Part 3
Here is a new desire, One of his latest lauds Throned on marble and praised With the lovely softness of fire. Signs acclaim it amazed, Its window-altar is hazed, And every gazer applauds The tremendous rubber tire.
APPLES OF EDEN
THE ETCHER
Unconsciously you sketched it in, The supple throat, the firm, sweet chin, The hair, wood-brown, leaf-brown unrolled But hesitating into gold, The face—a flying face and young ... Lashingly deep the acid stung, Charring my soul’s most stubborn plank, A long way in it burned and sank. Your tool cut sure, your tool cut deep! It roused my rebels from their sleep! Black Fortitude, the torture-wise, Whose eyes can beat down lions’ eyes; Song-happy Valor, long denied; The stubborn sergeant men call Pride; Humor, whose clear and mocking bells Cleanse the sick mind like crystal wells; Love in white wool that burnt like fire, And trampling on abased Desire! Their shining raiment bright as hail, They rose and cried and were in mail; Strong guards, impenetrable towers, Their swords grew round your face like flowers!
You started out in careless sort, But Kings have come into your court. And spear-bright Princes vigil keep, Where that your acid bit so deep. A shifting border wholly mine About that face you etched—a sign That, devil-come or devil-go, What man I am, you made me so! You stirred the sluggard, taught the clod, Came and were merciful and God To the mewed hawk with blinded eyes And flung him out across the skies!
Yet I have some of you—I hold A portion of your sacred gold! It was by steel and flame you taught And, though the lesson stands cheap-bought, A curl, a word, a face remain, For I have bought them with my pain. With bloody coins from hands cut through I here claim part and lot in you! For hells of fire, and hells of ice, A corner of your Paradise! You may not leave my soul unfed; Dies it, then part of you is dead. For every pageant of my foes A portion of your shining goes. You can forget the triumph-girt, But not the silly boy you hurt. You burned too deep, you seared too sure, The bonds you forged are most secure, Through splitting earth and rending sky, We are together—you and I!
GRAND LARCENY
What have you done to me, You, of the Helen-touch? You with the noon-bright hair And the voice like streams? Day has become a cloud! Season and order such Shapes as a wizard air Weaves out of dreams!
I was glad ere you came; Now I have great unease. You who have stol’n my soul As you’d pluck a leaf! Starved and wind-bitten oak, Yours the Hesperides! —Satan consume you whole, Beautiful Thief!
Where have you locked it up? Drowned it in colored pools With your moods’ goldfish or Swathed it in words? It should go raggedly, Hard from the scorn of fools! Whippings may hurt it sore! Where are its birds?
What—you will give it back? Flowery your footpath then! Songs of your grace I’ll sing Sleepier than bees! Hasten, oh wind-beloved! Grant me my own again! —What is this shining thing, Under the trees?—
Tremulous, lucentine, Sun-wave or heart of star— What is this magic you Proffer for mine? —Closer the wonder draws— (Those are your eyes!) But are All paradises true Then, oh Divine...?
You should have taken gold For your soul’s treasury! Not this poor kettle, Clay to all spears. Isn’t gold heavy, though!— We shall rust airily! Heavenly metal! Years upon years!
NOVEMBER PROTHALAMION
Rubicund Autumn, red as a cardinal, clasps his hands in the wine-chill air, Shaking down gold from the tattered leafiness, waving his torch till the sky’s aflare, Stars that sparkle like steel in a swordhilt burn the black water of night’s lagoons, Out in the frost-rimed waste of the corn-field are yellow pumpkins bigger than moons!
Pilfer the nightingale’s throat, my jackdaw Muse of the rebel and dark pretends, Steal one note from the silver babble that tells all Heaven a lark ascends! Stretch but a claw toward the dream-voiced pipes that Pan left whispering under a tree! Flute thou the tune to the rapturous dancers, let Io Hymen your cadence be!
“Io Hymen!”, a chorus of voices sung in the temple of Love the bright, “Eros, lord of the honey and flame, we bring you guests for your hall to-night! Grant them such marriage of heart and purpose as mates the hand to the perfect sword, The lips of courage, the eyes of truth, and the body of ecstasy, Eros, Lord!
Grant that their years like rocketing gems of a necklace snapped at the throat of a priest,
Differ from each by the color and shape, but in ardor and excellence none are least! Loose on them Trouble and Pain, swift leopards, to be taught and tamed by their crystal wills! Fling to them mountains to overcome that their feet may be glad on the necks of the hills!
Every immortal must put on dust at a time all know or he is not God, These shall take seizin of Death together, the dream shall break in the crumbling sod. But they shall inherit the resurrection, when Death has unloosened his strangling cord! Since they have endured they shall see your face where there is but Eternity, Eros, Lord!”
Therefore, Muse of the motley garments, indolent thief of obscure Romance, Puff your cheeks to your penny whistle! fillip the feet of the flying dance! Blow out your soul in a torrent of music—even the trees are like lamps ablaze! This is the song of the red-leaf wedding that ended the jack-o’-lantern days!
EXPRESSIONS NEAR THE END OF WINTER
If I but had my longing! not opals sad and rare, For noble stones are proud things, and best befit your hair; Not purple-buttoned waistcoats, nor sack to drink me deep, But white, smooth sheets to lie in—oh I’d sleep, sleep, sleep!
And the corners of that bedstead should be olivewood so green, And the gentle swan’s-down pillows should have comforted a queen; With a canopy above me, of azure silk outspread, Four carved evangels at my feet and magi at my head!
And no sun should creep there, and but small starlight, And the whole room be odorous of gardens known at night; The thick scents of evening, the attar of the rose, Should take away my weariness both drowsily and close.
You would come on tiptoe, like the whisper of birds’ wings, With a quite small music and some occupying things, And draw up close a cushion, and bend a cautious ear, And say “Now don’t disturb him—for he’s tired, poor dear!”
And then, both handfast, we would dream long days, Till the dry world shimmered to a sleepy, happy haze. With no cares to speak of—no silly fools to fret— Oh my great, proud longing that I’ll never, never get!
LOST LIGHTS
“Let’s not be sentimental!” You said, oh dear delight! Well, you held Heaven’s rental; And who was I to fight? “Cool friends, alert and laughing, And blessed by Plato’s snow. But other wine for quaffing, Be sentimental? No!”
I took you at your own word. —Fool while my life shall last! And found the “friend” a stone word, And knew the radiance past. The comradeship by snatches, The love that lit my days Went out like burnt-out matches Before your husband’s gaze.
He strokes you with caresses Too sugared to be sweet, And fatly pats your tresses, And binds your swift-winged feet; And you’ve no thirst to slake from The gold of each new June. Nor ever dare to break from Your sticky-bright cocoon.
I could have held you cleaner, And free as clouds are free, And shared you with nought meaner Than sun and stars and sea. But I’d a sense of humor —At least you told me so— And pride beyond all rumor! And so I let you go.
Life breaks us—that grows plainer. And wit declines to gall With none of us the gainer ... It seems a shame—that’s all! When truth about me nears you You’d better shut your eyes. And you—his sugar smears you. And the air crawls with flies.
COME BACK!
When we were not magnificent, nor heavenly, nor wise, And all our thoughts were clean and round, astonished as our eyes, Our life slid on untroubledly, as shiny-smooth as silk, And sugar-loaves from Paradise enriched our bread and milk.
But one day, in a closet where the grown-ups put some things, We found their elephantine clothes, and laid aside our wings. You gloved your arms with Common-Sense, and corseted in Pride, With starchy skirts of Knowledge stuck out yards on every side!
I laid aside Companionship for crimson Cloth-of-Pose, And stuck a blind man’s spectacles upon my foolish nose, And found a little whisky-flask of Irony or two— And we played up to each other as we’d seen our elders do!
We were Prince and sapphire Princess—though the jewels hurt your throat; We were haughtier than Pharaohs—and I sweltered in my coat; So we dared not shirk the ending, for our very ruffles’ sake! —Though a bad dream’s ice to choke you if your clothes won’t let you wake!
So, the Tragic Crown weighs heavy on that summer-shining head,
And—the scarlet of my doublet drips the wet where I have bled— And the grown-up phrases jangle, and their harps make angry noise— Helen of the angers, let us put aside these toys!
Put away your wisdom, and I will feed the vines The little drinks that eat me, and the sunset-colored wines! Come beneath the apple-bloom, beside the pinky pools, With awful maledictions on the two who were such fools!
Run, and be as darting as the sunlight through a tree! Sit, and sing a silly song of apricots with me! Innocence, oh Innocence, with whiteness on your names, Come into the crooked wood and help a child play games!
RESURRECTION
(_To J. W. A._)
The black sky scowled, abased and flat, On streets gaunt as an alley-cat And dry as misery or dirt— I’d tramped them till my hot feet hurt. Now—beaten as a beaten pup— I hummed to keep my courage up A stupid song I’d learned at school; Though all the words ran back to “Fool” ... Still, spite of all my flesh could feel, My mind kept on its burning wheel, Its blazing wheel of great aims lost, And how her face was white—almost— The day she’d spoken, kind and kind, And left me eating night and blind; So I slouched on till town was past And scrubby country came at last, Pinched as ingratitude. Across The sky clouds towered, boss on boss Of a black shield thrust down on earth And spanning planets in its girth; While white fire flickered in the South Like a dog’s tongue about his mouth.
A few hot raindrops spat my cheek— A cicada began to creak— And slashing lightning like a sword Unleashed the waters of the Lord! Roaring and heavy, gushing clear Through dirt and raggedness and fear, They struck before I’d time to curse, They soaked me like a leather purse! Caught in the terrier mouth of rain I had no time for thought or pain; Dripping and running like a brook With wetness everywhere I’d look, Fresh-mated with the fierce keen scents Where Spring had pitched her lilacked tents! Almost alive I tramped the wold Until a stick slid; and I rolled Head over heels asprawl in wet, ... And something in me overset, Snapped, went to pieces ... and I laughed And laughed till men had thought me daft! I beat my sides until I’d cry At the dull ape that had been I; That solemn insult to the earth! I shook the bushes with my mirth, And rose—and reeled with mockeries Of silly sky and idiot trees, Weak as a straw—but heart and head Arisen starry from the dead!
So, staggering with laughter still, I crossed the run and climbed the hill, Knocked at your door and called to you, And made you shriek with laughter too. You dried my clothes and gave me food And wine, to show that God was good. And, after speech that flapped like birds, I said you these prophetic words, “We shall ascend Olympus yet, Though scorpions the way beset! And plant our banner, _Deus vult_, Over the Tower Difficult, The lilied banner, badged with gold— Oh, we shall live before we’re old! And drink the ale of Tartary And eat the spice of Trebizond, And battle with the serpent-sea That roars round Alicant the fond! And princesses with ivory crowns, And girls in green, moon-spangled gowns Shall aid our high assault till we Have passed beyond the Topaz Sea; And found the quests that made us meek, Whose very names would burn the cheek With worship and with ecstasy, Those rippled names on which we cry— Those eyes we saw a while agone— But there’s adventure to be won! And slit-eyed men and ring-nosed men Shall bar our glorious way again That proud armadas’ trampled shards May make a new song for our bards! For we are young—and youth is steel! Hark! at our shattering trumpet-peal The spaniel worlds slink in to heel!”
“_Eh bien_—the fire’s gone out,” you said “And I’m tired, too.... Let’s go to bed!...”
FLOOD-TIDE
(_Maine Coast—1917_)
_Life went whistling a tune between the plum and the cherry, Rolling a blossom of pink like almonds under his tongue, Looked at us all as we grew, and made exceedingly merry. “Lord! how I’ll dibble and prune, when you aren’t so beautifully young!_
There was moon like a spilling of milky sap from the sky And the tree of the sky was a candle of creamy flame, Each white-fire-leaf of a star distinct; and old wind went by Hooded in dark and ashamed as it whispered some muttering name.
We were huddled up in the launch like a sleepy parcel of birds. The plunging silence engulfed us. We heard, as if we had died, The throb of the engine’s heart erase our tiptoeing words, And the slow mysterious mouth of the water against the side.
If you dripped your fingers awave, wet star-dust clung to the skin, Spangling the wax-cool hand with the pollen and seeds of dawn, And the wake, like a fish of fire, went twisting alive within The willow-dark cage of green, and in splinters of foam was gone.
Then we saw the cloudy old house, and the waters deep at its stair, Bright in an endless flood, irradiate, calm and wise, Like the milk-white body of Truth asleep in her naked hair, And the blood and strength of the Earth arose to our dazzling eyes!
Quiet, quiet and quiet, said the march of the wave beneath. Oh, immaculate shone the mind while the lotos of silence grew! And the sore heart heavy with youth was a clean blade straight in its sheath, As we drank with a matchless dream in that chrism of salt and dew!
_Death jams down on his spade in the bloom of our elvish orchard, Even the root-curls crawl at the skeleton jokes he cracks; Let’s make rhymes for a while, as our Youth goes out to be tortured! We shall remember a moon till they hew us under the axe!_
THE SONG OF COLD AND PAIN
Colder than leopards’ eyes the arc Where all the freezing stars go round, Black wind runs trotting to the dark, Striking cold hoofs on the cold ground.
The body crawls, the sinews scrape, Knotted and cramped by fingering cold; It shrinks my flesh into the shape I shall not break from when I’m old.
And yet my shoulders lift the air That weighs like ice, that pours like lead, For cold’s a thing the flesh can bear If desperation’s in the head.
The wooden head needs other pyres To warm alive its wooden wits! But in this cold there are more fires Than ever burnt a sun to bits!
Inside of cold, inside of pain, Past each last tingle of the sense, The flame called God ascends again In all its raging innocence!
It is the scarlets of the white, It is the seeing of the blind, More furiously clear than light It burns like snow upon the mind.
I built my house with Pain for wall, I filled its halls with Cold for wives, And twenty years have bade it fall And it shall stand for twenty lives!
I hung the doors with griefs I had, Fear was a grape I crushed to wine, And not an angel good or bad, Can boast such feasting as is mine!
The fire that on my hearth exults But Pain and Cold could throw and tame Till now I know in every pulse The last intensity of flame!
In that excruciating joy Have Cold and Pain my judgment writ, Though it exalt me or destroy I must arise and follow it!
Life is a vapor, dreaming South, A sleepy field ’twixt stream and stream. Death is a dream that shuts the mouth —Until you live inside the dream.
WISDOM-TEETH
When I was a man and a very young man I straddled the wings of Boreas! For I was the high gods’ drinking-can, My rhymes were their ale uproarious!
But they’ve poured out the posset of youth to cool And I shine like an empty tankard With a witless smile at the heavenly pool Where the moons of desire float anchored.
The bubble of sugar I swore was love, The purge that I knew for knowledge, I’m bare of the lot, and the winds above Are teaching me more than college!
The lash comes down and the yell goes up And the flesh of the fool keeps shrinking, But vinegar Time must scour the cup Till it’s clean for a draught worth drinking.
Pour me the stars of the seraphim Or the wine of God’s chastising! All that I ask is the flooding brim Where the tides of the heart are rising!
All that I ask is the ache of birth, Lords of the Planet Tally, And a girl to follow around the earth Or the wreck of a cause to rally!
Naked dirt that came from the dirt, Cup of your giant pleasure, What care I how your nectars hurt? Fill me again, full measure!
THE KINGDOM OF THE MAD
“_The progress of life is through the kingdom of the mad_....”
_Claude Gex (Warren’s translation)._
THE ORIGINAL IMPULSE
If I could lay my head upon Your breast, where it has never lain, And know there was an end to pain, And feel between my clasped hands, one Slight brown small hand, lean as a boy’s, And hear the murmur of your voice— Utterly peaceful, lapped around With sleepy harmonies of sound, Forgetful of the wings, the ruth, The bitter-sick unrest of youth, The causeless fight that scars the will ... But there’s the eternal combat still! The banner struck with darts like sleet, Implacable before defeat, And I must fight the bad game through! So take these verses made for you; Half-shadowings of the thing I meant, Blurred visions of a clear intent, The gems of paste that may not shine, Romantic gilt, sardonic brine. And when this agony is past I shall return to you at last, From the lost cause—the fruitless quest— And you will smile and give me rest. Rest ... and the peace I never knew....
Oh I shall ask great things of you! So keep this rhyme, and we’ll not quarrel! Perhaps, next time, I’ll bring you laurel!
LUNCH AT A CITY CLUB
(_For, though not to, D. M. C._)
The member with the face like a pale ham Settles his stomachs in the leather chair. The member with the mustard-colored hair Chats with the member like a curly ram, Then silence like the shutting of a clam, Gulps, and slow eating, and the waiters’ stare— Like prosperous leeches settling to their fare The members gorge, distending as they cram.
And I am fiery ice—and a hand knocks Inside my heart. Three hours till God comes true, When there’s no earth or sky or time in clocks But only hell and paradise and you. Life bows his strings! I shout the amazing tune! ... The dullest member drops his coffee spoon.
THE KNOCKOUT
The bell clanged “Time!” again. The boxers sparred, Creep-footed, tiger-muscled, cautious-eyed, Love the bright pugilist with his glance enskied, Fate swart as rock, indomitably hard. Slashing the battle joined of bull and pard With blows like hammerstrokes. A thick sob died In the crowd’s throat. Fate’s poison-smile grew wide, His mountainous fist ripped Love’s too-careless guard.
Fate smashed the reeling struggle to the ropes, Poised for the knockout; hurled his brute attack, —And suddenly was lying on his back— “Nine—Ten!” the slow words came like punctured hopes— Laughing I clapped, and winked at languid Love. I _knew_ he had a star inside his glove!
DEVOURER OF NATIONS
“Strength shall be thrust to the Eater, And down to the Strong One, sweet.” Was ever a proverb neater, A phrasing more apt, or meeter, To fix on our Course-Completer As we end Life’s beat?
You’ll decorate quite the scarlet And secret hall of his tongue— With your clasped hands marble and chilly, And your face like a frozen lily— For Death is a luscious varlet, And likes maids young!
So there’s the end of it, Nelly! Of you and your purple hat! And I, your impotent Shelley, With czars and pariahs smelly, Shall tapestry well his belly, That gray, round Rat!
ABRAHAM’S BOSOM
So the world darkened, as if ink were poured Over a picture, clotting jammily; And there was really nothing left to see, And I was just beginning to feel bored —They might have let me drive the hearse at least! I’d love to dangle on the plumes and kick Fat-vested mourners—when, in half a tick, Light gurgled from the sky and filled the East.
I walked on something squashy like a tire, Rebounding heavily where’er I trod, Set with black plants that grew like tangled wire.... I’d just begun to look around for God, When mountains fell, the skies gaped crimson-shot And thunder took the earth.... A voice said “_Vot?_”
PROHIBITION
“I wouldn’t mind if it were gin!” he said, “Good gin’s like ether, sick with pungent sweet, And rum I never liked—not even neat! Champagne and such stuck pins into my head. Old port was sunlight where a ruby bled. The silky-bright liqueurs had twinkling feet Like gipsy children running down a street; And beer’s as old a brother as good bread.
Still, I could give them up!” he mused and sighed Like a poor scrawny gust of city wind, “But it’s the precedent that’s bad! You’ll find Things worse Hereafter ... I’d a friend who died. And ... well, damned souls had never much to tell.... But now they’ve stopped the Lethe, down in Hell!”
MORTUARY PARLORS
The smooth, unobtrusive walls say “Hush!” in a voice of honey and meal, The refined and comforting chairs protest that sorrow may be genteel, They are all hiding the dead away, they are huddling them off to forget.... —I would rather scoop a hole in the sand till my hands ran blood and sweat, I would rather raise my friend on a pyre for the lightning to do its will, I would sooner leave my dead to the dogs—they are happy over their kill— Than to bring them here to this oily place to lie like a numbered sheaf! —This servants’ quiet can have no room for my racked and horrible grief— The windows smile with the smiles of masks, the curtains are specters walking, And Death, the obsequious gentleman, comes rubbing black gloves and talking!
TALK