Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne (Illustrated) (Delphi Poets Series)
Page 189
MARY SEYTON.
And the most loving: did you note last night
How long she held him with her hands and eyes,
Looking a little sadly, and at last
Kissed him below the chin and parted so
As the dance ended?
MARY HAMILTON.
This was courtesy;
So might I kiss my singing-bird’s red bill
After some song, till he bit short my lip.
MARY SEYTON.
But if a lady hold her bird anights
To sing to her between her fingers-ha?
I have seen such birds.
MARY CARMICHAEL.
O, you talk emptily;
She is full of grace; and marriage in good time
Will wash the fool called scandal off men’s lips.
MARY HAMILTON.
I know not that; I know how folk would gibe
If one of us pushed courtesy so far.
She has always loved love’s fashions well; you wot,
The marshal, head friend of this Chastelard’s,
She used to talk with ere he brought her here
And sow their talk with little kisses thick
As roses in rose-harvest. For myself,
I cannot see which side of her that lurks,
Which snares in such wise all the sense of men;
What special beauty, subtle as man’s eye
And tender as the inside of the eyelid is,
There grows about her.
MARY CARMICHAEL.
I think her cunning speech —
The soft and rapid shudder of her breath
In talking — the rare tender little laugh —
The pitiful sweet sound like a bird’s sigh
When her voice breaks; her talking does it all.
MARY SEYTON.
I say, her eyes with those clear perfect brows:
It is the playing of those eyelashes,
The lure of amorous looks as sad as love,
Plucks all souls toward her like a net.
MARY HAMILTON.
What, what!
You praise her in too lover-like a wise
For women that praise women; such report
Is like robes worn the rough side next the skin,
Frets where it warms.
MARY SEYTON.
You think too much in French.
Enter DARNLEY.
Here comes your thorn; what glove against it now?
MARY HAMILTON.
O, God’s good pity! this a thorn of mine?
It has not run deep in yet.
MARY CARMICHAEL.
I am not sure:
The red runs over to your face’s edge.
DARNLEY.
Give me one word; nay, lady, for love’s sake;
Here, come this way; I will not keep you; no.
— O my sweet soul, why do you wrong me thus?
MARY HAMILTON.
Why will you give me for men’s eyes to burn?
DARNLEY.
What, sweet, I love you as mine own soul loves me;
They shall divide when we do.
MARY HAMILTON.
I cannot say.
DARNLEY.
Why, look you, I am broken with the queen;
This is the rancor and the bitter heart
That grows in you; by God it is nought else.
Why, this last night she held me for a fool —
Ay, God wot, for a thing of stripe and bell.
I bade her make me marshal in her masque —
I had the dress here painted, gold and gray
(That is, not gray but a blue-green like this) —
She tells me she had chosen her marshal, she,
The best o’ the world for cunning and sweet wit;
And what sweet fool but her sweet knight, God help!
To serve her with that three-inch wit of his?
She is all fool and fiddling now; for me,
I am well-pleased; God knows, if I might choose
I would not be more troubled with her love.
Her love is like a briar that rasps the flesh,
And yours is soft like flowers. Come this way, love;
So, further in this window; hark you here.
Enter CHASTELARD.
MARY BEATON.
Good morrow, sir.
CHASTELARD.
Good morrow, noble lady.
MARY CARMICHAEL.
You have heard no news? what news?
CHASTELARD.
Nay, I have none.
That maiden-tongued male-faced Elizabeth
Hath eyes unlike our queen’s, hair not so soft,
And lips no kiss of love’s could bring to flower
In such red wise as our queen’s; save this news,
I know none English.
MARY SEYTON.
Come, no news of her;
For God’s love talk still rather of our queen.
MARY BEATON.
God give us grace then to speak well of her.
You did right joyfully in our masque last night’
I saw you when the queen lost breath (her head
Bent back, her chin and lips catching the air —
A goodly thing to see her) how you smiled
Across her head, between your lips-no doubt
You had great joy, sir. Did you not take note
Once how one lock fell? that was good to see.
CHASTELARD.
Yea, good enough to live for.
MARY BEATON.
Nay, but sweet
Enough to die. When she broke off the dance,
Turning round short and soft-I never saw
Such supple ways of walking as she has.
CHASTLELARD.
Why do you praise her gracious looks to me?
MARY BEATON.
Sir, for mere sport: but tell me even for love
How much you love her.
CHASTELARD.
I know not: it may be
If I had set mine eyes to find that out,
I should not know it. She hath fair eyes: may be
I love her for sweet eyes or brows or hair,
For the smooth temples, where God touching her
Made blue with sweeter veins the flower-sweet white
Or for the tender turning of her wrist,
Or marriage of the eyelid with the cheek;
I cannot tell; or flush of lifting throat,
I know not if the color get a name
This side of heaven-no man knows; or her mouth,
A flower’s lip with a snake’s lip, stinging sweet,
And sweet to sting with: face that one would see
And then fall blind and die with sight of it
Held fast between the eyelids-oh, all these
And all her body and the soul to that,
The speech and shape and hand and foot and heart
That I would die of-yea, her name that turns
My face to fire being written-I know no whit
How much I love them.
MARY BEATON.
Nor how she loves you back?
CHASTELARD.
I know her ways of loving, all of them:
A sweet soft way the first is; afterward
It burns and bites like fire; the end of that,
Charred dust, and eyelids bitten through with smoke.
MARY BEATON.
What has she done for you to gird at her?
CHASTELARD.
Nothing. You do not greatly love her, you,
Who do not-gird, you call it. I am bound to France;
Shall I take word from you to any one?
So it be harmless, not a gird, I will.
MARY BEATON.
I doubt you will not go hence with your life.
CHASTELARD.
Why, who should slay me? No man northwards born,
In my poor mind; my sword’s lip is no maid’s
; To fear the iron biting of their own,
Though they kiss hard for hate’s sake.
MARY BEATON.
Lo you, sir,
How sharp he whispers, what close breath and eyes —
And here are fast upon him, do you see?
CHASTELARD.
Well, which of these must take my life in hand?
Pray God it be the better: nay, which hand?
MARY BEATON.
I think, none such. The man is goodly made;
She is tender-hearted toward his courtesies,
And would not have them fall too low to find.
Look, they slip forth.
[Exeunt DARNLEY and MARY HAMILTON.]
MARY SEYTON.
For love’s sake, after them,
And soft as love can.
[Exeunt MARY CARMICHAEL and MARY SEYTON.]
CHASTELARD.
True, a goodly man.
What shapeliness and state he hath, what eyes,
Brave brow and lordly lip! Were it not fit
Great queens should love him?
MARY BEATON.
See how now, fair lord,
I have but scant breath’s time to help myself,
And I must cast my heart out on a chance;
So bear with me. That we twain have loved well,
I have no heart nor wit to say; God wot
We had never made good lovers, you and I.
Look you, I would not have you love me, sir,
For all the love’s sake in the world. I say,
You love the queen, and loving burns you up,
And mars the grace and joyous wit you had,
Turning your speech to sad, your face to strange,
Your mirth to nothing: and I am piteous, I,
Even as the queen is, and such women are;
And if I helped you to your love-longing,
Meseems some grain of love might fall my way
And love’s god help me when I came to love;
I have read tales of men that won their loves
On some such wise.
CHASTELARD.
If you mean mercifully,
I am bound to you past thought and thank; if worse
I will but thank your lips and not your heart.
MARY BEATON.
Nay, let love wait and praise me, in God’s name,
Some day when he shall find me; yet, God wot,
My lips are of one color with my heart.
Withdraw now from me, and about midnight
In some close chamber without light or noise
It may be I shall get you speech of her:
She loves you well: it may be she will speak,
I wot not what; she loves you at her heart.
Let her not see that I have given you word,
Lest she take shame and hate her love. Till night
Let her not see it.
CHASTLELARD.
I will not thank you now,
And then I’ll die what sort of death you will.
Farewell.
[Exit.]
MARY BEATON.
And by God’s mercy and my love’s
I will find ways to earn such thank of you.
[Exit.]
SCENE II.
A Hall in the same.
The QUEEN, DARNLEY, MURRAY, RANDOLPH, the MARIES, CHASTELARD, &c.
QUEEN.
Hath no man seen my lord of Chastelard?
Nay, no great matter. Keep you on that side:
Begin the purpose.
MARY CARMICHAEL.
Madam, he is here.
QUEEN.
Begin a measure now that other side.
I will not dance; let them play soft a little.
Fair sir, we had a dance to tread to-night,
To teach our north folk all sweet ways of France,
But at this time we have no heart to it.
Sit, sir, and talk. Look, this breast-clasp is new,
The French king sent it me.
CHASTELARD.
A goodly thing:
But what device? the word is ill to catch.
QUEEN.
A Venus crowned, that eats the hearts of men:
Below her flies a love with a bat’s wings,
And strings the hair of paramours to bind
Live birds’ feet with. Lo what small subtle work:
The smith’s name, Gian Grisostomo da — what?
Can you read that? The sea froths underfoot;
She stands upon the sea and it curls up
In soft loose curls that run to one in the wind.
But her hair is not shaken, there ‘s a fault;
It lies straight down in close-cut points and tongues,
Not like blown hair. The legend is writ small:
Still one makes out this — *Cave* — if you look.
CHASTELARD.
I see the Venus well enough, God wot,
But nothing of the legend.
QUEEN.
Come, fair lord,
Shall we dance now? My heart is good again.
[They dance a measure.]
DARNLEY.
I do not like this manner of a dance,
This game of two by two; it were much better
To meet between the changes and to mix
Than still to keep apart and whispering
Each lady out of earshot with her friend.
MARY BEATON.
That ‘s as the lady serves her knight, I think:
We are broken up too much.
DARNLEY.
Nay, no such thing;
Be not wroth, lady, I wot it was the queen
Pricked each his friend out. Look you now — your ear —
If love had gone by choosing — how they laugh,
Lean lips together, and wring hands underhand!
What, you look white too, sick of heart, ashamed,
No marvel — for men call it — hark you though —
[They pass.]
MURRAY.
Was the queen found no merrier in France?
MARY HAMILTON.
Why, have you seen her sorrowful to-night?
MURRAY.
I say not so much; blithe she seems at whiles,
Gentle and goodly doubtless in all ways,
But hardly with such lightness and quick heart
As it was said.
MARY HAMILTON.
’Tis your great care of her
Makes you misdoubt; nought else.
MURRAY.
Yea, may be so;
She has no cause I know to sadden her.
[They pass.]
QUEEN.
I am tired too soon; I could have danced down hours
Two years gone hence and felt no wearier.
One grows much older northwards, my fair lord;
I wonder men die south; meseems all France
Smells sweet with living, and bright breath of days
That keep men far from dying. Peace; pray you now,
No dancing more. Sing, sweet, and make us mirth;
We have done with dancing measures: sing that song
You call the song of love at ebb.
MARY BEATON.
[Sings.]
1.
Between the sunset and the sea
My love laid hands and lips on me;
Of sweet came sour, of day came night,
Of long desire came brief delight:
Ah love, and what thing came of thee
Between the sea-downs and the sea?
2.
Between the sea-mark and the sea
Joy grew to grief, grief grew to me;
Love turned to tears, and tears to fire,
And dead delight to new desire;
Love’s talk, love’s touch there seemed to be
Between the sea-sand and the sea.
3.
Between the sundown and the sea
Love watched one hour of love with me;<
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Then down the all-golden water-ways
His feet flew after yesterday’s;
I saw them come and saw them flee
Between the sea-foam and the sea.
4.
Between the sea-strand and the sea
Love fell on sleep, sleep fell on me;
The first star saw twain turn to one
Between the moonrise and the sun;
The next, that saw not love, saw me
Between the sea-banks and the sea.
QUEEN.
Lo, sirs,
What mirth is here! Some song of yours, fair lord;
You know glad ways of rhyming — no such tunes
As go to tears.
CHASTELARD.
I made this yesterday;
For its love’s sake I pray you let it live.
1.
Apres tant de jours, apres tant de pleurs,
Soyez secourable a mon ame en peine.
Voyez comme Avril fait l’amour aux fleurs;
Dame d’amour, dame aux belles couleurs,
Dieu vous a fait belle, Amour vous fait reine.
2.
Rions, je t’en prie; aimons, je le veux.
Le temps fuit et rit et ne revient guere
Pour baiser le bout de tes blonds cheveux,
Pour baiser tes cils, ta bouche et tes yeux;
L’amour n’a qu’un jour aupres de sa mere.
QUEEN.
’T is a true song; love shall not pluck time back
Nor time lie down with love. For me, I am old;
Have you no hair changed since you changed to Scot?
I look each day to see my face drawn up
About the eyes, as if they sucked the cheeks.
I think this air and face of things here north
Puts snow at flower-time in the blood, and tears
Between the sad eyes and the merry mouth
In their youth-days.
CHASTELARD.
It is a bitter air.
QUEEN.
Faith, if I might be gone, sir, would I stay?