Alfred, Lord Tennyson - Delphi Poets Series

by Lord Tennyson Alfred

  And lost to life and use and name and fame.

  And Vivien ever sought to work the charm

  Upon the great Enchanter of the Time,

  As fancying that her glory would be great

  According to his greatness whom she quenched.

  There lay she all her length and kissed his feet,

  As if in deepest reverence and in love.

  A twist of gold was round her hair; a robe

  Of samite without price, that more exprest

  Than hid her, clung about her lissome limbs,

  In colour like the satin-shining palm

  On sallows in the windy gleams of March:

  And while she kissed them, crying, ‘Trample me,

  Dear feet, that I have followed through the world,

  And I will pay you worship; tread me down

  And I will kiss you for it;’ he was mute:

  So dark a forethought rolled about his brain,

  As on a dull day in an Ocean cave

  The blind wave feeling round his long sea-hall

  In silence: wherefore, when she lifted up

  A face of sad appeal, and spake and said,

  ‘O Merlin, do ye love me?’ and again,

  ‘O Merlin, do ye love me?’ and once more,

  ‘Great Master, do ye love me?’ he was mute.

  And lissome Vivien, holding by his heel,

  Writhed toward him, slided up his knee and sat,

  Behind his ankle twined her hollow feet

  Together, curved an arm about his neck,

  Clung like a snake; and letting her left hand

  Droop from his mighty shoulder, as a leaf,

  Made with her right a comb of pearl to part

  The lists of such a board as youth gone out

  Had left in ashes: then he spoke and said,

  Not looking at her, ‘Who are wise in love

  Love most, say least,’ and Vivien answered quick,

  ‘I saw the little elf-god eyeless once

  In Arthur’s arras hall at Camelot:

  But neither eyes nor tongue — O stupid child!

  Yet you are wise who say it; let me think

  Silence is wisdom: I am silent then,

  And ask no kiss;’ then adding all at once,

  ‘And lo, I clothe myself with wisdom,’ drew

  The vast and shaggy mantle of his beard

  Across her neck and bosom to her knee,

  And called herself a gilded summer fly

  Caught in a great old tyrant spider’s web,

  Who meant to eat her up in that wild wood

  Without one word. So Vivien called herself,

  But rather seemed a lovely baleful star

  Veiled in gray vapour; till he sadly smiled:

  ‘To what request for what strange boon,’ he said,

  ‘Are these your pretty tricks and fooleries,

  O Vivien, the preamble? yet my thanks,

  For these have broken up my melancholy.’

  And Vivien answered smiling saucily,

  ‘What, O my Master, have ye found your voice?

  I bid the stranger welcome. Thanks at last!

  But yesterday you never opened lip,

  Except indeed to drink: no cup had we:

  In mine own lady palms I culled the spring

  That gathered trickling dropwise from the cleft,

  And made a pretty cup of both my hands

  And offered you it kneeling: then you drank

  And knew no more, nor gave me one poor word;

  O no more thanks than might a goat have given

  With no more sign of reverence than a beard.

  And when we halted at that other well,

  And I was faint to swooning, and you lay

  Foot-gilt with all the blossom-dust of those

  Deep meadows we had traversed, did you know

  That Vivien bathed your feet before her own?

  And yet no thanks: and all through this wild wood

  And all this morning when I fondled you:

  Boon, ay, there was a boon, one not so strange —

  How had I wronged you? surely ye are wise,

  But such a silence is more wise than kind.’

  And Merlin locked his hand in hers and said:

  ‘O did ye never lie upon the shore,

  And watch the curled white of the coming wave

  Glassed in the slippery sand before it breaks?

  Even such a wave, but not so pleasurable,

  Dark in the glass of some presageful mood,

  Had I for three days seen, ready to fall.

  And then I rose and fled from Arthur’s court

  To break the mood. You followed me unasked;

  And when I looked, and saw you following me still,

  My mind involved yourself the nearest thing

  In that mind-mist: for shall I tell you truth?

  You seemed that wave about to break upon me

  And sweep me from my hold upon the world,

  My use and name and fame. Your pardon, child.

  Your pretty sports have brightened all again.

  And ask your boon, for boon I owe you thrice,

  Once for wrong done you by confusion, next

  For thanks it seems till now neglected, last

  For these your dainty gambols: wherefore ask;

  And take this boon so strange and not so strange.’

  And Vivien answered smiling mournfully:

  ‘O not so strange as my long asking it,

  Not yet so strange as you yourself are strange,

  Nor half so strange as that dark mood of yours.

  I ever feared ye were not wholly mine;

  And see, yourself have owned ye did me wrong.

  The people call you prophet: let it be:

  But not of those that can expound themselves.

  Take Vivien for expounder; she will call

  That three-days-long presageful gloom of yours

  No presage, but the same mistrustful mood

  That makes you seem less noble than yourself,

  Whenever I have asked this very boon,

  Now asked again: for see you not, dear love,

  That such a mood as that, which lately gloomed

  Your fancy when ye saw me following you,

  Must make me fear still more you are not mine,

  Must make me yearn still more to prove you mine,

  And make me wish still more to learn this charm

  Of woven paces and of waving hands,

  As proof of trust. O Merlin, teach it me.

  The charm so taught will charm us both to rest.

  For, grant me some slight power upon your fate,

  I, feeling that you felt me worthy trust,

  Should rest and let you rest, knowing you mine.

  And therefore be as great as ye are named,

  Not muffled round with selfish reticence.

  How hard you look and how denyingly!

  O, if you think this wickedness in me,

  That I should prove it on you unawares,

  That makes me passing wrathful; then our bond

  Had best be loosed for ever: but think or not,

  By Heaven that hears I tell you the clean truth,

  As clean as blood of babes, as white as milk:

  O Merlin, may this earth, if ever I,

  If these unwitty wandering wits of mine,

  Even in the jumbled rubbish of a dream,

  Have tript on such conjectural treachery —

  May this hard earth cleave to the Nadir hell

  Down, down, and close again, and nip me flat,

  If I be such a traitress. Yield my boon,

  Till which I scarce can yield you all I am;

  And grant my re-reiterated wish,

  The great proof of your love: because I think,

  However wise, ye hardly know me yet.’

  And Merlin loosed his hand from hers and said,

  ‘I never w
as less wise, however wise,

  Too curious Vivien, though you talk of trust,

  Than when I told you first of such a charm.

  Yea, if ye talk of trust I tell you this,

  Too much I trusted when I told you that,

  And stirred this vice in you which ruined man

  Through woman the first hour; for howsoe’er

  In children a great curiousness be well,

  Who have to learn themselves and all the world,

  In you, that are no child, for still I find

  Your face is practised when I spell the lines,

  I call it, — well, I will not call it vice:

  But since you name yourself the summer fly,

  I well could wish a cobweb for the gnat,

  That settles, beaten back, and beaten back

  Settles, till one could yield for weariness:

  But since I will not yield to give you power

  Upon my life and use and name and fame,

  Why will ye never ask some other boon?

  Yea, by God’s rood, I trusted you too much.’

  And Vivien, like the tenderest-hearted maid

  That ever bided tryst at village stile,

  Made answer, either eyelid wet with tears:

  ‘Nay, Master, be not wrathful with your maid;

  Caress her: let her feel herself forgiven

  Who feels no heart to ask another boon.

  I think ye hardly know the tender rhyme

  Of “trust me not at all or all in all.”

  I heard the great Sir Lancelot sing it once,

  And it shall answer for me. Listen to it.

  “In Love, if Love be Love, if Love be ours,

  Faith and unfaith can ne’er be equal powers:

  Unfaith in aught is want of faith in all.

  “It is the little rift within the lute,

  That by and by will make the music mute,

  And ever widening slowly silence all.

  “The little rift within the lover’s lute

  Or little pitted speck in garnered fruit,

  That rotting inward slowly moulders all.

  “It is not worth the keeping: let it go:

  But shall it? answer, darling, answer, no.

  And trust me not at all or all in all.”

  O Master, do ye love my tender rhyme?’

  And Merlin looked and half believed her true,

  So tender was her voice, so fair her face,

  So sweetly gleamed her eyes behind her tears

  Like sunlight on the plain behind a shower:

  And yet he answered half indignantly:

  ‘Far other was the song that once I heard

  By this huge oak, sung nearly where we sit:

  For here we met, some ten or twelve of us,

  To chase a creature that was current then

  In these wild woods, the hart with golden horns.

  It was the time when first the question rose

  About the founding of a Table Round,

  That was to be, for love of God and men

  And noble deeds, the flower of all the world.

  And each incited each to noble deeds.

  And while we waited, one, the youngest of us,

  We could not keep him silent, out he flashed,

  And into such a song, such fire for fame,

  Such trumpet-glowings in it, coming down

  To such a stern and iron-clashing close,

  That when he stopt we longed to hurl together,

  And should have done it; but the beauteous beast

  Scared by the noise upstarted at our feet,

  And like a silver shadow slipt away

  Through the dim land; and all day long we rode

  Through the dim land against a rushing wind,

  That glorious roundel echoing in our ears,

  And chased the flashes of his golden horns

  Till they vanished by the fairy well

  That laughs at iron — as our warriors did —

  Where children cast their pins and nails, and cry,

  “Laugh, little well!” but touch it with a sword,

  It buzzes fiercely round the point; and there

  We lost him: such a noble song was that.

  But, Vivien, when you sang me that sweet rhyme,

  I felt as though you knew this cursed charm,

  Were proving it on me, and that I lay

  And felt them slowly ebbing, name and fame.’

  And Vivien answered smiling mournfully:

  ‘O mine have ebbed away for evermore,

  And all through following you to this wild wood,

  Because I saw you sad, to comfort you.

  Lo now, what hearts have men! they never mount

  As high as woman in her selfless mood.

  And touching fame, howe’er ye scorn my song,

  Take one verse more — the lady speaks it — this:

  ‘“My name, once mine, now thine, is closelier mine,

  For fame, could fame be mine, that fame were thine,

  And shame, could shame be thine, that shame were mine.

  So trust me not at all or all in all.”

  ‘Says she not well? and there is more — this rhyme

  Is like the fair pearl-necklace of the Queen,

  That burst in dancing, and the pearls were spilt;

  Some lost, some stolen, some as relics kept.

  But nevermore the same two sister pearls

  Ran down the silken thread to kiss each other

  On her white neck — so is it with this rhyme:

  It lives dispersedly in many hands,

  And every minstrel sings it differently;

  Yet is there one true line, the pearl of pearls:

  “Man dreams of Fame while woman wakes to love.”

  Yea! Love, though Love were of the grossest, carves

  A portion from the solid present, eats

  And uses, careless of the rest; but Fame,

  The Fame that follows death is nothing to us;

  And what is Fame in life but half-disfame,

  And counterchanged with darkness? ye yourself

  Know well that Envy calls you Devil’s son,

  And since ye seem the Master of all Art,

  They fain would make you Master of all vice.’

  And Merlin locked his hand in hers and said,

  ‘I once was looking for a magic weed,

  And found a fair young squire who sat alone,

  Had carved himself a knightly shield of wood,

  And then was painting on it fancied arms,

  Azure, an Eagle rising or, the Sun

  In dexter chief; the scroll “I follow fame.”

  And speaking not, but leaning over him

  I took his brush and blotted out the bird,

  And made a Gardener putting in a graff,

  With this for motto, “Rather use than fame.”

  You should have seen him blush; but afterwards

  He made a stalwart knight. O Vivien,

  For you, methinks you think you love me well;

  For me, I love you somewhat; rest: and Love

  Should have some rest and pleasure in himself,

  Not ever be too curious for a boon,

  Too prurient for a proof against the grain

  Of him ye say ye love: but Fame with men,

  Being but ampler means to serve mankind,

  Should have small rest or pleasure in herself,

  But work as vassal to the larger love,

  That dwarfs the petty love of one to one.

  Use gave me Fame at first, and Fame again

  Increasing gave me use. Lo, there my boon!

  What other? for men sought to prove me vile,

  Because I fain had given them greater wits:

  And then did Envy call me Devil’s son:

  The sick weak beast seeking to help herself

  By striking at her better, missed, and brought

  Her own cla
w back, and wounded her own heart.

  Sweet were the days when I was all unknown,

  But when my name was lifted up, the storm

  Brake on the mountain and I cared not for it.

  Right well know I that Fame is half-disfame,

  Yet needs must work my work. That other fame,

  To one at least, who hath not children, vague,

  The cackle of the unborn about the grave,

  I cared not for it: a single misty star,

  Which is the second in a line of stars

  That seem a sword beneath a belt of three,

  I never gazed upon it but I dreamt

  Of some vast charm concluded in that star

  To make fame nothing. Wherefore, if I fear,

  Giving you power upon me through this charm,

  That you might play me falsely, having power,

  However well ye think ye love me now

  (As sons of kings loving in pupilage

  Have turned to tyrants when they came to power)

  I rather dread the loss of use than fame;

  If you — and not so much from wickedness,

  As some wild turn of anger, or a mood

  Of overstrained affection, it may be,

  To keep me all to your own self, — or else

  A sudden spurt of woman’s jealousy, —

  Should try this charm on whom ye say ye love.’

  And Vivien answered smiling as in wrath:

  ‘Have I not sworn? I am not trusted. Good!

  Well, hide it, hide it; I shall find it out;

  And being found take heed of Vivien.

  A woman and not trusted, doubtless I

  Might feel some sudden turn of anger born

  Of your misfaith; and your fine epithet

  Is accurate too, for this full love of mine

  Without the full heart back may merit well

  Your term of overstrained. So used as I,

  My daily wonder is, I love at all.

  And as to woman’s jealousy, O why not?

  O to what end, except a jealous one,

  And one to make me jealous if I love,

  Was this fair charm invented by yourself?

  I well believe that all about this world

  Ye cage a buxom captive here and there,

  Closed in the four walls of a hollow tower

  From which is no escape for evermore.’

  Then the great Master merrily answered her:

  ‘Full many a love in loving youth was mine;

  I needed then no charm to keep them mine

  But youth and love; and that full heart of yours

  Whereof ye prattle, may now assure you mine;

  So live uncharmed. For those who wrought it first,

  The wrist is parted from the hand that waved,

  The feet unmortised from their ankle-bones

  Who paced it, ages back: but will ye hear

  The legend as in guerdon for your rhyme?