Complete Works of Robert Louis Stevenson

by Robert Louis Stevenson

  And find you at the window pane;

  And you again see hill and peel,

  And the bright springs gush at your heel.

  So went the fiat forth, and so

  Garrulous like a brook you go,

  With sound of happy mirth and sheen

  Of daylight — whether by the green

  You fare that moment, or the gray;

  Whether you dwell in March or May;

  Or whether treat of reels and rods

  Or of the old unhappy gods:

  Still like a brook your page has shone,

  And your ink sings of Helicon.

  ET TU IN ARCADIA VIXISTI

  (TO R. A. M. S.)

  In ancient tales, O friend, thy spirit dwelt;

  There, from of old, thy childhood passed; and there

  High expectation, high delights and deeds,

  Thy fluttering heart with hope and terror moved.

  And thou hast heard of yore the Blatant Beast,

  And Roland’s horn, and that war-scattering shout

  Of all-unarmed Achilles, ægis-crowned

  And perilous lands thou sawest, sounding shores

  And seas and forests drear, island and dale

  And mountain dark. For thou with Tristram rod’st

  Or Bedevere, in farthest Lyonesse.

  Thou hadst a booth in Samarcand, whereat

  Side-looking Magians trafficked; thence, by night,

  An Afreet snatched thee, and with wings upbore

  Beyond the Aral mount; or, hoping gain,

  Thou, with a jar of money, didst embark,

  For Balsorah, by sea. But chiefly thou

  In that clear air took’st life; in Arcady

  The haunted, land of song; and by the wells

  Where most the gods frequent. There Chiron old,

  In the Pelethronian antre, taught thee lore:

  The plants, he taught, and by the shining stars

  In forests dim to steer. There hast thou seen

  Immortal Pan dance secret in a glade,

  And, dancing, roll his eyes; these, where they fell,

  Shed glee, and through the congregated oaks

  A flying horror winged; while all the earth

  To the god’s pregnant footing thrilled within.

  Or whiles, beside the sobbing stream, he breathed,

  In his clutched pipe unformed and wizard strains

  Divine yet brutal; which the forest heard,

  And thou, with awe; and far upon the plain

  The unthinking ploughman started and gave ear.

  Now things there are that, upon him who sees,

  A strong vocation lay; and strains there are

  That whoso hears shall hear for evermore.

  For evermore thou hear’st immortal Pan

  And those melodious godheads, ever young

  And ever quiring, on the mountains old.

  What was this earth, child of the gods, to thee?

  Forth from thy dreamland thou, a dreamer, cam’st

  And in thine ears the olden music rang,

  And in thy mind the doings of the dead,

  And those heroic ages long forgot.

  To a so fallen earth, alas! too late,

  Alas! in evil days, thy steps return,

  To list at noon for nightingales, to grow

  A dweller on the beach till Argo come

  That came long since, a lingerer by the pool

  Where that desirèd angel bathes no more.

  As when the Indian to Dakota comes,

  Or farthest Idaho, and where he dwelt,

  He with his clan, a humming city finds;

  Thereon awhile, amazed, he stares, and then

  To right and leftward, like a questing dog,

  Seeks first the ancestral altars, then the hearth

  Long cold with rains, and where old terror lodged,

  And where the dead. So thee undying Hope,

  With all her pack, hunts screaming through the years:

  Here, there, thou fleeëst; but nor here nor there

  The pleasant gods abide, the glory dwells.

  That, that was not Apollo, not the god.

  This was not Venus, though she Venus seemed

  A moment. And though fair yon river move,

  She, all the way, from disenchanted fount

  To seas unhallowed runs; the gods forsook

  Long since her trembling rushes; from her plains

  Disconsolate, long since adventure fled;

  And now although the inviting river flows,

  And every poplared cape, and every bend

  Or willowy islet, win upon thy soul

  And to thy hopeful shallop whisper speed;

  Yet hope not thou at all; hope is no more;

  And O, long since the golden groves are dead

  The faery cities vanished from the land!

  TO W. E. HENLEY

  The year runs through her phases; rain and sun,

  Springtime and summer pass; winter succeeds;

  But one pale season rules the house of death.

  Cold falls the imprisoned daylight; fell disease

  By each lean pallet squats, and pain and sleep

  Toss gaping on the pillows.

  But O thou!

  Uprise and take thy pipe. Bid music flow,

  Strains by good thoughts attended, like the spring

  The swallows follow over land and sea.

  Pain sleeps at once; at once, with open eyes,

  Dozing despair awakes. The shepherd sees

  His flock come bleating home; the seaman hears

  Once more the cordage rattle. Airs of home!

  Youth, love and roses blossom; the gaunt ward

  Dislimns and disappears, and, opening out,

  Shows brooks and forests, and the blue beyond

  Of mountains.

  Small the pipe; but oh! do thou,

  Peak-faced and suffering piper, blow therein

  The dirge of heroes dead; and to these sick,

  These dying, sound the triumph over death.

  Behold! each greatly breathes; each tastes a joy

  Unknown before, in dying; for each knows

  A hero dies with him — though unfulfilled,

  Yet conquering truly — and not dies in vain

  So is pain cheered, death comforted; the house

  Of sorrow smiles to listen. Once again —

  O thou, Orpheus and Heracles, the bard

  And the deliverer, touch the stops again!

  HENRY JAMES

  Who comes to-night? We ope the doors in vain.

  Who comes? My bursting walls, can you contain

  The presences that now together throng

  Your narrow entry, as with flowers and song,

  As with the air of life, the breath of talk?

  Lo, how these fair immaculate women walk

  Behind their jocund maker; and we see

  Slighted De Mauves, and that far different she,

  Gressie, the trivial sphynx; and to our feast

  Daisy and Barb and Chancellor (she not least!)

  With all their silken, all their airy kin,

  Do like unbidden angels enter in.

  But he, attended by these shining names,

  Comes (best of all) himself — our welcome James.

  THE MIRROR SPEAKS

  Where the bells peal far at sea

  Cunning fingers fashioned me.

  There on palace walls I hung

  While that Consuelo sung;

  But I heard, though I listened well,

  Never a note, never a trill,

  Never a beat of the chiming bell.

  There I hung and looked, and there

  In my gray face, faces fair

  Shone from under shining hair.

  Well I saw the poising head,

  But the lips moved and nothing said;

  And when lights were in the hall,

  Silent moved the dancers
all.

  So awhile I glowed, and then

  Fell on dusty days and men;

  Long I slumbered packed in straw,

  Long I none but dealers saw;

  Till before my silent eye

  One that sees came passing by.

  Now with an outlandish grace,

  To the sparkling fire I face

  In the blue room at Skerryvore;

  Where I wait until the door

  Open, and the Prince of Men,

  Henry James, shall come again.

  KATHARINE

  We see you as we see a face

  That trembles in a forest place

  Upon the mirror of a pool

  Forever quiet, clear and cool;

  And in the wayward glass, appears

  To hover between smiles and tears,

  Elfin and human, airy and true,

  And backed by the reflected blue.

  TO F. J. S.

  I read, dear friend, in your dear face

  Your life’s tale told with perfect grace;

  The river of your life, I trace

  Up the sun-chequered, devious bed

  To the far-distant fountain-head.

  Not one quick beat of your warm heart,

  Nor thought that came to you apart,

  Pleasure nor pity, love nor pain

  Nor sorrow, has gone by in vain;

  But as some lone, wood-wandering child

  Brings home with him at evening mild

  The thorns and flowers of all the wild,

  From your whole life, O fair and true

  Your flowers and thorns you bring with you!

  REQUIEM

  Under the wide and starry sky,

  Dig the grave and let me lie.

  Glad did I live and gladly die,

  And I laid me down with a will.

  This be the verse you grave for me:

  Here he lies where he longed to be;

  Home is the sailor, home from sea,

  And the hunter home from the hill.

  THE CELESTIAL SURGEON

  If I have faltered more or less

  In my great task of happiness;

  If I have moved among my race

  And shown no glorious morning face;

  If beams from happy human eyes

  Have moved me not; if morning skies,

  Books, and my food, and summer rain

  Knocked on my sullen heart in vain: —

  Lord, thy most pointed pleasure take

  And stab my spirit broad awake;

  Or, Lord, if too obdurate I,

  Choose thou, before that spirit die,

  A piercing pain, a killing sin,

  And to my dead heart run them in!

  OUR LADY OF THE SNOWS

  Out of the sun, out of the blast,

  Out of the world, alone I passed

  Across the moor and through the wood

  To where the monastery stood.

  There neither lute nor breathing fife,

  Nor rumour of the world of life,

  Nor confidences low and dear,

  Shall strike the meditative ear.

  Aloof, unhelpful, and unkind,

  The prisoners of the iron mind,

  Where nothing speaks except the hell

  The unfraternal brothers dwell.

  Poor passionate men, still clothed afresh

  With agonising folds of flesh;

  Whom the clear eyes solicit still

  To some bold output of the will,

  While fairy Fancy far before

  And musing Memory-Hold-the-door

  Now to heroic death invite

  And now uncurtain fresh delight:

  O, little boots it thus to dwell

  On the remote unneighboured hill!

  O to be up and doing, O

  Unfearing and unshamed to go

  In all the uproar and the press

  About my human business!

  My undissuaded heart I hear

  Whisper courage in my ear.

  With voiceless calls, the ancient earth

  Summons me to a daily birth.

  Thou, O my love, ye, O my friends —

  The gist of life, the end of ends —

  To laugh, to love, to live, to die,

  Ye call me by the ear and eye!

  Forth from the casemate, on the plain

  Where honour has the world to gain,

  Pour forth and bravely do your part,

  O knights of the unshielded heart!

  Forth and forever forward! — out

  From prudent turret and redoubt,

  And in the mellay charge amain,

  To fall but yet to rise again!

  Captive? ah, still, to honour bright,

  A captive soldier of the right!

  Or free and fighting, good with ill?

  Unconquering but unconquered still!

  And ye, O brethren, what if God,

  When from Heav’n’s top he spies abroad,

  And sees on this tormented stage

  The noble war of mankind rage:

  What if his vivifying eye,

  O monks, should pass your corner by?

  For still the Lord is Lord of might;

  In deeds, in deeds, he takes delight;

  The plough, the spear, the laden barks,

  The field, the founded city, marks;

  He marks the smiler of the streets,

  The singer upon garden seats;

  He sees the climber in the rocks:

  To him, the shepherd folds his flocks.

  For those he loves that underprop

  With daily virtues Heaven’s top,

  And bear the falling sky with ease,

  Unfrowning caryatides.

  Those he approves that ply the trade,

  That rock the child, that wed the maid,

  That with weak virtues, weaker hands,

  Sow gladness on the peopled lands,

  And still with laughter, song and shout,

  Spin the great wheel of earth about.

  But ye? — O ye who linger still

  Here in your fortress on the hill,

  With placid face, with tranquil breath,

  The unsought volunteers of death,

  Our cheerful General on high

  With careless looks may pass you by.

  XXIV

  Not yet, my soul, these friendly fields desert,

  Where thou with grass, and rivers, and the breeze,

  And the bright face of day, thy dalliance hadst;

  Where to thine ear first sang the enraptured birds;

  Where love and thou that lasting bargain made.

  The ship rides trimmed, and from the eternal shore

  Thou hearest airy voices; but not yet

  Depart, my soul, not yet awhile depart.

  Freedom is far, rest far. Thou art with life

  Too closely woven, nerve with nerve intwined;

  Service still craving service, love for love,

  Love for dear love, still suppliant with tears.

  Alas, not yet thy human task is done!

  A bond at birth is forged; a debt doth lie

  Immortal on mortality. It grows —

  By vast rebound it grows, unceasing growth;

  Gift upon gift, alms upon alms, upreared,

  From man, from God, from nature, till the soul

  At that so huge indulgence stands amazed.

  Leave not, my soul, the unfoughten field, nor leave

  Thy debts dishonoured, nor thy place desert

  Without due service rendered. For thy life,

  Up, spirit, and defend that fort of clay,

  Thy body, now beleaguered; whether soon

  Or late she fall; whether to-day thy friends

  Bewail thee dead, or, after years, a man

  Grown old in honour and the friend of peace.

  Contend, my soul, for moments and for hours;

  Each is with service pregnant; each
reclaimed

  Is as a kingdom conquered, where to reign.

  As when a captain rallies to the fight

  His scattered legions, and beats ruin back,

  He, on the field, encamps, well pleased in mind.

  Yet surely him shall fortune overtake,

  Him smite in turn, headlong his ensigns drive;

  And that dear land, now safe, to-morrow fall.

  But he, unthinking, in the present good

  Solely delights, and all the camps rejoice.

  XXV

  It is not yours, O mother, to complain,

  Not, mother, yours to weep,

  Though nevermore your son again

  Shall to your bosom creep,

  Though nevermore again you watch your baby sleep.

  Though in the greener paths of earth,

  Mother and child, no more

  We wander; and no more the birth

  Of me whom once you bore,

  Seems still the brave reward that once it seemed of yore;

  Though as all passes, day and night,

  The seasons and the years,

  From you, O mother, this delight,

  This also disappears —

  Some profit yet survives of all your pangs and tears.

  The child, the seed, the grain of corn,

  The acorn on the hill,

  Each for some separate end is born

  In season fit, and still

  Each must in strength arise to work the almighty will.

  So from the hearth the children flee,

  By that almighty hand

  Austerely led; so one by sea

  Goes forth, and one by land;

  Nor aught of all man’s sons escapes from that command

  So from the sally each obeys

  The unseen almighty nod;

  So till the ending all their ways

  Blindfolded loth have trod:

  Nor knew their task at all, but were the tools of God.

  And as the fervent smith of yore

  Beat out the glowing blade,

  Nor wielded in the front of war

  The weapons that he made,

  But in the tower at home still plied his ringing trade;

  So like a sword the son shall roam

  On nobler missions sent;

  And as the smith remained at home

  In peaceful turret pent,

  So sits the while at home the mother well content.

  THE SICK CHILD

  Child. O mother, lay your hand on my brow!

  O mother, mother, where am I now?

  Why is the room so gaunt and great?

  Why am I lying awake so late?

  Mother. Fear not at all: the night is still.