are so near us, -- + For I have heard the stars of heaven, and they were nearer still. + All within an hour it is that I have heard them calling, + And though I pray for them to cease, I know they never will; + For their music on my heart, though you may freeze it, will fall always, + Like summer snow that never melts upon a mountain-top. + Do you hear them? Do you hear them overhead -- the children -- singing? + Do you hear the children singing? . . . God, will you make them stop!" + + "And what now in his holy name have you to do with mountains? + We're back to town again, my dear, and we've a dance tonight. + Frozen hearts and falling music? Snow and stars, and -- what the devil! + Say it over to me slowly, and be sure you have it right." + + "God knows if I be right or wrong in saying what I tell you, + Or if I know the meaning any more of what I say. + All I know is, it will kill me if I try to keep it hidden -- + Well, I met him. . . . Yes, I met him, and I talked with him -- today." + + "You met him? Did you meet the ghost of someone you had poisoned, + Long ago, before I knew you for the woman that you are? + Take a chair; and don't begin your stories always in the middle. + Was he man, or was he demon? Anyhow, you've gone too far + To go back, and I'm your servant. I'm the lord, but you're the master. + Now go on with what you know, for I'm excited." + + "Do you mean -- + Do you mean to make me try to think that you know less than I do?" + + "I know that you foreshadow the beginning of a scene. + Pray be careful, and as accurate as if the doors of heaven + Were to swing or to stay bolted from now on for evermore." + + "Do you conceive, with all your smooth contempt of every feeling, + Of hiding what you know and what you must have known before? + Is it worth a woman's torture to stand here and have you smiling, + With only your poor fetish of possession on your side? + No thing but one is wholly sure, and that's not one to scare me; + When I meet it I may say to God at last that I have tried. + And yet, for all I know, or all I dare believe, my trials + Henceforward will be more for you to bear than are your own; + And you must give me keys of yours to rooms I have not entered. + Do you see me on your threshold all my life, and there alone? + Will you tell me where you see me in your fancy -- when it leads you + Far enough beyond the moment for a glance at the abyss?" + + "Will you tell me what intrinsic and amazing sort of nonsense + You are crowding on the patience of the man who gives you -- this? + Look around you and be sorry you're not living in an attic, + With a civet and a fish-net, and with you to pay the rent. + I say words that you can spell without the use of all your letters; + And I grant, if you insist, that I've a guess at what you meant." + + "Have I told you, then, for nothing, that I met him? Are you trying + To be merry while you try to make me hate you?" + + "Think again, + My dear, before you tell me, in a language unbecoming + To a lady, what you plan to tell me next. If I complain, + If I seem an atom peevish at the preference you mention -- + Or imply, to be precise -- you may believe, or you may not, + That I'm a trifle more aware of what he wants than you are. + But I shouldn't throw that at you. Make believe that I forgot. + Make believe that he's a genius, if you like, -- but in the meantime + Don't go back to rocking-horses. There, there, there, now." + + "Make believe! + When you see me standing helpless on a plank above a whirlpool, + Do I drown, or do I hear you when you say it? Make believe? + How much more am I to say or do for you before I tell you + That I met him! What's to follow now may be for you to choose. + Do you hear me? Won't you listen? It's an easy thing to listen. . . ." + + "And it's easy to be crazy when there's everything to lose." + + "If at last you have a notion that I mean what I am saying, + Do I seem to tell you nothing when I tell you I shall try? + If you save me, and I lose him -- I don't know -- it won't much matter. + I dare say that I've lied enough, but now I do not lie." + + "Do you fancy me the one man who has waited and said nothing + While a wife has dragged an old infatuation from a tomb? + Give the thing a little air and it will vanish into ashes. + There you are -- piff! presto!" + + "When I came into this room, + It seemed as if I saw the place, and you there at your table, + As you are now at this moment, for the last time in my life; + And I told myself before I came to find you, `I shall tell him, + If I can, what I have learned of him since I became his wife.' + And if you say, as I've no doubt you will before I finish, + That you have tried unceasingly, with all your might and main, + To teach me, knowing more than I of what it was I needed, + Don't think, with all you may have thought, that you have tried in vain; + For you have taught me more than hides in all the shelves of knowledge + Of how little you found that's in me and was in me all along. + I believed, if I intruded nothing on you that I cared for, + I'd be half as much as horses, -- and it seems that I was wrong; + I believed there was enough of earth in me, with all my nonsense + Over things that made you sleepy, to keep something still awake; + But you taught me soon to read my book, and God knows I have read it -- + Ages longer than an angel would have read it for your sake. + I have said that you must open other doors than I have entered, + But I wondered while I said it if I might not be obscure. + Is there anything in all your pedigrees and inventories + With a value more elusive than a dollar's? Are you sure + That if I starve another year for you I shall be stronger + To endure another like it -- and another -- till I'm dead?" + + "Has your tame cat sold a picture? -- or more likely had a windfall? + Or for God's sake, what's broke loose? Have you a bee-hive in your head? + A little more of this from you will not be easy hearing. + Do you know that? Understand it, if you do; for if you won't. . . . + What the devil are you saying! Make believe you never said it, + And I'll say I never heard it. . . . Oh, you. . . . If you. . . ." + + "If I don't?" + + "There are men who say there's reason hidden somewhere in a woman, + But I doubt if God himself remembers where the key was hung." + + "He may not; for they say that even God himself is growing. + I wonder if he makes believe that he is growing young; + I wonder if he makes believe that women who are giving + All they have in holy loathing to a stranger all their lives + Are the wise ones who build houses in the Bible. . . ." + + "Stop -- you devil!" + + ". . . Or that souls are any whiter when their bodies are called wives. + If a dollar's worth of gold will hoop the walls of hell together, + Why need heaven be such a ruin of a place that never was? + And if at last I lied my starving soul away to nothing, + Are you sure you might not miss it? Have you come to such a pass + That you would have me longer in your arms if you discovered + That I made you into someone else. . . . Oh! . . . Well, there are + worse ways. + But why aim it at my feet -- unless you fear you may be sorry. . . . + There are many days ahead of you." + + "I do not see those days." + + "I can see them. Granted even I am wrong, there are the children. + And are they to praise their father for his insight if we die? + Do you hear them? Do you hear them overhead -- the children -- singing? + Do you hear them? Do you hear the children?" + + "Damn the children!" + + "Why? + What have THEY done? . . . Well, then, -- do it. . . . Do it now, + and have it over." + + "Oh, you devil! . . . Oh, you. . . ." + + "No, I'm not a devil, I'm a prophet -- + One who sees the end already of so much that one end more + Would have now the small importance of one other small illusion, + Which in turn would have a welcome where the rest have gone before. + But if I were you, my fancy would look on a little farther + For the glimpse of a release that may be somewhere still in sight. + Furthermore, you must remember those two hundred invitations + For the dancing after dinner. We shall have to shine tonight. + We shall dance, and be as happy as a pair of merry spectres, + On the grave of all the lies that we shall never have to tell; + We shall dance among the ruins of the tomb of our endurance, + And I have not a doubt that we shall do it very well. + There! -- I'm glad you've put it back; for I don't like it. + Shut the drawer now. + No -- no -- don't cancel anything. I'll dance until I drop. + I can't walk yet, but I'm going to. . . . Go away somewhere, + and leave me. . . . + Oh, you children! Oh, you children! . . . God, will they never stop!" + + + + + Tasker Norcross + + "Whether all towns and all who live in them -- + So long as they be somewhere in this world + That we in our complacency call ours -- + Are more or less the same, I leave to you. + I should say less. Whether or not, meanwhile, + We've all two legs -- and as for that, we haven't -- + There were three kinds of men where I was born: + The good, the not so good, and Tasker Norcross. + Now there are two kinds." + + "Meaning, as I divine, + Your friend is dead," I ventured. + + Ferguson, + Who talked himself at last out of the world + He censured, and is therefore silent now, + Agreed indifferently: "My friends are dead -- + Or most of them." + + "Remember one that isn't," + I said, protesting. "Honor him for his ears; + Treasure him also for his understanding." + Ferguson sighed, and then talked on again: + "You have an overgrown alacrity + For saying nothing much and hearing less; + And I've a thankless wonder, at the start, + How much it is to you that I shall tell + What I have now to say of Tasker Norcross, + And how much to the air that is around you. + But given a patience that is not averse + To the slow tragedies of haunted men -- + Horrors, in fact, if you've a skilful eye + To know them at their firesides, or out walking, --" + + "Horrors," I said, "are my necessity; + And I would have them, for their best effect, + Always out walking." + + Ferguson frowned at me: + "The wisest of us are not those who laugh + Before they know. Most of us never know -- + Or the long toil of our mortality + Would not be done. Most of us never know -- + And there you have a reason to believe + In God, if you may have no other. Norcross, + Or so I gather of his infirmity, + Was given to know more than he should have known, + And only God knows why. See for yourself + An old house full of ghosts of ancestors, + Who did their best, or worst, and having done it, + Died honorably; and each with a distinction + That hardly would have been for him that had it, + Had honor failed him wholly as a friend. + Honor that is a friend begets a friend. + Whether or not we love him, still we have him; + And we must live somehow by what we have, + Or then we die. If you say chemistry, + Then you must have your molecules in motion, + And in their right abundance. Failing either, + You have not long to dance. Failing a friend, + A genius, or a madness, or a faith + Larger than desperation, you are here + For as much longer than you like as may be. + Imagining now, by way of an example, + Myself a more or less remembered phantom -- + Again, I should say less -- how many times + A day should I come back to you? No answer. + Forgive me when I seem a little careless, + But we must have examples, or be lucid + Without them; and I question your adherence + To such an undramatic narrative + As this of mine, without the personal hook." + + "A time is given in Ecclesiastes + For divers works," I told him. "Is there one + For saying nothing in return for nothing? + If not, there should be." I could feel his eyes, + And they were like two cold inquiring points + Of a sharp metal. When I looked again, + To see them shine, the cold that I had felt + Was gone to make way for a smouldering + Of lonely fire that I, as I knew then, + Could never quench with kindness or with lies. + I should have done whatever there was to do + For Ferguson, yet I could not have mourned + In honesty for once around the clock + The loss of him, for my sake or for his, + Try as I might; nor would his ghost approve, + Had I the power and the unthinking will + To make him tread again without an aim + The road that was behind him -- and without + The faith, or friend, or genius, or the madness + That he contended was imperative. + + After a silence that had been too long, + "It may be quite as well we don't," he said; + "As well, I mean, that we don't always say it. + You know best what I mean, and I suppose + You might have said it better. What was that? + Incorrigible? Am I incorrigible? + Well, it's a word; and a word has its use, + Or, like a man, it will soon have a grave. + It's a good word enough. Incorrigible, + May be, for all I know, the word for Norcross. + See for yourself that house of his again + That he called home: An old house, painted white, + Square as a box, and chillier than a tomb + To look at or to live in. There were trees -- + Too many of them, if such a thing may be -- + Before it and around it. Down in front + There was a road, a railroad, and a river; + Then there were hills behind it, and more trees. + The thing would fairly stare at you through trees, + Like a pale inmate out of a barred window + With a green shade half down; and I dare say + People who passed have said: `There's where he lives. + We know him, but we do not seem to know + That we remember any good of him, + Or any evil that is interesting. + There you have all we know and all we care.' + They might have said it in all sorts of ways; + And then, if they perceived a cat, they might + Or might not have remembered what they said. + The cat might have a personality -- + And maybe the same one the Lord left out + Of Tasker Norcross, who, for lack of it, + Saw the same sun go down year after year; + All which at last was my discovery. + And only mine, so far as evidence + Enlightens one more darkness. You have known + All round you, all your days, men who are nothing -- + Nothing, I mean, so far as time tells yet + Of any other need it has of them + Than to make sextons hardy -- but no less + Are to themselves incalculably something, + And therefore to be cherished. God, you see, + Being sorry for them in their fashioning, + Indemnified them with a quaint esteem + Of self, and with illusions long as life. + You know them well, and you have smiled at them; + And they, in their serenity, may have had + Their time to smile at you. Blessed are they + That see themselves for what they never were + Or were to be, and are, for their defect, + At ease with mirrors and the dim remarks + That pass their tranquil ears." + + "Come, come," said I; + "There may be names in your compendium + That we are not yet all on fire for shouting. + Skin most of us of our mediocrity, + We should have nothing then that we could scratch. + The picture smarts. Cover it, if you please, + And do so rather gently. Now for Norcross." + + Ferguson closed his eyes in resignation, + While a dead sigh came out of him. "Good God!" + He said, and said it only half aloud, + As if he knew no longer now, nor cared, + If one were there to listen: "Have I said nothing -- + Nothing at all -- of Norcross? Do you mean + To patronize him till his name becomes + A toy made out of letters? If a name + Is all you need, arrange an honest column + Of all the people you have ever known + That you have never liked. You'll have enough; + And you'll have mine, moreover. No, not yet. + If I assume too many privileges, + I pay, and I alone, for their assumption; + By which, if I assume a darker knowledge + Of Norcross than another, let the weight + Of my injustice aggravate the load + That is not on your shoulders. When I came + To know this fellow Norcross in his house, + I found him as I found him in the street -- + No more, no less; indifferent, but no better. + `Worse' were not quite the word: he was not bad; + He was not . . . well, he was not anything. + Has your invention ever entertained + The picture of a dusty worm so dry + That even the early bird would shake his head + And fly on farther for another breakfast?" + + "But why forget the fortune of the worm," + I said, "if in the dryness you deplore + Salvation centred and endured? Your Norcross + May have been one for many to have envied." + + "Salvation? Fortune? Would the worm say that? + He might; and therefore I dismiss the worm + With all dry things but one. Figures away, + Do you begin to see this man a little? + Do you begin to see him in the air, + With all the vacant horrors of his outline + For you to fill with more than it will hold? + If so, you needn't crown yourself at once + With epic laurel if you seem to fill it. + Horrors, I say, for in the fires and forks + Of a new hell -- if one were not enough -- + I doubt if a new horror would have held him + With a malignant ingenuity + More to be feared than his before he died. + You smile, as if in doubt. Well, smile again. + Now come into his house, along with me: + The four square sombre things that you see first + Around you are four walls that go as high + As to the ceiling. Norcross knew them well, + And he knew others like them. Fasten to that + With all the claws of your intelligence; + And hold the man before you in his house + As if he were a white rat in a box, + And one that knew himself to be no other. + I tell you twice that he knew all about it, + That you may not forget the worst of all + Our tragedies begin with what we know. + Could Norcross only not have known, I wonder + How many would have blessed and envied him! + Could he have had the usual eye for spots + On others, and for none upon himself, + I smile to ponder on the carriages + That might as well as not have clogged the town + In honor of his end. For there was gold, + You see, though all he needed was a little, + And what he gave said nothing of who gave it. + He would have given it all if in return + There might have been a more sufficient face + To greet him when he shaved. Though you insist + It is the dower, and always, of our degree + Not to be cursed with such invidious insight, + Remember that you stand, you and your fancy, + Now in his house; and since we are together, + See for yourself and tell me what you see. + Tell me the best you see. Make a slight noise + Of recognition when you find a book + That you would not as lief read upside down + As otherwise, for example. If there you fail, + Observe the walls and lead me to the place, + Where you are led. If there you meet a picture + That holds you near it for a longer time + Than you are sorry, you may call it yours, + And hang it in the dark of your remembrance, + Where Norcross never sees. How can he see + That has no eyes to see? And as for music, + He paid with empty wonder for the pangs + Of his infrequent forced endurance of it; + And having had no pleasure, paid no more + For needless immolation, or for the sight + Of those who heard what he was never to hear. + To see them listening was itself enough + To make him suffer; and to watch worn eyes, + On other days, of strangers who forgot + Their sorrows and their failures and themselves + Before a few mysterious odds and ends + Of marble carted from the Parthenon -- + And all for seeing what he was never to see, + Because it was alive and he was dead -- + Here was a wonder that was more profound + Than any that was in fiddles and brass horns. + + "He knew, and in his knowledge there was death. + He knew there was a region all around him + That lay outside man's havoc and affairs, + And yet was not all hostile to their tumult, + Where poets would have served and honored him, + And saved him, had there been anything to save. + But there was nothing, and his tethered range + Was only a small desert. Kings of song + Are not for thrones in deserts. Towers of sound + And flowers of sense are but a waste of heaven + Where there is none to know them from the rocks + And sand-grass of his own monotony + That makes earth less than earth. He could see that, + And he could see no more. The captured light + That may have been or not, for all he cared, + The song that is in sculpture was not his, + But only, to his God-forgotten eyes, + One more immortal nonsense in a world + Where all was mortal, or had best be so, + And so be done with. `Art,' he would have said, + `Is not life, and must therefore be a lie;' + And with a few profundities like that + He would have controverted and dismissed + The benefit of the Greeks. He had heard of them, + As he had heard of his aspiring soul -- + Never to the perceptible advantage, + In his esteem, of either. `Faith,' he said, + Or would have said if he had thought of it, + `Lives in the same house with Philosophy, + Where the two feed on scraps and are forlorn + As orphans after war. He could see stars, + On a clear night, but he had not an eye + To see beyond them. He could hear spoken words, + But had no ear for silence when alone. + He could eat food of which he knew the savor, + But had no palate for the Bread of Life, + That human desperation, to his thinking, + Made famous long ago, having no other. + Now do you see? Do you begin to see?" + + I told him that I did begin to see; + And I was nearer than I should have been + To laughing at his malign inclusiveness, + When I considered that, with all our speed, + We are not laughing yet at funerals. + I see him now as I could see him then, + And I see now that it was good for me, + As it was good for him, that I was quiet; + For Time's eye was on Ferguson, and the shaft + Of its inquiring hesitancy had touched him, + Or so I chose to fancy more than once + Before he told of Norcross. When the word + Of his release (he would have called it so) + Made half an inch of news, there were no tears + That are recorded. Women there may have been + To wish him back, though I should say, not knowing, + The few there were to mourn were not for love, + And were not lovely. Nothing of them, at least, + Was in the meagre legend that I gathered + Years after, when a chance of travel took me + So near the region of his nativity + That a few miles of leisure brought me there; + For there I found a friendly citizen + Who led me to his house among the trees + That were above a railroad and a river. + Square as a box and chillier than a tomb + It was indeed, to look at or to live in -- + All which had I been told. "Ferguson died," + The stranger said, "and then there was an auction. + I live here, but I've never yet been warm. + Remember him? Yes, I remember him. + I knew him -- as a man may know a tree -- + For twenty years. He may have held himself + A little high when he was here, but now . . . + Yes, I remember Ferguson. Oh, yes." + Others, I found, remembered Ferguson, + But none of them had heard of Tasker Norcross. + + + + + A Song at Shannon's + + Two men came out of Shannon's having known + The faces of each other for as long + As they had listened there to an old song, + Sung thinly in a wastrel monotone + By some unhappy night-bird, who had flown + Too many times and with a wing too strong + To save himself, and so done heavy wrong + To more frail elements than his alone. + + Slowly away they went, leaving behind + More light than was before them. Neither met + The other's eyes again or said a word. + Each to his loneliness or to his kind, + Went his own way, and with his own regret, + Not knowing what the other may have heard. + + + + + Souvenir + + A vanished house that for an hour I knew + By some forgotten chance when I was young + Had once a glimmering window overhung + With honeysuckle wet with evening dew. + Along the path tall dusky dahlias grew, + And shadowy hydrangeas reached and swung + Ferociously; and over me, among + The moths and mysteries, a blurred bat flew. + + Somewhere within there were dim presences + Of days that hovered and of years gone by. + I waited, and between their silences + There was an evanescent faded noise; + And though a child, I knew it was the voice + Of one whose occupation was to die. + + + + + Discovery + + We told of him as one who should have soared + And seen for us the devastating light + Whereof there is not either day or night, + And shared with us the glamour of the Word + That fell once upon Amos to record + For men at ease in Zion, when the sight + Of ills obscured aggrieved him and the might + Of Hamath was a warning of the Lord. + + Assured somehow that he would make us wise, + Our pleasure was to wait; and our surprise + Was hard when we confessed the dry return + Of his regret. For we were still to learn + That earth has not a school where we may go + For wisdom, or for more than we may know. + + + + + Firelight + + Ten years together without yet a cloud, + They seek each other's eyes at intervals + Of gratefulness to firelight and four walls + For love's obliteration of the crowd. + Serenely and perennially endowed + And bowered as few may be, their joy recalls + No snake, no sword; and over them there falls + The blessing of what neither says aloud. + + Wiser for silence, they were not so glad + Were she to read the graven tale of lines + On the wan face of one somewhere alone; + Nor were they more content could he have had + Her thoughts a moment since of one who shines + Apart, and would be hers if he had known. + + + + + The New Tenants + + The day was here when it was his to know + How fared the barriers he had built between + His triumph and his enemies unseen, + For them to undermine and overthrow; + And it was his no longer to forego + The sight of them, insidious and serene, + Where they were delving always and had been + Left always to be vicious and to grow. + + And there were the new tenants who had come, + By doors that were left open unawares, + Into his house, and were so much at home + There now that he would hardly have to guess, + By the slow guile of their vindictiveness, + What ultimate insolence would soon be theirs. + + + + + Inferential + + Although I saw before me there the face + Of one whom I had honored among men + The least, and on regarding him again + Would not have had him in another place, + He fitted with an unfamiliar grace + The coffin where I could not see him then + As I had seen him and appraised him when + I deemed him unessential to the race. + + For there was more of him than what I saw. + And there was on me more than the old awe + That is the common genius of the dead. + I might as well have heard him: "Never mind; + If some of us were not so far behind, + The rest of us were not so far ahead." + + + + + The Rat + + As often as he let himself be seen + We pitied him, or scorned him, or deplored + The inscrutable profusion of the Lord + Who shaped as one of us a thing so mean -- + Who made him human when he might have been + A rat, and so been wholly in accord + With any other creature we abhorred + As always useless and not always clean. + + Now he is hiding all alone somewhere, + And in a final hole not ready then; + For now he is among those over there + Who are not coming back to us again. + And we who do the fiction of our share + Say less of rats and rather more of men. + + + + + Rahel to Varnhagen + +Note. -- Rahel Robert and Varnhagen von Ense were married, +after many protestations on her part, in 1814. The marriage -- so far +as he was concerned, at any rate -- appears to have been satisfactory. + + Now you have read them all; or if not all, + As many as in all conscience I should fancy + To be enough. There are no more of them -- + Or none to burn your sleep, or to bring dreams + Of devils. If these are not sufficient, surely + You are a strange young man. I might live on + Alone, and for another forty years, + Or not quite forty, -- are you happier now? -- + Always to ask if there prevailed elsewhere + Another like yourself that would have held + These aged hands as long as you have held them, + Not once observing, for all I can see, + How they are like your mother's. Well, you have read + His letters now, and you have heard me say + That in them are the cinders of a passion + That was my life; and you have not yet broken + Your way out of my house, out of my sight, -- + Into the street. You are a strange young man. + I know as much as that of you, for certain; + And I'm already praying, for your sake, + That you be not too strange. Too much of that + May lead you bye and bye through gloomy lanes + To a sad wilderness, where one may grope + Alone, and always, or until he feels + Ferocious and invisible animals + That wait for men and eat them in the dark. + Why do you sit there on the floor so long, + Smiling at me while I try to be solemn? + Do you not hear it said for your salvation, + When I say truth? Are you, at four and twenty, + So little deceived in us that you interpret + The humor of a woman to be noticed + As her choice between you and Acheron? + Are you so unscathed yet as to infer + That if a woman worries when a man, + Or a man-child, has wet shoes on his feet + She may as well commemorate with ashes + The last eclipse of her tranquillity? + If you look up at me and blink again, + I shall not have to make you tell me lies + To know the letters you have not been reading. + I see now that I may have had for nothing + A most unpleasant shivering in my conscience + When I laid open for your contemplation + The wealth of my worn casket. If I did, + The fault was not yours wholly. Search again + This wreckage we may call for sport a face, + And you may chance upon the price of havoc + That I have paid for a few sorry stones + That shine and have no light -- yet once were stars, + And sparkled on a crown. Little and weak + They seem; and they are cold, I fear, for you. + But they that once were fire for me may not + Be cold again for me until I die; + And only God knows if they may be then. + There is a love that ceases to be love + In being ourselves. How, then, are we to lose it? + You that are sure that you know everything + There is to know of love, answer me that. + Well? . . . You are not even interested. + + Once on a far off time when I was young, + I felt with your assurance, and all through me, + That I had undergone the last and worst + Of love's inventions. There was a boy who brought + The sun with him and woke me up with it, + And that was every morning; every night + I tried to dream of him, but never could, + More than I might have seen in Adam's eyes + Their fond uncertainty when Eve began + The play that all her tireless progeny + Are not yet weary of. One scene of it + Was brief, but was eternal while it lasted; + And that was while I was the happiest + Of an imaginary six or seven, + Somewhere in history but not on earth, + For whom the sky had shaken and let stars + Rain down like diamonds. Then there were clouds, + And a sad end of diamonds; whereupon + Despair came, like a blast that would have brought + Tears to the eyes of all the bears in Finland, + And love was done. That was how much I knew. + Poor little wretch! I wonder where he is + This afternoon. Out of this rain, I hope. + + At last, when I had seen so many days + Dressed all alike, and in their marching order, + Go by me that I would not always count them, + One stopped -- shattering the whole file of Time, + Or so it seemed; and when I looked again, + There was a man. He struck once with his eyes, + And then there was a woman. I, who had come + To wisdom, or to vision, or what you like, + By the old hidden road that has no name, -- + I, who was used to seeing without flying + So much that others fly from without seeing, + Still looked, and was afraid, and looked again. + And after that, when I had read the story + Told in his eyes, and felt within my heart + The bleeding wound of their necessity, + I knew the fear was his. If I had failed him + And flown away from him, I should have lost + Ingloriously my wings in scrambling back, + And found them arms again. If he had struck me + Not only with his eyes but with his hands, + I might have pitied him and hated love, + And then gone mad. I, who have been so strong -- + Why don't you laugh? -- might even have done all that. + I, who have learned so much, and said so much, + And had the commendations of the great + For one who rules herself -- why don't you cry? -- + And own a certain small authority + Among the blind, who see no more than ever, + But like my voice, -- I would have tossed it all + To Tophet for one man; and he was jealous. + I would have wound a snake around my neck + And then have let it bite me till I died, + If my so doing would have made me sure + That one man might have lived; and he was jealous. + I would have driven these hands into a cage + That held a thousand scorpions, and crushed them, + If only by so poisonous a trial + I could have crushed his doubt. I would have wrung + My living blood with mediaeval engines + Out of my screaming flesh, if only that + Would have made one man sure. I would have paid + For him the tiresome price of body and soul, + And let the lash of a tongue-weary town + Fall as it might upon my blistered name; + And while it fell I could have laughed at it, + Knowing that he had found out finally + Where the wrong was. But there was evil in him + That would have made no more of his possession + Than confirmation of another fault; + And there was honor -- if you call it honor + That hoods itself with doubt and wears a crown + Of lead that might as well be gold and fire. + Give it as heavy or as light a name + As any there is that fits. I see myself + Without the power to swear to this or that + That I might be if he had been without it. + Whatever I might have been that I was not, + It only happened that it wasn't so. + Meanwhile, you might seem to be listening: + If you forget yourself and go to sleep, + My treasure, I shall not say this again. + Look up once more into my poor old face, + Where you see beauty, or the Lord knows what, + And say to me aloud what else there is + Than ruins in it that you most admire. + + No, there was never anything like that; + Nature has never fastened such a mask + Of radiant and impenetrable merit + On any woman as you say there is + On this one. Not a mask? I thank you, sir, + But you see more with your determination, + I fear, than with your prudence or your conscience; + And you have never met me with my eyes + In all the mirrors I've made faces at. + No, I shall never call you strange again: + You are the young and inconvincible + Epitome of all blind men since Adam. + May the blind lead the blind, if that be so? + And we shall need no mirrors? You are saying + What most I feared you might. But if the blind, + Or one of them, be not so fortunate + As to put out the eyes of recollection, + She might at last, without her meaning it, + Lead on the other, without his knowing it, + Until the two of them should lose themselves + Among dead craters in a lava-field + As empty as a desert on the moon. + I am not speaking in a theatre, + But in a room so real and so familiar + That sometimes I would wreck it. Then I pause, + Remembering there is a King in Weimar -- + A monarch, and a poet, and a shepherd + Of all who are astray and are outside + The realm where they should rule. I think of him, + And save the furniture; I think of you, + And am forlorn, finding in you the one + To lavish aspirations and illusions + Upon a faded and forsaken house + Where love, being locked alone, was nigh to burning + House and himself together. Yes, you are strange, + To see in such an injured architecture + Room for new love to live in. Are you laughing? + No? Well, you are not crying, as you should be. + Tears, even if they told only gratitude + For your escape, and had no other story, + Were surely more becoming than a smile + For my unwomanly straightforwardness + In seeing for you, through my close gate of years + Your forty ways to freedom. Why do you smile? + And while I'm trembling at my faith in you + In giving you to read this book of danger + That only one man living might have written -- + These letters, which have been a part of me + So long that you may read them all again + As often as you look into my face, + And hear them when I speak to you, and feel them + Whenever you have to touch me with your hand, -- + Why are you so unwilling to be spared? + Why do you still believe in me? But no, + I'll find another way to ask you that. + I wonder if there is another way + That says it better, and means anything. + There is no other way that could be worse? + I was not asking you; it was myself + Alone that I was asking. Why do I dip + For lies, when there is nothing in my well + But shining truth, you say? How do you know? + Truth has a lonely life down where she lives; + And many a time, when she comes up to breathe, + She sinks before we seize her, and makes ripples. + Possibly you may know no more of me + Than a few ripples; and they may soon be gone, + Leaving you then with all my shining truth + Drowned in a shining water; and when you look + You may not see me there, but something else + That never was a woman -- being yourself. + You say to me my truth is past all drowning, + And safe with you for ever? You know all that? + How do you know all that, and who has told you? + You know so much that I'm an atom frightened + Because you know so little. And what is this? + You know the luxury there is in haunting + The blasted thoroughfares of disillusion -- + If that's your name for them -- with only ghosts + For company? You know that when a woman + Is blessed, or cursed, with a divine impatience + (Another name of yours for a bad temper) + She must have one at hand on whom to wreak it + (That's what you mean, whatever the turn you give it), + Sure of a kindred sympathy, and thereby + Effect a mutual calm? You know that wisdom, + Given in vain to make a food for those + Who are without it, will be seen at last, + And even at last only by those who gave it, + As one or more of the forgotten crumbs + That others leave? You know that men's applause + And women's envy savor so much of dust + That I go hungry, having at home no fare + But the same changeless bread that I may swallow + Only with tears and prayers? Who told you that? + You know that if I read, and read alone, + Too many books that no men yet have written, + I may go blind, or worse? You know yourself, + Of all insistent and insidious creatures, + To be the one to save me, and to guard + For me their flaming language? And you know + That if I give much headway to the whim + That's in me never to be quite sure that even + Through all those years of storm and fire I waited + For this one rainy day, I may go on, + And on, and on alone, through smoke and ashes, + To a cold end? You know so dismal much + As that about me? . . . Well, I believe you do. + + + + + Nimmo + + Since you remember Nimmo, and arrive + At such a false and florid and far drawn + Confusion of odd nonsense, I connive + No longer, though I may have led you on. + + So much is told and heard and told again, + So many with his legend are engrossed, + That I, more sorry now than I was then, + May live on to be sorry for his ghost. + + You knew him, and you must have known his eyes, -- + How deep they were, and what a velvet light + Came out of them when anger or surprise, + Or laughter, or Francesca, made them bright. + + No, you will not forget such eyes, I think, -- + And you say nothing of them. Very well. + I wonder if all history's worth a wink, + Sometimes, or if my tale be one to tell. + + For they began to lose their velvet light; + Their fire grew dead without and small within; + And many of you deplored the needless fight + That somewhere in the dark there must have been. + + All fights are needless, when they're not our own, + But Nimmo and Francesca never fought. + Remember that; and when you are alone, + Remember me -- and think what I have thought. + + Now, mind you, I say nothing of what was, + Or never was, or could or could not be: + Bring not suspicion's candle to the glass + That mirrors a friend's face to memory. + + Of what you see, see all, -- but see no more; + For what I show you here will not be there. + The devil has had his way with paint before, + And he's an artist, -- and you needn't stare. + + There was a painter and he painted well: + He'd paint you Daniel in the lions' den, + Beelzebub, Elaine, or William Tell. + I'm coming back to Nimmo's eyes again. + + The painter put the devil in those eyes, + Unless the devil did, and there he stayed; + And then the lady fled from paradise, + And there's your fact. The lady was afraid. + + She must have been afraid, or may have been, + Of evil in their velvet all the while; + But sure as I'm a sinner with a skin, + I'll trust the man as long as he can smile. + + I trust him who can smile and then may live + In my heart's house, where Nimmo is today. + God knows if I have more than men forgive + To tell him; but I played, and I shall pay. + + I knew him then, and if I know him yet, + I know in him, defeated and estranged, + The calm of men forbidden to forget + The calm of women who have loved and changed. + + But there are ways that are beyond our ways, + Or he would not be calm and she be mute, + As one by one their lost and empty days + Pass without even the warmth of a dispute. + + God help us all when women think they see; + God save us when they do. I'm fair; but though + I know him only as he looks to me, + I know him, -- and I tell Francesca so. + + And what of Nimmo? Little would you ask + Of him, could you but see him as I can, + At his bewildered and unfruitful task + Of being what he was born to be -- a man. + + Better forget that I said anything + Of what your tortured memory may disclose; + I know him, and your worst remembering + Would count as much as nothing, I suppose. + + Meanwhile, I trust him; and I know his way + Of trusting me, as always in his youth. + I'm painting here a better man, you say, + Than I, the painter; and you say the truth. + + + + + Peace on Earth + + He took a frayed hat from his head, + And "Peace on Earth" was what he said. + "A morsel out of what you're worth, + And there we have it: Peace on Earth. + Not much, although a little more + Than what there was on earth before. + I'm as you see, I'm Ichabod, -- + But never mind the ways I've trod; + I'm sober now, so help me God." + + I could not pass the fellow by. + "Do you believe in God?" said I; + "And is there to be Peace on Earth?" + + "Tonight we celebrate the birth," + He said, "of One who died for men; + The Son of God, we say. What then? + Your God, or mine? I'd make you laugh + Were I to tell you even half + That I have learned of mine today + Where yours would hardly seem to stay. + Could He but follow in and out + Some anthropoids I know about, + The God to whom you may have prayed + Might see a world He never made." + + "Your words are flowing full," said I; + "But yet they give me no reply; + Your fountain might as well be dry." + + "A wiser One than you, my friend, + Would wait and hear me to the end; + And for His eyes a light would shine + Through this unpleasant shell of mine + That in your fancy makes of me + A Christmas curiosity. + All right, I might be worse than that; + And you might now be lying flat; + I might have done it from behind, + And taken what there was to find. + Don't worry, for I'm not that kind. + `Do I believe in God?' Is that + The price tonight of a new hat? + Has He commanded that His name + Be written everywhere the same? + Have all who live in every place + Identified His hidden face? + Who knows but He may like as well + My story as one you may tell? + And if He show me there be Peace + On Earth, as there be fields and trees + Outside a jail-yard, am I wrong + If now I sing Him a new song? + Your world is in yourself, my friend, + For your endurance to the end; + And all the Peace there is on Earth + Is faith in what your world is worth, + And saying, without any lies, + Your world could not be otherwise." + + "One might say that and then be shot," + I told him; and he said: "Why not?" + I ceased, and gave him rather more + Than he was counting of my store. + "And since I have it, thanks to you, + Don't ask me what I mean to do," + Said he. "Believe that even I + Would rather tell the truth than lie -- + On Christmas Eve. No matter why." + + His unshaved, educated face, + His inextinguishable grace, + And his hard smile, are with me still, + Deplore the vision as I will; + For whatsoever he be at, + So droll a derelict as that + Should have at least another hat. + + + + + Late Summer + + (Alcaics) + + Confused, he found her lavishing feminine + Gold upon clay, and found her inscrutable; + And yet she smiled. Why, then, should horrors + Be as they were, without end, her playthings? + + And why were dead years hungrily telling her + Lies of the dead, who told them again to her? + If now she knew, there might be kindness + Clamoring yet where a faith lay stifled. + + A little faith in him, and the ruinous + Past would be for time to annihilate, + And wash out, like a tide that washes + Out of the sand what a child has drawn there. + + God, what a shining handful of happiness, + Made out of days and out of eternities, + Were now the pulsing end of patience -- + Could he but have what a ghost had stolen! + + What was a man before him, or ten of them, + While he was here alive who could answer them, + And in their teeth fling confirmations + Harder than agates against an egg-shell? + + But now the man was dead, and would come again + Never, though she might honor ineffably + The flimsy wraith of him she conjured + Out of a dream with his wand of absence. + + And if the truth were now but a mummery, + Meriting pride's implacable irony, + So much the worse for pride. Moreover, + Save her or fail, there was conscience always. + + Meanwhile, a few misgivings of innocence, + Imploring to be sheltered and credited, + Were not amiss when she revealed them. + Whether she struggled or not, he saw them. + + Also, he saw that while she was hearing him + Her eyes had more and more of the past in them; + And while he told what cautious honor + Told him was all he had best be sure of, + + He wondered once or twice, inadvertently, + Where shifting winds were driving his argosies, + Long anchored and as long unladen, + Over the foam for the golden chances. + + "If men were not for killing so carelessly, + And women were for wiser endurances," + He said, "we might have yet a world here + Fitter for Truth to be seen abroad in; + + "If Truth were not so strange in her nakedness, + And we were less forbidden to look at it, + We might not have to look." He stared then + Down at the sand where the tide threw forward + + Its cold, unconquered lines, that unceasingly + Foamed against hope, and fell. He was calm enough, + Although he knew he might be silenced + Out of all calm; and the night was coming. + + "I climb for you the peak of his infamy + That you may choose your fall if you cling to it. + No more for me unless you say more. + All you have left of a dream defends you: + + "The truth may be as evil an augury + As it was needful now for the two of us. + We cannot have the dead between us. + Tell me to go, and I go." -- She pondered: + + "What you believe is right for the two of us + Makes it as right that you are not one of us. + If this be needful truth you tell me, + Spare me, and let me have lies hereafter." + + She gazed away where shadows were covering + The whole cold ocean's healing indifference. + No ship was coming. When the darkness + Fell, she was there, and alone, still gazing. + + + + + An Evangelist's Wife + + "Why am I not myself these many days, + You ask? And have you nothing more to ask? + I do you wrong? I do not hear your praise + To God for giving you me to share your task? + + "Jealous -- of Her? Because her cheeks are pink, + And she has eyes? No, not if she had seven. + If you should only steal an hour to think, + Sometime, there might be less to be forgiven. + + "No, you are never cruel. If once or twice + I found you so, I could applaud and sing. + Jealous of -- What? You are not very wise. + Does not the good Book tell you anything? + + "In David's time poor Michal had to go. + Jealous of God? Well, if you like it so." + + + + + The Old King's New Jester + + You that in vain would front the coming order + With eyes that meet forlornly what they must, + And only with a furtive recognition + See dust where there is dust, -- + Be sure you like it always in your faces, + Obscuring your best graces, + Blinding your speech and sight, + Before you seek again your dusty places + Where the old wrong seems right. + + Longer ago than cave-men had their changes + Our fathers may have slain a son or two, + Discouraging a further dialectic + Regarding what was new; + And after their unstudied admonition + Occasional contrition + For their old-fashioned ways + May have reduced their doubts, and in addition + Softened their final days. + + Farther away than feet shall ever travel + Are the vague towers of our unbuilded State; + But there are mightier things than we to lead us, + That will not let us wait. + And we go on with none to tell us whether + Or not we've each a tether + Determining how fast or far we go; + And it is well, since we must go together, + That we are not to know. + + If the old wrong and all its injured glamour + Haunts you by day and gives your night no peace, + You may as well, agreeably and serenely, + Give the new wrong its lease; + For should you nourish a too fervid yearning + For what is not returning, + The vicious and unfused ingredient + May give you qualms -- and one or two concerning + The last of your content. + + + + + Lazarus + + "No, Mary, there was nothing -- not a word. + Nothing, and always nothing. Go again + Yourself, and he may listen -- or at least + Look up at you, and let you see his eyes. + I might as well have been the sound of rain, + A wind among the cedars, or a bird; + Or nothing. Mary, make him look at you; + And even if he should say that we are nothing, + To know that you have heard him will be something. + And yet he loved us, and it was for love + The Master gave him back. Why did He wait + So long before He came? Why did He weep? + I thought He would be glad -- and Lazarus -- + To see us all again as He had left us -- + All as it was, all as it was before." + + Mary, who felt her sister's frightened arms + Like those of someone drowning who had seized her, + Fearing at last they were to fail and sink + Together in this fog-stricken sea of strangeness, + Fought sadly, with bereaved indignant eyes, + To find again the fading shores of home + That she had seen but now could see no longer. + Now she could only gaze into the twilight, + And in the dimness know that he was there, + Like someone that was not. He who had been + Their brother, and was dead, now seemed alive + Only in death again -- or worse than death; + For tombs at least, always until today, + Though sad were certain. There was nothing certain + For man or God in such a day as this; + For there they were alone, and there was he -- + Alone; and somewhere out of Bethany, + The Master -- who had come to them so late, + Only for love of them and then so slowly, + And was for their sake hunted now by men + Who feared Him as they feared no other prey -- + For the world's sake was hidden. "Better the tomb + For Lazarus than life, if this be life," + She thought; and then to Martha, "No, my dear," + She said aloud; "not as it was before. + Nothing is ever as it was before, + Where Time has been. Here there is more than Time; + And we that are so lonely and so far + From home, since he is with us here again, + Are farther now from him and from ourselves + Than we are from the stars. He will not speak + Until the spirit that is in him speaks; + And we must wait for all we are to know, + Or even to learn that we are not to know. + Martha, we are too near to this for knowledge, + And that is why it is that we must wait. + Our friends are coming if we call for them, + And there are covers we'll put over him + To make him warmer. We are too young, perhaps, + To say that we know better what is best + Than he. We do not know how old he is. + If you remember what the Master said, + Try to believe that we need have no fear. + Let me, the selfish and the careless one, + Be housewife and a mother for tonight; + For I am not so fearful as you are, + And I was not so eager." + + Martha sank + Down at her sister's feet and there sat watching + A flower that had a small familiar name + That was as old as memory, but was not + The name of what she saw now in its brief + And infinite mystery that so frightened her + That life became a terror. Tears again + Flooded her eyes and overflowed. "No, Mary," + She murmured slowly, hating her own words + Before she heard them, "you are not so eager + To see our brother as we see him now; + Neither is He who gave him back to us. + I was to be the simple one, as always, + And this was all for me." She stared again + Over among the trees where Lazarus, + Who seemed to be a man who was not there, + Might have been one more shadow among shadows, + If she had not remembered. Then she felt + The cool calm hands of Mary on her face, + And shivered, wondering if such hands were real. + + "The Master loved you as He loved us all, + Martha; and you are saying only things + That children say when they have had no sleep. + Try somehow now to rest a little while; + You know that I am here, and that our friends + Are coming if I call." + + Martha at last + Arose, and went with Mary to the door, + Where they stood looking off at the same place, + And at the same shape that was always there + As if it would not ever move or speak, + And always would be there. "Mary, go now, + Before the dark that will be coming hides him. + I am afraid of him out there alone, + Unless I see him; and I have forgotten + What sleep is. Go now -- make him look at you -- + And I shall hear him if he stirs or whispers. + Go! -- or I'll scream and bring all Bethany + To come and make him speak. Make him say once + That he is glad, and God may say the rest. + Though He say I shall sleep, and sleep for ever, + I shall not care for that . . . Go!" + + Mary, moving + Almost as if an angry child had pushed her, + Went forward a few steps; and having waited + As long as Martha's eyes would look at hers, + Went forward a few more, and a few more; + And so, until she came to Lazarus, + Who crouched with his face hidden in his hands, + Like one that had no face. Before she spoke, + Feeling her sister's eyes that were behind her + As if the door where Martha stood were now + As far from her as Egypt, Mary turned + Once more to see that she was there. Then, softly, + Fearing him not so much as wondering + What his first word might be, said, "Lazarus, + Forgive us if we seemed afraid of you;" + And having spoken, pitied her poor speech + That had so little seeming gladness in it, + So little comfort, and so little love. + + There was no sign from him that he had heard, + Or that he knew that she was there, or cared + Whether she spoke to him again or died + There at his feet. "We love you, Lazarus, + And we are not afraid. The Master said + We need not be afraid. Will you not say + To me that you are glad? Look, Lazarus! + Look at my face, and see me. This is Mary." + + She found his hands and held them. They were cool, + Like hers, but they were not so calm as hers. + Through the white robes in which his friends had wrapped him + When he had groped out of that awful sleep, + She felt him trembling and she was afraid. + At last he sighed; and she prayed hungrily + To God that she might have again the voice + Of Lazarus, whose hands were giving her now + The recognition of a living pressure + That was almost a language. When he spoke, + Only one word that she had waited for + Came from his lips, and that word was her name. + + "I heard them saying, Mary, that He wept + Before I woke." The words were low and shaken, + Yet Mary knew that he who uttered them + Was Lazarus; and that would be enough + Until there should be more . . . "Who made Him come, + That He should weep for me? . . . Was it you, Mary?" + The questions held in his incredulous eyes + Were more than she would see. She looked away; + But she had felt them and should feel for ever, + She thought, their cold and lonely desperation + That had the bitterness of all cold things + That were not cruel. "I should have wept," he said, + "If I had been the Master. . . ." + + Now she could feel + His hands above her hair -- the same black hair + That once he made a jest of, praising it, + While Martha's busy eyes had left their work + To flash with laughing envy. Nothing of that + Was to be theirs again; and such a thought + Was like the flying by of a quick bird + Seen through a shadowy doorway in the twilight. + For now she felt his hands upon her head, + Like weights of kindness: "I forgive you, Mary. . . . + You did not know -- Martha could not have known -- + Only the Master knew. . . . Where is He now? + Yes, I remember. They came after Him. + May the good God forgive Him. . . . I forgive Him. + I must; and I may know only from Him + The burden of all this. . . . Martha was here -- + But I was not yet here. She was afraid. . . . + Why did He do it, Mary? Was it -- you? + Was it for you? . . . Where are the friends I saw? + Yes, I remember. They all went away. + I made them go away. . . . Where is He now? . . . + What do I see down there? Do I see Martha -- + Down by the door? . . . I must have time for this." + + Lazarus looked about him fearfully, + And then again at Mary, who discovered + Awakening apprehension in his eyes, + And shivered at his feet. All she had feared + Was here; and only in the slow reproach + Of his forgiveness lived his gratitude. + Why had he asked if it was all for her + That he was here? And what had Martha meant? + Why had the Master waited? What was coming + To Lazarus, and to them, that had not come? + What had the Master seen before He came, + That He had come so late? + + "Where is He, Mary?" + Lazarus asked again. "Where did He go?" + Once more he gazed about him, and once more + At Mary for an answer. "Have they found Him? + Or did He go away because He wished + Never to look into my eyes again? . . . + That, I could understand. . . . Where is He, Mary?" + + "I do not know," she said. "Yet in my heart + I know that He is living, as you are living -- + Living, and here. He is not far from us. + He will come back to us and find us all -- + Lazarus, Martha, Mary -- everything -- + All as it was before. Martha said that. + And He said we were not to be afraid." + Lazarus closed his eyes while on his face + A tortured adumbration of a smile + Flickered an instant. "All as it was before," + He murmured wearily. "Martha said that; + And He said you were not to be afraid . . . + Not you . . . Not you . . . Why should you be afraid? + Give all your little fears, and Martha's with them, + To me; and I will add them unto mine, + Like a few rain-drops to Gennesaret." + + "If you had frightened me in other ways, + Not willing it," Mary said, "I should have known + You still for Lazarus. But who is this? + Tell me again that you are Lazarus; + And tell me if the Master gave to you + No sign of a new joy that shall be coming + To this house that He loved. Are you afraid? + Are you afraid, who have felt everything -- + And seen . . . ?" + + But Lazarus only shook his head, + Staring with his bewildered shining eyes + Hard into Mary's face. "I do not know, + Mary," he said, after a long time. + "When I came back, I knew the Master's eyes + Were looking into mine. I looked at His, + And there was more in them than I could see. + At first I could see nothing but His eyes; + Nothing else anywhere was to be seen -- + Only His eyes. And they looked into mine -- + Long into mine, Mary, as if He knew." + + Mary began to be afraid of words + As she had never been afraid before + Of loneliness or darkness, or of death, + But now she must have more of them or die: + "He cannot know that there is worse than death," + She said. "And you . . ." + + "Yes, there is worse than death." + Said Lazarus; "and that was what He knew; + And that is what it was that I could see + This morning in his eyes. I was afraid, + But not as you are. There is worse than death, + Mary; and there is nothing that is good + For you in dying while you are still here. + Mary, never go back to that again. + You would not hear me if I told you more, + For I should say it only in a language + That you are not to learn by going back. + To be a child again is to go forward -- + And that is much to know. Many grow old, + And fade, and go away, not knowing how much + That is to know. Mary, the night is coming, + And there will soon be darkness all around you. + Let us go down where Martha waits for us, + And let there be light shining in this house." + + He rose, but Mary would not let him go: + "Martha, when she came back from here, said only + That she heard nothing. And have you no more + For Mary now than you had then for Martha? + Is Nothing, Lazarus, all you have for me? + Was Nothing all you found where you have been? + If that be so, what is there worse than that -- + Or better -- if that be so? And why should you, + With even our love, go the same dark road over?" + + "I could not answer that, if that were so," + Said Lazarus, -- "not even if I were God. + Why should He care whether I came or stayed, + If that were so? Why should the Master weep -- + For me, or for the world, -- or save Himself + Longer for nothing? And if that were so, + Why should a few years' more mortality + Make Him a fugitive where flight were needless, + Had He but held his peace and given his nod + To an old Law that would be new as any? + I cannot say the answer to all that; + Though I may say that He is not afraid, + And that it is not for the joy there is + In serving an eternal Ignorance + Of our futility that He is here. + Is that what you and Martha mean by Nothing? + Is that what you are fearing? If that be so, + There are more weeds than lentils in your garden. + And one whose weeds are laughing at his harvest + May as well have no garden; for not there + Shall he be gleaning the few bits and orts + Of life that are to save him. For my part, + I am again with you, here among shadows + That will not always be so dark as this; + Though now I see there's yet an evil in me + That made me let you be afraid of me. + No, I was not afraid -- not even of life. + I thought I was . . . I must have time for this; + And all the time there is will not be long. + I cannot tell you what the Master saw + This morning in my eyes. I do not know. + I cannot yet say how far I have gone, + Or why it is that I am here again, + Or where the old road leads. I do not know. + I know that when I did come back, I saw + His eyes again among the trees and faces -- + Only His eyes; and they looked into mine -- + Long into mine -- long, long, as if He knew." + + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Three Taverns, by Edwin Arlington Robinson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE TAVERNS *** + +***** This file should be named 1040.txt or 1040.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/4/1040/ + +Produced by Alan R. Light. 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