Alfred, Lord Tennyson - Delphi Poets Series

by Lord Tennyson Alfred

  Should come most welcome, seeing men, in this

  Only are likest gods, who have attained

  Rest in a happy place and quiet seats

  Above the thunder, with undying bliss

  In knowledge of their own supremacy;

  The changeless calm of undisputed right,

  The highest height and topmost strength of power.’

  “Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  She ceased, and Paris held the costly fruit

  Out at arm’s length, so much the thought of power

  Flattered his heart: but Pallas where she stood

  Somewhat apart, her clear and barèd limbs

  O’erthwarted with the brazen-headed spear

  Upon her pearly shoulder leaning cold;

  The while, above, her full and earnest eye

  Over her snowcold breast and angry cheek

  Kept watch, waiting decision, made reply.

  “‘Selfreverence, selfknowledge, selfcontrol

  Are the three hinges of the gates of Life,

  That open into power, everyway

  Without horizon, bound or shadow or cloud.

  Yet not for power (power of herself

  Will come uncalled-for) but to live by law

  Acting the law we live by without fear,

  And, because right is right, to follow right

  Were wisdom, in the scorn of consequence.

  (Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.)

  Not as men value gold because it tricks

  And blazons outward Life with ornament,

  But rather as the miser, for itself.

  Good for selfgood doth half destroy selfgood.

  The means and end, like two coiled snakes, infect

  Each other, bound in one with hateful love.

  So both into the fountain and the stream

  A drop of poison falls. Come hearken to me,

  And look upon me and consider me,

  So shall thou find me fairest, so endurance,

  Like to an athlete’s arm, shall still become

  Sinewed with motion, till thine active will

  (As the dark body of the Sun robed round

  With his own ever-emanating lights)

  Be flooded o’er with her own effluences,

  And thereby grow to freedom.’ “Here she ceased

  And Paris pondered. I cried out, ‘Oh, Paris,

  Give it to Pallas!’ but he heard me not,

  Or hearing would not hear me, woe is me!

  “O mother Ida, manyfountained Ida,

  Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  Idalian Aphrodite oceanborn,

  Fresh as the foam, newbathed in Paphian wells,

  With rosy slender fingers upward drew

  From her warm brow and bosom her dark hair

  Fragrant and thick, and on her head upbound

  In a purple band: below her lucid neck

  Shone ivorylike, and from the ground her foot

  Gleamed rosywhite, and o’er her rounded form

  Between the shadows of the vine-bunches

  Floated the glowing sunlights, as she moved.

  “Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  She with a subtle smile in her mild eyes,

  The herald of her triumph, drawing nigh

  Half-whispered in his ear, ‘I promise thee

  The fairest and most loving wife in Greece’.

  I only saw my Paris raise his arm:

  I only saw great Herè’s angry eyes,

  As she withdrew into the golden cloud,

  And I was left alone within the bower;

  And from that time to this I am alone.

  And I shall be alone until I die.

  “Yet, mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  Fairest why fairest wife? am I not fair?

  My love hath told me so a thousand times.

  Methinks I must be fair, for yesterday,

  When I passed by, a wild and wanton pard,

  Eyed like the evening star, with playful tail

  Crouched fawning in the weed. Most loving is she?

  Ah me, my mountain shepherd, that my arms

  Were wound about thee, and my hot lips prest

  Close-close to thine in that quickfalling dew

  Of fruitful kisses, thick as Autumn rains

  Flash in the pools of whirling Simois.

  “Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  They came, they cut away my tallest pines

  My dark tall pines, that plumed the craggy ledge

  High over the blue gorge, or lower down

  Filling greengulphèd Ida, all between

  The snowy peak and snowwhite cataract

  Fostered the callow eaglet from beneath

  Whose thick mysterious boughs in the dark

  The panther’s roar came muffled, while I sat

  Low in the valley. Never, nevermore

  Shall lone Œnone see the morning mist

  Sweep thro’ them never see them overlaid

  With narrow moon-lit slips of silver cloud,

  Between the loud stream and the trembling stars.

  “Oh! mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  Hath he not sworn his love a thousand times,

  In this green valley, under this green hill,

  Ev’n on this hand, and sitting on this stone?

  Sealed it with kisses? watered it with tears?

  Oh happy tears, and how unlike to these!

  Oh happy Heaven, how can’st thou see my face?

  Oh happy earth, how can’st thou bear my weight?

  O death, death, death, thou ever-floating cloud,

  There are enough unhappy on this earth,

  Pass by the happy souls, that love to live:

  I pray thee, pass before my light of life.

  And shadow all my soul, that I may die.

  Thou weighest heavy on the heart within,

  Weigh heavy on my eyelids let me die.

  “Yet, mother Ida, hear me ere I die.

  I will not die alone, for fiery thoughts

  Do shape themselves within me, more and more,

  Whereof I catch the issue, as I hear

  Dead sounds at night come from the inmost hills,

  Like footsteps upon wool. I dimly see

  My far-off doubtful purpose, as a mother

  Conjectures of the features of her child

  Ere it is born. I will not die alone.

  “Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.

  Hear me, O earth. I will not die alone,

  Lest their shrill, happy laughter, etc.

  (Same as last stanza of subsequent editions.)

  The Sisters

  We were two daughters of one race:

  She was the fairest in the face:

  The wind is blowing in turret and tree.

  They were together and she fell;

  Therefore revenge became me well.

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  She died: she went to burning flame:

  She mix’d her ancient blood with shame.

  The wind is howling in turret and tree.

  Whole weeks and months, and early and late,

  To win his love I lay in wait:

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  I made a feast; I bad him come;

  I won his love, I brought him home.

  The wind is roaring in turret and tree.

  And after supper, on a bed,

  Upon my lap he laid his head:

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  I kiss’d his eyelids into rest:

  His ruddy cheek upon my breast.

  The wind is raging in turret and tree.

  I hated him with the hate of hell,

  But I loved his beauty passing well.

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  I rose up in the silent night:

  I made my dagger sharp and bright.

  The wind is raving in turret and tree.

 
; As half-asleep his breath he drew,

  Three times I stabb’d him thro’ and thro’.

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  I curl’d and comb’d his comely head,

  He look’d so grand when he was dead.

  The wind is blowing in turret and tree.

  I wrapt his body in the sheet,

  And laid him at his mother’s feet.

  O the Earl was fair to see!

  To ––

  I send you here a sort of allegory,

  (For you will understand it) of a soul,

  A sinful soul possess’d of many gifts,

  A spacious garden full of flowering weeds,

  A glorious Devil, large in heart and brain,

  That did love Beauty only, (Beauty seen

  In all varieties of mould and mind)

  And Knowledge for its beauty; or if Good,

  Good only for its beauty, seeing not

  That beauty, Good, and Knowledge, are three sisters

  That doat upon each other, friends to man,

  Living together under the same roof,

  And never can be sunder’d without tears.

  And he that shuts Love out, in turn shall be

  Shut out from Love, and on her threshold lie

  Howling in outer darkness. Not for this

  Was common clay ta’en from the common earth,

  Moulded by God, and temper’d with the tears

  Of angels to the perfect shape of man.

  The Palace of Art

  I built my soul a lordly pleasure-house

  Wherein at ease for aye to dwell.

  I said, “O Soul, make merry and carouse,

  Dear soul, for all is well”.

  A huge crag-platform, smooth as burnish’d brass,

  I chose. The ranged ramparts bright

  From level meadow-bases of deep grass

  Suddenly scaled the light.

  Thereon I built it firm. Of ledge or shelf

  The rock rose clear, or winding stair.

  My soul would live alone unto herself

  In her high palace there.

  And “while the world runs round and round,”

  I said, “Reign thou apart, a quiet king,

  Still as, while Saturn whirls, his stedfast shade

  Sleeps on his luminous ring.”

  To which my soul made answer readily:

  “Trust me, in bliss I shall abide

  In this great mansion, that is built for me,

  So royal-rich and wide”

  ...

  Four courts I made, East, West and South and North,

  In each a squared lawn, wherefrom

  The golden gorge of dragons spouted forth

  A flood of fountain-foam.

  And round the cool green courts there ran a row

  Of cloisters, branch’d like mighty woods,

  Echoing all night to that sonorous flow

  Of spouted fountain-floods.

  And round the roofs a gilded gallery

  That lent broad verge to distant lands,

  Far as the wild swan wings, to where the sky

  Dipt down to sea and sands.

  From those four jets four currents in one swell

  Across the mountain stream’d below

  In misty folds, that floating as they fell

  Lit up a torrent-bow.

  And high on every peak a statue seem’d

  To hang on tiptoe, tossing up

  A cloud of incense of all odour steam’d

  From out a golden cup.

  So that she thought, “And who shall gaze upon

  My palace with unblinded eyes,

  While this great bow will waver in the sun,

  And that sweet incense rise?”

  For that sweet incense rose and never fail’d,

  And, while day sank or mounted higher,

  The light aerial gallery, golden-rail’d,

  Burnt like a fringe of fire.

  Likewise the deep-set windows, stain’d and traced,

  Would seem slow-flaming crimson fires

  From shadow’d grots of arches interlaced,

  And tipt with frost-like spires.

  ...

  Full of long-sounding corridors it was,

  That over-vaulted grateful gloom,

  Thro’ which the livelong day my soul did pass,

  Well-pleased, from room to room.

  Full of great rooms and small the palace stood,

  All various, each a perfect whole

  From living Nature, fit for every mood

  And change of my still soul.

  For some were hung with arras green and blue,

  Showing a gaudy summer-morn,

  Where with puff’d cheek the belted hunter blew

  His wreathed bugle-horn.

  One seem’d all dark and red a tract of sand,

  And some one pacing there alone,

  Who paced for ever in a glimmering land,

  Lit with a low large moon.

  One show’d an iron coast and angry waves.

  You seem’d to hear them climb and fall

  And roar rock-thwarted under bellowing caves,

  Beneath the windy wall.

  And one, a full-fed river winding slow

  By herds upon an endless plain,

  The ragged rims of thunder brooding low,

  With shadow-streaks of rain.

  And one, the reapers at their sultry toil.

  In front they bound the sheaves.

  Behind Were realms of upland, prodigal in oil,

  And hoary to the wind.

  And one, a foreground black with stones and slags,

  Beyond, a line of heights, and higher

  All barr’d with long white cloud the scornful crags,

  And highest, snow and fire.

  And one, an English home gray twilight pour’d

  On dewy pastures, dewy trees,

  Softer than sleep all things in order stored,

  A haunt of ancient Peace.

  Nor these alone, but every landscape fair,

  As fit for every mood of mind,

  Or gay, or grave, or sweet, or stern, was there,

  Not less than truth design’d.

  ...

  Or the maid-mother by a crucifix,

  In tracts of pasture sunny-warm,

  Beneath branch-work of costly sardonyx

  Sat smiling, babe in arm.

  Or in a clear-wall’d city on the sea,

  Near gilded organ-pipes, her hair

  Wound with white roses, slept St. Cecily;

  An angel look’d at her.

  Or thronging all one porch of Paradise,

  A group of Houris bow’d to see

  The dying Islamite, with hands and eyes

  That said, We wait for thee.

  Or mythic Uther’s deeply-wounded son

  In some fair space of sloping greens

  Lay, dozing in the vale of Avalon,

  And watch’d by weeping queens.

  Or hollowing one hand against his ear,

  To list a foot-fall, ere he saw

  The wood-nymph, stay’d the Ausonian king to hear

  Of wisdom and of law.

  Or over hills with peaky tops engrail’d,

  And many a tract of palm and rice,

  The throne of Indian Cama slowly sail’d

  A summer fann’d with spice.

  Or sweet Europa’s mantle blew unclasp’d,

  From off her shoulder backward borne:

  From one hand droop’d a crocus: one hand grasp’d

  The mild bull’s golden horn.

  Or else flush’d Ganymede, his rosy thigh

  Half-buried in the Eagle’s down,

  Sole as a flying star shot thro’ the sky

  Above the pillar’d town.

  Nor these alone: but every legend fair

  Which the supreme Caucasian mind

  Carved out of Nature for itself, was there,

>   Not less than life, design’d.

  * * * *

  Then in the towers I placed great bells that swung,

  Moved of themselves, with silver sound;

  And with choice paintings of wise men I hung

  The royal dais round.

  For there was Milton like a seraph strong,

  Beside him Shakespeare bland and mild;

  And there the world-worn Dante grasp’d his song,

  And somewhat grimly smiled.

  And there the Ionian father of the rest;

  A million wrinkles carved his skin;

  A hundred winters snow’d upon his breast,

  From cheek and throat and chin.

  Above, the fair hall-ceiling stately set

  Many an arch high up did lift,

  And angels rising and descending met

  With interchange of gift.

  Below was all mosaic choicely plann’d

  With cycles of the human tale

  Of this wide world, the times of every land

  So wrought, they will not fail.

  The people here, a beast of burden slow,

  Toil’d onward, prick’d with goads and stings;

  Here play’d, a tiger, rolling to and fro

  The heads and crowns of kings;

  Here rose, an athlete, strong to break or bind

  All force in bonds that might endure,

  And here once more like some sick man declined,

  And trusted any cure.

  But over these she trod: and those great bells

  Began to chime. She took her throne:

  She sat betwixt the shining Oriels,

  To sing her songs alone.

  And thro’ the topmost Oriels’ colour’d flame

  Two godlike faces gazed below;

  Plato the wise, and large-brow’d Verulam,

  The first of those who know.

  And all those names, that in their motion were

  Full-welling fountain-heads of change,

  Betwixt the slender shafts were blazon’d fair

  In diverse raiment strange:

  Thro’ which the lights, rose, amber, emerald, blue,

  Flush’d in her temples and her eyes,

  And from her lips, as morn from Memnon, drew

  Rivers of melodies.

  No nightingale delighteth to prolong

  Her low preamble all alone,

  More than my soul to hear her echo’d song

  Throb thro’ the ribbed stone;

  Singing and murmuring in her feastful mirth,

  Joying to feel herself alive,

  Lord over Nature, Lord of the visible earth,

  Lord of the senses five;

  Communing with herself: “All these are mine,

  And let the world have peace or wars,

  Tis one to me”. She when young night divine

  Crown’d dying day with stars,

  Making sweet close of his delicious toils

  Lit light in wreaths and anadems,

  And pure quintessences of precious oils