ATHENÉ
But while I stood
Expectant, lo! a fair pale form drew near
With front severe, and wide blue eyes which bore
Mild wisdom in their gaze. Great purity
Shone from her—not the young-eyed innocence
Of her whom first I saw, but that which comes
From wider knowledge, which restrains the tide
Of passionate youth, and leads the musing soul
By the calm deeps of Wisdom. And I knew
My eyes had seen the fair, the virgin Queen,
Who once within her shining Parthenon
Beheld the sages kneel.
She with clear voice
And coldly sweet, yet with a softness too,
As doth befit a virgin:
"She does right
To boast her sway, my sister, seeing indeed
That all things are as by a double law,
And from a double root the tree of Life
Springs up to the face of heaven. Body and Soul,
Matter and Spirit, lower joys of Sense
And higher joys of Thought, I know that both
Build up the shrine of Being. The brute sense
Leaves man a brute; but, winged with soaring thought
Mounts to high heaven. The unembodied spirit,
Dwelling alone, unmated, void of sense,
Is impotent. And yet I hold there is,
Far off, but not too far for mortal reach,
A calmer height, where, nearer to the stars,
Thought sits alone and gazes with rapt gaze,
A large-eyed maiden in a robe of white.
Who brings the light of Knowledge down, and draws
To her pontifical eyes a bridge of gold,
Which spans from earth to heaven.
For what were life,
If things of sense were all, for those large souls
And high, which grudging Nature has shut fast
Within unlovely forms, or those from whom
The circuit of the rapid gliding years
Steals the brief gift of beauty? Shall we hold,
With idle singers, all the treasure of hope
Is lost with youth—swift-fleeting, treacherous youth,
Which fades and flies before the ripening brain
Crowns life with Wisdom's crown? Nay, even in youth,
Is it not more to walk upon the heights
Alone—the cold free heights—and mark the vale
Lie breathless in the glare, or hidden and blurred
By cloud and storm; or pestilence and war
Creep on with blood and death; while the soul dwells
Apart upon the peaks, outfronts the sun
As the eagle does, and takes the coming dawn
While all the vale is dark, and knows the springs
Of tiny rivulets hurrying from the snows,
Which soon shall swell to vast resistless floods,
And feed the Oceans which divide the World?
Oh, ecstasy! oh, wonder! oh, delight!
Which neither the slow-withering wear of Time,
That takes all else—the smooth and rounded cheek
Of youth; the lightsome step; the warm young heart
Which beats for love or friend; the treasure of hope
Immeasurable; the quick-coursing blood
Which makes it joy to be,—ay, takes them all
And leaves us naught—nor yet satiety
Born of too full possession, takes or mars!
Oh, fair delight of learning! which grows great
And stronger and more keen, for slower limbs,
And dimmer eyes and loneliness, and loss
Of lower good—wealth, friendship, ay, and Love—
When the swift soul, turning its weary gaze
From the old vanished joys, projects itself
Into the void and floats in empty space,
Striving to reach the mystic source of Things,
The secrets of the earth and sea and air,
The Law that holds the process of the suns,
The awful depths of Mind and Thought; the prime
Unfathomable mystery of God!
Is there, then, any who holds my worship cold
And lifeless? Nay, but 'tis the light which cheers
The waning life! Love thou thy love, brave youth!
Cleave to thy love, fair maid! it is the Law
Which dominates the world, that bids ye use
Your nature; but, when now the fuller tide
Slackens a little, turn your calmer eyes
To the fair page of Knowledge. It is power
I give, and power is precious. It is strength
To live four-square, careless of outward shows,
And self-sufficing. It is clearer sight
To know the rule of life, the Eternal scheme;
And, knowing it, to do and not to err,
And, doing, to be blest."
The calm voice soared
Higher and higher to the close; the cold
Clear accents, fired as by a hidden fire,
Glowed into life and tenderness, and throbbed
As with some spiritual ecstasy
Sweeter than that of Love.
HERÉ
But as they died,
I heard an ampler voice; and looking, marked
A fair and gracious form. She seemed a Queen
Who ruled o'er gods and men; the majesty
Of perfect womanhood. No opening bud
Of beauty, but the full consummate flower
Was hers; and from her mild large eyes looked forth
Gentle command, and motherhood, and home,
And pure affection. Awe and reverence
O'erspread me, as I knew my eyes had looked
On sovereign Heré, mother of the gods.
She, with clear, rounded utterance, sweet and calm
"I know Love's fruit is good and fair to see
And taste, if any gain it, and I know
How brief Life's Passion-tide, which when it ends
May change to thirst for Knowledge, and I know
How fair the realm of Mind, wherein the soul
Thirsting to know, wings its impetuous way
Beyond the bounds of Thought; and yet I hold
There is a higher bliss than these, which fits
A mortal life, compact of Body and Soul,
And therefore double-natured—a calm path
Which lies before the feet, thro' common ways
And undistinguished crowds of toiling men,
And yet is hard to tread, tho' seeming smooth,
And yet, tho' level, earns a worthier crown.
For Knowledge is a steep which few may climb,
While Duty is a path which all may tread.
And if the Soul of Life and Thought be this,
How best to speed the mighty scheme, which still
Fares onward day by day—the Life of the World,
Which is the sum of petty lives, that live
And die so this may live—how then shall each
Of that great multitude of faithful souls
Who walk not on the heights, fulfil himself,
But by the duteous Life which looks not forth
Beyond its narrow sphere, and finds its work,
And works it out; content, this done, to fall
And perish, if Fate will, so the great Scheme
Goes onward?
Wherefore am I Queen in Heaven
And Earth, whose realm is Duty, bearing rule
More constant and more wide than those whose words
Thou heardest last. Mine are the striving souls
Of fathers toiling day by day obscure
And unrewarded, save by their own hearts,
Mid wranglings of the Forum or the mart;
Who long for joys of Thought, and yet must toil
Unmurmuring thro' dull lives from youth to age;
Who haply might have worn instead the crown
Of Honour and of Fame: mine the fair mothers
Who, for the love of children and of home,
When passion dies, expend their toilful years
In loving labour sweetened by the sense
Of Duty: mine the statesman who toils on
Thro' vigilant nights and days, guiding his State.
Yet finds no gratitude; and those white souls
Who give themselves for others all their years
In trivial tasks of Pity. The fine growths
Of Man and Time are mine, and spend themselves
For me and for the mystical End which lies
Beyond their gaze and mine, and yet is good,
Tho' hidden from men and gods.
For as the flower
Of the tiger-lily bright with varied hues
Is for a day, then fades and leaves behind
Fairness nor fruit, while the green tiny tuft
Swells to the purple of the clustering grape
Or golden waves of wheat; so lives of men
Which show most splendid; fade and are deceased
And leave no trace; while those, unmarked, unseen,
Which no man recks of, rear the stately tree
Of Knowledge, not for itself sought out, but found
In the dusty ways of life—a fairer growth
Than springs in cloistered shades; and from the sum
Of Duty, blooms sweeter and more divine
The fair ideal of the Race, than comes
From glittering gains of Learning.
Life, full life,
Full-flowered, full-fruited, reared from homely earth,
Rooted in duty, and thro' long calm years
Bearing its load of healthful energies;
Stretching its arms on all sides; fed with dews
Of cheerful sacrifice, and clouds of care,
And rain of useful tears; warmed by the sun
Of calm affection, till it breathes itself
In perfume to the heavens—this is the prize
I hold most dear, more precious than the fruit
Of Knowledge or of Love."
The goddess ceased
As dies some gracious harmony, the child
Of wedded themes which single and alone
Were discords, but united breathe a sound
Sweet as the sounds of heaven.
No comments:
Post a Comment