ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN (1841 - 1901)

{Undertones 1863}

                                                                                                                                                                 145

XII.

SAPPHO:

ON THE LEUCADIAN ROCK.

_____

1.

     O SWEET, sweet, sweet!
While the Moon, with her dove’s eyes fair,
And her beautiful yellow hair,
     And the Sea-Snake coiling round her silvery feet,                                 [l.iv]
Walk’d dumbly up above in the jewell’d air
     Waving her luminous wings,
To sit upon this crag above the sea
Clasp’d close, so close, to thee,
     Pale with much yearning, while the murmurings
Of the great waters seem’d to waft to me
     The name of Phaon,
     To whisper Phaon, Phaon,
Phaon, Phaon, Phaon, with deep intoning,                                                 146
     Hushfully, hushfully moaning!

2.

     O bliss, bliss, bliss!
Though the Moon look’d pale in the sky,
On thy passionate heart to lie,
     To cling to thy burning lips with kiss on kiss,
Faintly watching the butterfly stars swim by
     In the track of that queenly Moon;
And in a dream, clasp’d close, so close, to thee,
To list and seem to be
     A portion of the faint monotonous tune
Made for its mistress by the serpent sea,
     That whisper’d Phaon,
     Phaon, Phaon, Phaon,
Phaon, Phaon, Phaon, while Dian darkening
     Stoop’d hushfully, hushfully, harkening!

3.

     O pain, pain, pain!
While the Moon, in a sky as clear
As of old, walks on, and I hear                                                                  147
     Her palpitating foot on the living main,
While, under her feet, the green sea-snake creeps near
     Hissing with scales that gleam,
To stand upon this crag beside the sea,
And dream, and dream, of thee—
     With clench’d white hands, set teeth, and robes that stream
Behind me in the wind, while audibly
     The waves moan Phaon,
     Shriek Phaon, Phaon, Phaon,
Phaon, Phaon, Phaon, with deep intoning,
     Mournfully, mournfully, moaning!

4.

     O rest, rest, rest!—
While the Moon with her virgin light
Thro’ eternities of night
     Dumbly paces on to the east from the west,—
To mingle with the waves that under the height
     Murmur along the shore,
To mix my virgin love, my agony,
Into the serpent sea                                                                                   148
     That Dian seeks to silence evermore,
To cling to those white skirts and moan of thee,
     O Phaon, Phaon,
     Restless for love of Phaon,
Phaon, Phaon, Phaon, with ceaseless motion
     Soothed by the soother of Ocean!

[Notes:
Alterations in the 1884 edition of The Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan:
v. 1, l. iv: And the Sea-Snake coiling round her silvern feet, ]

                                                                                                                                                               149

XIII.

THE SYREN.

_____

AH, kiss me, Sweetest, while on yellow sand
     Murmurs the breaking billow,
And smoothe my silken ringlets with thy hand,
     And make my breast thy pillow;
And clasp me, Dearest, close to lip and cheek
     And bosom softly sighing,
While o’er the green sea, in one orange streak,
     The summer day is dying!
Kiss, kiss, as one that presses to his mouth
     A vine-bunch bursting mellow,
In this lone islet of the sleepy south
     Fringëd with smooth sands yellow:
A twilight of fresh leaves endusks us round,
     Flowers at our feet are springing,
And wave on wave breaks smoothly to the sound                                      150
     Of my sweet singing!

EUMOLPUS.

Is it the voice of mine own Soul I hear?
     Or some white sybil of the spherëd ocean?
And are these living limbs that lie so near,
     Clinging around me with a serpent-motion?                                           [vi]
Is this a tress of yellow yellow hair,
     Around my finger in a ring enfolden?
Whose face is this, so musically fair,
     That swoons upon my ken thro’ vapours golden?
What sad song withers on the odorous air?
Where am I, where?
     Where is my country and that vision olden?

THE SYREN.

I sang thee hither in thy bark to land
     With deftly warbled measure,
I wove a witch’s spell with fluttering hand,
     Till thou wert drunken, Dearest, with much pleasure.
At hush of noon I had thee at my knee,
     And round thy finger pink I wound a curl,
     And singing smiled beneath with teeth of pearl,                                     151
Of what had been, what was, and what should be
Sang dying ditties three!
And lo! thy blood was ravish’d with the theme,
And lo! thy face was pale with drowsy dream,
While stooping low, with rich lips tremulous,
I kiss thee thus!—and thus!

EUMOLPUS.

Thy kisses trance me to a vision wan
     Of what hath been and nevermore will be.
O little fishing-town Sicilian,
     I can behold thee sitting by the sea!
O little red-tiled town where I was born!
     O days ere yet I sail’d from mortal ken!
Why did I launch upon the deep forlorn,
     Nor fish in shallow pools with simple men?
It was a charm; for while I rockt at ease
     Within our little bay,
There came a melody across the seas
     From regions far away;
And ah! I fell into a swooning sleep,
     And all the world had changed before I knew,—
And I awoke upon a glassy deep                                                               152
     With not a speck of land to break the view,
And tho’ I was alone, I did not weep,
     For I was singing too!
I sang! I sang! and with mine oars kept time
Unto the rude sweet rhyme,
And went a-sailing on into the west
     Blown on by airs divine,
Singing for ever on a wild-eyed quest
     For that immortal minstrel feminine;
And night and day went past, until I lost
     All count of time, yet still did melodise;
     And sun and stars beheld me from their skies;
And ships swam by me, from whose decks storm-tost
     Rude seamen gazed with terror-glazëd eyes.
And still I found not her for whom I sought,
     Yet smiled without annoy,
To ply the easy oar, and take no thought,
     And sing, was such sweet joy!—
Then Tempest came, and to and from the sky
     I rose and fell in that frail bark of mine,
While the snake Lightning, with its blank bright eye,
     Writhed fierily in swift coils serpentine
     Along the slippery brine;                                                                       153
And there were days when dismal sobbing Rain
Made melancholy music for the brain,
And hours when I shriek’d out and wept in woe
     Prison’d about by chilly still affright,
While all around dropt hushëd flakes of Snow
     Melting and mingling down blue chasms of night.
Yet evermore, I heard that voice sublime
     Twining afar its weirdly woven song,
And ever, ever more, mine oars kept time,
And evermore I utterëd in song
     My yearnings sad or merry, faint or strong.
Ah me! my love for her afar away,
My yearning and my burning night and day!
In dreams alone, I met her in still lands,
     And knelt in tears before her,
And could not sing, but only wring mine hands,
     Adore her and implore her!
She glisten’d past me as a crane that sails
Above the meeting of the ocean-gales,
     With waft of broad slow wing to regions new;
And tho’ I follow’d her from place to place,
She held her veil dew-spangled to her face,
     And I could merely feel her eyes of blue                                                154
     Steadfastly gazing thro’!
Wherefore my heart had broken quite,—but then
I would awake again,—
To see the oily water steep’d in rest,
     While, glistering in many-colour’d flakes
Harming me not, lay brooding on its breast
     Leviathan and all the ocean-snakes,
And on the straight faint streak afar the round
     Moist eye of morning lookt thro’ dewy air,
And all was still, a joyous calm profound,—
And I would break the charm with happy sound
     To find the world so fair!
And lo! I drank the rain-drops and was glad,
     And smote the bird of ocean down and ate;
And ocean harm’d me not, and monsters sad
     That people ocean and the desolate
Abysses spared me,—charmëd by the song
I warbled wildly as I went along.
Yet day and night sped on, and I grew old
     Before I knew; and lo!
My hands were wither’d, on my bosom cold
     There droopt a beard of snow,—
And raising hands I shriek’d, I cried a curse                                              155
     On that weird voice that twinëd me from home;
And echoes of the awful universe
     Answer’d me; and the deep with lips of foam
Mock’d me and spat upon me; and the things
     That people ocean rose and threaten’d ill,
Yea also air-born harpies waving wings,
     Because I could not sing to charm them still.
I was alone, the shadow of a man,
     Haunting the trackless waste of waves forlorn,
Blown on by pitiless rains and vapours wan,
Plaining for that small town Sicilian,
     Where, in the sweet beginning, I was born!

THE SYREN.

Ah, weep not, Dearest! lean upon my breast,
     While sunset darkens stilly,
And Dian poises o’er the slumberous west
     Her silver sickle chilly;
The eyes of heaven are opening, the leaves
     Fold silver-dewy round the closing roses,                                             [l.xix]
In lines of foam the breaking billow heaves,
Each thing that gladdens and each thing that grieves                                   156
     Dip slow to dark reposes.                                                                   [l.ii]

EUMOLPUS.

O voice that lured me on, I know thee now!
     O melancholy eyes, ye mildly beam!                                                    [l.iv]
O kiss, thy touch is dewy on my brow!
     Sweet Spirit of my dream!

THE SYREN.

     Name thy love, and I am she,
     Name thy woe, and look on me,
     Name the weary melody
     That led thee hither o’er the sea,—
     Then call to mind my ditties three
Of what hath been, what is, and what shall be!

EUMOLPUS.

     Ah woe! ah woe!
I see thee and I clasp thee, and I know!
Sing to me, Sweetest, while the shadows grow—
     Sing low! sing low!
Oh, sweet were slumber now, at last, at last,
     For I am sick of wandering to and fro,                                                  157
And ah! my singing-days are nearly pass’d—
     Sing low! sing low! sing low!

THE SYREN.

Love with wet cheek, Joy with red lips apart,
     Hope with her blue eyes dim from looking long,
Ambition with thin hand upon his heart—
     Of which shall be the song?
Of one, of one,
Who loved till life was done,
     For life with him was loving, tho’ she slew his love with wrong.
Then, on a winter day,
When all was lost and his young brow was gray,
     He knelt before an Altar pilëd proud
With bleachëd bones and fruits and garlands gay,
     And cried aloud:—
“Have I brought Joy, and slain her at thy feet?
     Have I brought Peace, for thy cold kiss to kill,
Have I brought Youth crownëd with wild-flowers sweet,
     With sandals dewy from a morning hill,
     For thy gray solemn eyes to fright and chill?
Have I brought Scorn the pale and Hope the fleet,                                      158
And First-Love in her lily winding-sheet?
     And art thou pitiless still?
O Poesy, thou nymph of fire,
Grandest of that fair quire
Which in the dim beginning stoop’d and fell,—
     So beauteous yet so awful, standing tall
Upon the mountain-tops where mortals dwell,
     Seeing strange visions of the end of all,
And pallid from the white-heat glare of Hell!
Is there no prophecy, far-seeing one,
     To seal upon these lips that yearn to sing?
Can nought be gain’d again? can nought be won?
     Is there no utterance in this suffering,
     Is there no voice for any human thing?”
Then, smiling in the impotence of pain,
     His sweet breath at the Altar did he yield,—
While she he loved, afar across the main,
Stoop’d down to break a weary people’s chain,
     And crown a Hero on a battle-field!

EUMOLPUS.

Ah no! ah no!
So sad a theme is too much woe!                                                              159
Sing to me sweetlier, since thou lovest me so—
Sing low; sing low!

THE SYREN.

               Sisters we, the syrens three,
               Fame and Love and Poesy!
               In the solitude we sit,
               On the mountain-tops we flit,
               From the islands of the sea
               Luring man with melody;
               Sisters three we seem to him
               Foating over waters dim,—
               Syrens, syrens three, are we—
               Fame and Love and Poesy!

EUMOLPUS.

Ah woe! ah woe!
That is the song I heard so long ago!
That is the song
That lured me long:
Those were the three I saw, with arms of snow
     And ringlets waving yellow, beckoning,
While on the violet deep I floated slow,                                                     160
     With little heart to sing;
And lo! they faded as I leapt to land,
     And their weird music wither’d on the air,
And I was lying drowsy on the sand
     Smiling and toying with thy yellow hair!

THE SYREN.

               Sisters we, the syrens three,
               Fame and Love and Poesy,
               Sitting singing in the sun,
                   While the weary marinere
                   Passes on or creeps in fear,—                                              [l.xi]
               Sisters three, yet only one,
                   When he cometh near!
               Charmëd sight and charmëd sound
               Hover quietly around,
               Mine are dusky bowers and deep,
               Closëd lids and balmy sleep,
Kisses cool for fever’d cheeks and warmth for eyes that weep!

EUMOLPUS.

     Sing low! sing low!
Thou art more wondrous fair than mortals know.                                       161
Bringest thou, Beautiful, or peace or woe?
Close up each eyelid with a warm rich kiss,
     And let me listen while the sunlights go:
I cannot bear a time so still as this,
     Unbroken by thy voice’s fall and flow.
     Sing to me, Beautiful! Sing low, sing low, sing low!

THE SYREN.

Love with wet cheek, Joy with red lips apart,
     Hope with her blue eyes dim from looking long,
Ambition with thin hand upon his heart—
     Of which shall be the song?
Ah, woe! ah, woe!
For Love is dead and wintry winds do blow.
Yea, Love is dead; and by her funeral bier
Ambition gnaws the lip and sheds no tear;
And in the outer chamber Hope sits wild,
     Watching the faces in the fire and weeping;
And at the threshold Joy the little child
     With rosy cheeks runs leaping,
And stops.—while in the misty distance creeping
Down western hills the large red sun sinks slow—
To see Death’s footprints on the still white snow.                                       162
Ah, Love has gone, and all the rest must go.
     Sing low! sing low! sing low!

EUMOLPUS.

It is a song that slays me. Sing no more.

THE SYREN.

Ah, Sweet, the song is o’er!—
The ocean-hum is hush’d, ’tis end of day,
     The long white foam fades faintly,
The orange sunset dies into the gray
     Where star on star swims saintly.
Hast thou not sung? and is not song enough?
     Hast thou not loved? and is not loving all?
Art thou not weary of the wayfare rough,
     Or is there aught of life thou wouldst recall?
Ah no, ah no!
The life came sweetly—sweetly let it go!
     Mine are dusky bowers and deep,
     Closëd eyes and balmy sleep,
Kisses cool for fever’d cheeks and warmth for eyes that weep!

                                                                                                                                                               163

EUMOLPUS.

Thou art the gentle witch that men call Death!
     Ah, Beauteous, I am weary, and would rest!

THE SYREN.

Lie very softly, Sweet, and let thy breath
     Fade calmly on my breast!
     Call me Love or call me Fame,
         Call me Death or Poesy,
     Call me by whatever name
         Seemeth sweetest unto thee:—
     I anoint thee, I caress thee,
     With my dark reposes bless thee,
     I redeem thee, I possess thee!
     I can never more forsake thee!
         Slumber, slumber, peacefully,
         Slumber calm and dream of me,
     Till I touch thee, and awake thee!

EUMOLPUS.

Diviner far than song divine can tell!
     Thine eyes are dim with dreams of that awaking!
     Yea, let me slumber, for my heart is breaking
With too much love. Farewell! farewell! farewell!

                                                                                                                                                               164

THE SYREN.

     Charmëd sight and charmëd sound
     Close the weary one around!
     Charmëd dream of charmëd sleep
     Make his waiting sweet and deep!
     Husht be all things! Let the spell
     Duskly on his eyelids dwell!

EUMOLPUS.

     Farewell! farewell! farewell!

THE SYREN.

O melancholy waters, softly flow!
     O Stars, shine softly, dropping dewy balm!
O Moon walk on in sandals white as snow!
     O Winds, be calm, be calm!
For he is tired with wandering to and fro,
Yea, weary with unrest to see and know.
         O charmëd sound
         That hoverest around!
O voices of the Night! Sing low! sing low! sing low!

[Notes:
Alterations in the 1884 edition of The Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan:
Page 150, l. vi: Stirring around me with a serpent-motion?
Page 155, l. xix: Fold dark and dewy round the closing roses,
Page 156, l. ii: Dip slow to sweet reposes.
Page 156, l. iv: O melancholy eyes, how bright ye beam!
Page 160, l. xi: Passes on or faints in fear,— ]

                                                                                                                                                               165

XIV.

A VOICE FROM ACADEME.

_____

OVER this azure poplar glade
The sunshine, fainting high above,
Ebbs back from woolly clouds that move
Like browsing lambs and cast no shade;
And straight before me, faintly seen
Thro’ emerald boughs that intervene,
The visible sun turns white and weaves
Long webs of silver thro’ the leaves.
The grassy sward beneath my foot
Is soft as lips of lambs and beeves.
How cool those lilies at the root                                                      [l.xi]
Of yonder tree, that dimly dance
Thro’ dews of their own radiance!

Yonder I see the river run,
Half in the shade, half in the sun;
And as I near its rushy brink                                                          166 [l.i]
The sparkling minnows, where they lie
With silver bellies to the sky,
Flash from me in a shower and sink.
I stand in shadows cool and sweet,
But in the mirror at my feet
The heated azure heavens wink.

All round about this shaded spot,
Whither the sunshine cometh not,
Where all is beautiful repose—
I know the kindled landskip glows;
And further, flutter golden showers
On proud Athenai white with towers,
And catching from the murmurous sea,
[Stain’d with deep shadows as of flowers
And dark’ning down to purple bowers
Thro’ which the sword-fish darts in glee,]
A strife that cometh not to me.

For in this place of shade and sound,
Hid from the garish heat around,
I feel like one removed from strain                                                    167
And fever of the happy brain—
Where thoughts thrill fiery into pain:
Like one who, in the pleasant shade
The peaceful pulseless dead have made,
Walking in silence, just perceives
The gaudy world from which he went
Subdue itself to his content,
Like that white globe beyond the leaves!

[Notes:
Alterations in the 1884 edition of The Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan:
Page 165, l. xi: How cool those harebells at the root
Page 166, l. i: And as I near its shallow brink ]

                                                                                                                                                               168

XV.

PYGMALION THE SCULPTOR.

“Materiem superabat opus.”

_____

1.—SHADOW.

UPON the very morn I should have wed
Jove put his silence in a mourning house;                                          [l.ii]
And, coming fresh from feast, I saw her lie
In stainless marriage samite, white and cold,
With orange blossoms in her hair, and gleams
Of the ungiven kisses of the bride
Playing about the edges of her lips.

     Then I, Pygmalion, kiss’d her as she slept,
And drew my robe across my face whereon
The midnight revel linger’d dark, and pray’d;
And the sore trouble hollow’d out my heart
To hatred of a harsh unhallow’d youth
As I glode forth. Next, day by day, my soul                                      169
Grew conscious of itself and of its fief
Within the shadow of her grave: therewith,
Waken’d a thirst for silence such as dwells
Under the ribs of death: whence slowly grew
Old instincts that had trancëd me to tears
In mine unsinew’d boyhood, sympathies
Full of faint odours and of music faint
Like buds of roses blowing;—till I felt
Her voice come down from heaven on my soul,
And stir it as a wind that droppeth down
Unseen, unfelt, unheard, until its breath
Troubles the shadows in a sleeping lake.

     And the voice said, “Pygmalion,” and “Behold,”
I answer’d, “I am here;” when thus the voice:
“Put men behind thee—take thy tools, and choose
A rock of marble white as is a star,                                                 [l.xvii]
Cleanse it and make it pure, and fashion it
After mine image: heal thyself: from grief
Comes glory, like a rainbow from a cloud.
For surely life and death, which dwell apart
In grosser human sense, conspire to make
The breathless beauty and eternal joy                                              170
Of sculptured shapes in stone. Wherefore thy life
Shall purify itself and heal itself
In the long toil of love made meek by tears.”

     I barr’d the entrance-door to this my tower
Against the hungry world, I hid above
The mastiff-murmur of the town, I pray’d
In my pale chamber. Then I wrought, and chose
A rock of marble white as is a star,
And to her silent image fashion’d clay,
And purified myself and heal’d myself
In the long toil of love made meek by tears.

2.—THE MARBLE LIFE.

THE multitudinous light oppress’d me not,
But smiled subdued, as a young mother smiles,
As fearful lest the sunbeam of the smile                                           [l.xv]
Trouble the eyelids of the babe asleep.

     As Ocean murmurs when the storm is past
And keeps the echoed thunders many days,
My solitude was troublous for a time:                                                171
Wherefore I should have harden’d; but the clay
Grew to my touch, and brighten’d, and assumed
Fantastic images of natural things,
Which, melting as the fleecy vapours melt
Around the shining cestus of the moon,
Made promise of the special shape I loved.
Withdrawing back, I gazed. The unshaped stone
Took outline in the dusk, as rocks unhewn
Seen from afar thro’ floating mountain mists
Gather strange forms and human lineaments.
And thus mine eye was filled with what I sought
As with a naked image, thus I grew
Self-credulous of the form the stone would wear,
And creeping close I strove to fashion clay
After the vision. Day and night, I drew
New comfort from my grief; my tears became
As honey’d rain that makes the woodbine sweet,
Until my task assumed a precious strength
Wherewith I fortified mine inner ear
Against the pleadings of the popular tongue
That babbled at my door; and when there dawn’d
A hand as pure as milk and cold as snow,
A small white hand, a little lady hand,                                              172 [l.i]
That peep’d out perfect from the changing mass,
And seem’d a portion of some perfect shape
Unfreed, imprison’d in the stone,—I wept
Warm tears of utter joy, and kiss’d the hand,
As sweet girl-mothers kiss the newly born,
Weak as a mother. Then I heard no more
The murmurous swarm beneath me, women and men;
But, hoarded in my toil, I counted not
The coming and the going of the sun:
Save when I swoon’d to sleep before the stone,
And dream’d, and dreaming saw the perfect shape
Emblazon’d, like the rainbow in a stream,
On the transparent tapestry of sleep.

     Ah me, the joy, the glory, and the dream,
When like a living wonder senseless stone
Smiles to the beating of a heart that hangs
Suspended in the tumult of the blood!
To the warm touch of my creating hand
The marble was as snow; and like the snow
Whereon the molten sunshine gleams as blood,
It soften’d, glow’d, and changed. As one who stands
Beneath the cool and rustling dark to watch                                      173
The shadow of his silently beloved
Cross o’er the lighted cottage blind and feel
The brightness of the face he cannot see,
So stood I, trembling, while the shape unborn
Darken’d across the white and milky mass
And left the impress of its loveliness
To glorify and guide me. As I wrought
The Past came back upon me, like the ghost
Of the To-Come. Whate’er was pure and white,
Soft-shining with a snow-like chastity,
Came back from childhood, and from that dim land
Which lies behind the horizon of the sense,
Felt though forgotten; vanishings divine
Of the strange vapours many-shaped and fair
Which moisten sunrise when the eye of heaven
Openeth dimly from the underworld:
Faint instincts of the helpless babe that smiles
At the sweet pictures in its mother’s eyes
And lieth with a halo round its head
Of beauty uncompleted: memories
Of young Love’s vivid heaven-enthronëd light,
By whose moist rays the pensive soul of youth
Was troubled at the fountains, like a well                                           174
Wherein the mirror’d motion of a star
Lies dewy and deep;—and, amid all, there dwelt
A vaguer glory, deeper sense of power,
Scarce conscious of itself yet ruling all,
Like the hid heart which rocks the jaded blood,
Brightens the cheek, throbs music to the brain,
Yet dwells within the breast scarce recognised,
Save when our pulses warn us and in fear
We pause to listen.—Even so at times
Those visions tranced me to a dumb dismay,
And, sudden music thronging in mine ears,
I hearken’d for that central loveliness
Whose magic guided and created all.

     Then languor balmier than the blood i’ the veins
When youth and maiden mingle and the moon
Breathes on the odorous room wherein they lie
Chamber’d as in a folded rose’s leaves,
Oppress’d me, and a lover’s rapture fill’d
My soul to swooning. Lo, I kiss’d the stone,
And toy’d with the cold hand, and look’d for light
In the dim onward-looking marble eyes,
And smooth’d the hair until it seem’d to grow                                  175
Soft as the living ringlets tingling warm
Against a heaving bosom. At her feet
I knelt, and tingled to the finger-tips
To gaze upon her breathless loveliness—
Like one who, shuddering, gazes on a shrine
From human eyes kept holy.
                                               Then at last,
Fair-statured, noble, like an awful thing
Frozen upon the very verge of life,
And looking back along eternity
With rayless eyes that keep the shadow Time,
She rose before me in the milky stone,
White-limb’d, immortal; and I gazed and gazed
Like one that sees a vision, and in awe
Half hides his face, yet looks, and seems to dream.

3.—THE SIN.

BLUE night. I threw the lattice open wide,
Drinking the odorous air; and from my height
I saw the watch-fires of the town and heard
The gradual dying of the murmurous day.
Then, as the twilight deepen’d, on her limbs                                       176
The silver lances of the stars and moon
Were shatter’d, and the shining fragments fell
Like jewels at her feet. The Cyprian star                                          [l.iv]
Quiver’d to liquid emerald where it hung
On the rib’d ledges of the darkening hills,
Gazing upon her; and, as in a dream,
Methought the marble, underneath that look,
Stirr’d—like a bank of stainless asphodels
Kiss’d into tumult by a wind of light.

     Whereat there swam upon me utterly
A drowsy sense wherein my holy dream
Was melted, as a pearl in wine: bright-eyed,
Keen, haggard, passionate, with languid thrills
Of insolent unrest, I watch’d the stone,
And lo, I loved it: not as men love fame,
Not as the warrior loves his laurel wreath,
But with prelusion of a passionate joy
That threw me from the height whereon I stood
To grasp at Glory, and in impiousness
Of sweet communing with some living Soul
Chamber’d in that cold bosom. As I gazed,
There was a buzz of revel in mine ears,                                            177
And tinkling fragments of a song of love,
Warbled by wantons over wine-cups, swam
Like bees within the brain.—Then I was shamed                              [l.iv]
By her pale beauty, and I scorn’d myself,
And standing at the lattice dark and cool
Watch’d the dim winds of twilight enter in,
And draw a veil about that loveliness
White, dim, and breathed on by the common air.

     But, like a snake’s moist eye, the dewy star
Of lovers drew me; and I watch’d it grow
Large, soft, and tremulous; and as I gazed
In fascinated impotence of heart,
I pray’d the lifeless silence might assume
A palpable life, and soften into flesh,
And be a beautiful and human joy
To crown my love withal; and thrice the prayer
Blacken’d across my pale face with no word.
But thro’ the woolly silver of a cloud
The cool star dripping emerald from the baths
Of Ocean brighten’d in upon my tower,
And touch’d the marble forehead with a gleam
Soft, green, and dewy; and I said “the prayer                                    178
Is heard!”
               The live-long night, the breathless night,
I waited in a darkness, in a dream,
Watching the snowy figure faintly seen,
And ofttimes shuddering when I seem’d to see
Life, like a taper burning in a scull,                                                   [l.vii]
Gleam thro’ the rayless eyes: yea, wearily
I hearken’d thro’ the dark and seem’d to hear
The low warm billowing of a living breast,
Or the slow motion of anointed limbs
New-stirring into life; and, shuddering,
Fearing the thing I hoped for, awful eyed,
On her cold breast I placed a hand as cold
And sought a fluttering heart.—But all was still,
And chill, and breathless; and she gazed right on
With rayless orbs, nor marvell’d at my touch:
White, silent, pure, ineffable, a shape
Rebuking human hope, a deathless thing,
Sharing the wonder of the Sun who sends
His long bright look thro’ all futurity.

     When Shame lay heavy on me, and I hid
My face, and almost hated her, my work,                                        179
Because she was so fair, so human fair,
Yea not divinely fair as that pure face
Which, when mine hour of loss and travail came,
Haunted me, out of heaven. Then the Dawn
Stared in upon her: when I open’d eyes,
And saw the gradual Dawn encrimson her
Like blood that blush’d within her,—and behold
She trembled—and I shriek’d!
                                             With haggard eyes,
I gazed on her, my fame, my work, my love!
Red sunrise mingled with the first bright flush
Of palpable life—she trembled, stirr’d, and sigh’d—
And the dim blankness of her stony eyes
Melted to azure. Then, by slow degrees,
She tingled with the warmth of living blood:
Her eyes were vacant of a seeing soul,
But dewily the bosom rose and fell,
The lips caught sunrise, parting, and the breath
Fainted thro’ pearly teeth.
                                           I was as one
Who gazes on a goddess serpent-eyed,
And cannot fly, and knows to look is death.
O apparition. of my work and wish!                                                 180
The weight of awe oppress’d me, and the air
Swung as the Seas swing around drowning men.

4.—DEATH IN LIFE.

ABOUT her brow the marble hair had clung
With wavy tresses, in a simple knot
Bound up and braided; but behold, her eyes
Droop’d downward, as she wonder’d at herself,
Then flush’d to see her naked loveliness,
And trembled, stooping downward; and the hair
Unloosening fell, and brighten’d as it fell,
Till gleaming ringlets tingled to the knees
And cluster’d round about her where she stood
As yellow leaves around a lily’s bud,
Making a fountain round her such as clips
A Naiad in the sunshine, pouring down
And throwing moving shadows o’er the floor
Whereon she stood and brighten’d.
                                                     Wondering eyed,
With softly heaving breast and outstretch’d arms,
Slow as an eyeless man who gropes his way,
She thrust a curving foot and touch’d the ground,                              181
And stirr’d; and, downcast-lidded, saw not me.
Then as the foot descended with no sound,
The whole live blood grew pink within the veins
For joy of its own motion. Step by step,
She paced the chamber, groping till she gain’d
One sunlight-slip that thro’ the curtain’d pane
Crept slant—a gleaming line on roof and floor;                               [l.viii]
And there, in light, she pausing sunn’d herself
With half-closed eyes; while flying gleams of gold
Sparkled like flies of fire among her hair,
And the live blood show’d brightlier, as wine
Gleams thro’ a curd-white cup of porcelain.

     There, stirring not, she paused and sunn’d herself,
With drooping eyelids that grew moist and warm,
What time, withdrawn into the further dark,
I watch’d her, nerveless, as a murderer stretch’d
Under a nightmare of the murder’d man.
And still she, downcast-lidded, saw me not;
But gather’d glory while she sunn’d herself,
Drawing deep breath of gladness such as earth
Breathes dewily in the sunrise after rain.

     Then pray’d I, lifting up my voice aloud.                                       182
“O apparition of my work and wish!
Thou most divinely fair as she whose face
Haunted me, out of heaven! Raise thine eyes!
Live, love, as thou and I have lived and loved!
Behold me—it is I—Pygmalion.
Speak, Psyche, with thy human eyes and lips,
Speak, to Pygmalion, with thy human soul!”

     And still she, downcast-lidded, saw me not,
But gather’d glory as she sunn’d herself.
Yet listen’d murmuring inarticulate speech,
Listen’d with ear inclined and fluttering lids,
As one who lying on a bed of flowers
Hearkeneth to the distant fall of waves,
That cometh muffled in the drowsy hum
Of bees pavilion’d among roses’-leaves
Near to the ears that listen. So she stood
And listen’d to my voice, framing her lips
After the speech; nay, when the sound had ceased,
Still listen’d, with a shadow on her cheek—
Like the Soul’s Music, when the Soul has fled,
Fading upon a dead Musician’s face.

     But, stooping in mine awe, with outstretch’d arms,                        183
I crept to her; nor stirr’d she, till my breath
Was warm upon her neck: then raised she eyes
Of dewy azure, ring in ring of blue
Less’ning in passionate orbs whereon my face
Fell white with yearning wonder; when a cry
Tore her soft lips apart, the gleaming orbs
Widen’d to silvery terror, and she fled,
With yellow locks that shone and arms that waved,
And in the further darkness cower’d and moan’d,
Dumb as a ringdove that with fluttering wings
Watches an adder in the act to leap.                                                 [l.xii]

     What follow’d was a strange and wondrous dream
Wherein, half conscious, wearily and long
I wooed away her fears with gentle words,
Smooth gestures, and sweet smiles.—with kindness such
As calms the terror of a new-yean’d lamb,
So pure, it fears its shadow on the grass;
And all the while thick pulses of my heart
Throng’d hot in ears and eyelids,—for my Soul
Seem’d swooning, deaden’d in the sense, like one
Who sinks in snows, and sleeps, and wakes no more.

     Yet was I conscious of a hollow void,                                         184
A yearning in the tumult of the blood,
Her presence fill’d not, quell’d not; and I search’d
Her eyes for meanings that they harbour’d not,
Her face for beauty that disturb’d it not.
’Twas Psyche’s face, and yet ’twas not her face,
A face most fair, yet not so heavenly fair,
As hers who, when my time of travail came,
Haunted me, out of heaven. For its smile
Brought no good news from realms beyond the sun,
The lips framed heavenly nor human speech,
And to the glorious windows of the eyes
No Soul clomb up—to look upon the stars,
And search the void for glimpses of the peaks
Of that far land of morning whence it comes.

     Then, further, I was conscious that my face
Had lull’d her fears; that close to me she came
Tamer than beast, and toy’d with my great beard,
And murmur’d sounds like prattled infants’ speech,
And yielding to my kisses kissed again.
Whereat, in scorn of my pale Soul, I cried,
“Here will I feast in honour of this night!”
And spread the board with meats and bread and wine,                    185 [l.i]
And drew the curtain with a wave of arm
Bidding the sunlight welcome: lastly, snatch’d
A purple robe of richness from the wall,
And flung it o’er her while she kiss’d and smiled,
Girdling the waist with clasp and cord of gold.

     Then sat we, side by side. She, queenly stoled,
Amid the gleaming fountain of her hair,
With liquid azure orbs and rosy lips
Gorgeous with honey’d kisses; I, like a man
Who loves fair eyes and knows they are a fiend’s,
And in them sees a heav’n he knows is hell.
For, like a glorious feast, she ate and drank,
Staining her lips in crimson wine, and laugh’d
To feel the vinous bubbles froth and burst
In veins whose sparking blood was meet to be
An angel’s habitation. Cup on cup                                                  [l.xvii]
I drain’d in fulness—careless as a god—
A haggard bearded head upon a breast
In tumult like a sun-kist bed of flowers.

     But ere, suffused with light, the eyes of Heaven
Widen’d to gaze upon the white-arm’d Moon,                                 186
Stiller than stone we reign’d there, side by side.
Yea, like a lonely King whose Glory sits
Beside him,—impotent of life but fair,—
Brightly apparelëd I sat above
The tumult of the town, as on a throne,
Watching her wearily; while far away
The sunset dark’d like dying eyes that shut
Under the waving of an angel’s wing.

5.—SHADOW.

THREE days and nights the vision dwelt with me,
Three days and nights we dozed in dreadful state,
Look’d piteously upon by sun and star;
But the third night there pass’d a homeless sound
Across the city underneath my tower,
And lo! there came a roll of muffled wheels,
A shrieking and a hurrying to and fro
Beneath, and I gazed forth. Then far below
I heard the people shriek “A pestilence!”
But, while they shriek’d, they carried forth their Dead,
And flung them out upon the common ways,
And moaning fled: while far across the hills                                       187
A dark and brazen sunset ribb’d with black
Glared, like the sullen eyeballs of the plague.

     I turn’d to her, the partner of my height:
She, with bright eyeballs sick with wine, and hair
Gleaming in sunset, on a couch asleep.
And lo! a horror lifted up my scalp,
The pulses plunged upon the heart, and fear
Froze my wide eyelids. Peacefully she lay
In purple stole array’d, one little hand
Bruising the downy cheek, the other still
Clutching the dripping goblet, and the light,
With gleams of crimson on the ruinous hair,
Spangling a blue-vein’d bosom whence the robe
Fell back in rifled folds; but dreadful change
Grew pale and hideous on the waxen face,
And in her sleep she did not stir, nor dream.
Therefore, it seem’d, Death pluck’d me by the sleeve,
And, sweeping past, with lean forefinger touch’d
The sleeper’s brow and smiled; when, shrinking back,
I turn’d my face away, and saw afar
The brazen sullen sunset ribb’d with black
Glare on her, like the eyeballs of the plague.                                     188 [l.i]

     O apparition of my work and wish!
Shrieking I fled, my robe across my face,
And left my glory and my woe behind,
And sped, thro’ pathless woods, o’er moonlit peaks,
Toward sunrise;—nor have halted since that hour,—
But wander far away, a homeless man,
Prophetic, orphan’d both of name and fame.
Nay, like a timid Phantom evermore
I come and go with haggard warning eyes;
And some, that sit with lemans over wine,
Or dally idly with the glorious hour,
Turn cynic eyes away and smile aside;
And some are saved because they see me pass,
And, shuddering, yet constant to their task,
Look up for comfort to the silent stars.

[Notes:
“Materiem superabat opus.” The workmanship was better than the subject matter. (Ovid, Metamorphoses Book II, l. v).
Alterations in the 1884 edition of The Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan:
Page 168, l. ii: Death put his silence in a mourning house;
Page 169, l. xvii: A block of marble white as is a star,
Page 170, l. xv: When fearful lest the sunbeam of the smile
Page 172, l. i: A small white hand, a little radiant hand,
Page 176, l iv: Resplendent at her feet. The Cyprian star
Page 177, l. iv: Wildly within the brain.—Then I was shamed
Page 178, l. vii: Life, like a taper burning in a skull,
Page 181, l. viii: Crept slant—a gleaming line on wall and floor;
Page 183, l. xii: Watches a serpent in the act to spring.
Page 185, l. i: And spread the board with meats and fruits and wine,
Page 185, l. xvii: A spirit’s habitation. Cup on cup
Page 188, l. i: Glare on her, like the eyeballs of the plague! ]

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