Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series

by Robert Browning

  When the crickets stopped their cry,

  When the owls forbore a term,

  You heard music; that was I.

  III.

  Earth turned in her sleep with pain,

  Sultrily suspired for proof:

  In at heaven and out again,

  Lightning! — where it broke the roof,

  Bloodlike, some few drops of rain.

  IV.

  What they could my words expressed,

  O my love, my all, my one!

  Singing helped the verses best,

  And when singing’s best was done,

  To my lute I left the rest.

  V.

  So wore night; the East was gray,

  White the broad-faced hemlock-flowers:

  There would be another day;

  Ere its first of heavy hours

  Found me, I had passed away.

  VI.

  What became of all the hopes,

  Words and song and lute as well?

  Say, this struck you — ”When life gropes

  Feebly for the path where fell

  Light last on the evening slopes,

  VII.

  “One friend in that path shall be,

  To secure my step from wrong;

  One to count night day for me,

  Patient through the watches long,

  Serving most with none to see.”

  VIII.

  Never say — as something bodes —

  ”So, the worst has yet a worse!

  When life halts ‘neath double loads,

  Better the taskmaster’s curse

  Than such music on the roads!

  IX.

  “When no moon succeeds the sun,

  Nor can pierce the midnight’s tent

  Any star, the smallest one,

  While some drops, where lightning rent,

  Show the final storm begun —

  X.

  “When the fire-fly hides its spot,

  When the garden-voices fail

  In the darkness thick and hot, —

  Shall another voice avail,

  That shape be where these are not?

  XI.

  “Has some plague a longer lease,

  Proffering its help uncouth?

  Can’t one even die in peace?

  As one shuts one’s eyes on youth,

  Is that face the last one sees?”

  XII.

  Oh how dark your villa was,

  Windows fast and obdurate!

  How the garden grudged me grass

  Where I stood — the iron gate

  Ground its teeth to let me pass!

  My Star

  ALL that I know

  Of a certain star,

  Is, it can throw

  (Like the angled spar)

  Now a dart of red,

  Now a dart of blue,

  Till my friends have said

  They would fain see, too,

  My star that dartles the red and the blue!

  Then it stops like a bird; like a flower, hangs furled:

  They must solace themselves with the Saturn above it.

  What matter to me if their star is a world?

  Mine has opened its soul to me; therefore I love it.

  Instans Tyrannus

  I.

  OF THE million or two, more or less,

  I rule and possess,

  One man, for some cause undefined,

  Was least to my mind.

  II.

  I struck him, he grovelled of course —

  For, what was his force?

  I pinned him to earth with my weight

  And persistence of hate:

  And he lay, would not moan, would not curse,

  As his lot might be worse.

  III.

  “Were the object less mean, would he stand

  At the swing of my hand!

  For obscurity helps him and blots

  The hole where he squats.”

  So, I set my five wits on the stretch

  To inveigle the wretch.

  All in vain! Gold and jewels I threw,

  Still he couched there perdue;

  I tempted his blood and his flesh,

  Hid in roses my mesh,

  Choicest cates and the flagon’s best spilth —

  Still he kept to his filth.

  IV.

  Had he kith now or kin, were access

  To his heart, did I press:

  Just a son or a mother to seize!

  No such booty as these.

  Were it simply a friend to pursue

  ‘Mid my million or two,

  Who could pay me in person or pelf

  What he owes me himself!

  No: I could not but smile through my chafe —

  For the fellow lay safe

  As his mates do, the midge and the nit,

  — Through minuteness, to wit.

  V.

  Then a humour more great took its place

  At the thought of his face,

  The droop, the low cares of the mouth,

  The trouble uncouth

  ‘Twixt the brows, all that air one is fain

  To put out of its pain.

  And, “no!” I admonished myself,

  “Is one mocked by an elf,

  Is one baffled by toad or by rat?

  The gravamen’s in that!

  How the lion, who crouches to suit

  His back to my foot,

  Would admire that I stand in debate!

  But the small turns the great

  If it vexes you, — that is the thing!

  Toad or rat vex the king?

  Though I waste half my realm to unearth

  Toad or rat, ‘tis well worth!”

  VI.

  So, I soberly laid my last plan

  To extinguish the man.

  Round his creep-hole, with never a break

  Ran my fires for his sake;

  Over-head, did my thunder combine

  With my underground mine:

  Till I looked from my labour content

  To enjoy the event.

  VII.

  When sudden . . . how think ye, the end?

  Did I say “without friend”?

  Say rather, from marge to blue marge

  The whole sky grew his targe

  With the sun’s self for visible boss,

  While an Arm ran across

  Which the earth heaved beneath like a breast

  Where the wretch was safe prest!

  Do you see? Just my vengeance complete,

  The man sprang to his feet,

  Stood erect, caught at God’s skirts, and prayed!

  — So, I was afraid!

  A Pretty Woman

  I.

  THAT fawn-skin-dappled hair of hers,

  And the blue eye

  Dear and dewy,

  And that infantine fresh air of hers!

  II.

  To think men cannot take you, Sweet,

  And enfold you,

  Ay, and hold you,

  And so keep you what they make you, Sweet!

  III.

  You like us for a glance, you know —

  For a word’s sake

  Or a sword’s sake,

  All’s the same, whate’er the chance, you know.

  IV.

  And in turn we make you ours, we say —

  You and youth too,

  Eyes and mouth too,

  All the face composed of flowers, we say.

  V.

  All’s our own, to make the most of, Sweet —

  Sing and say for,

  Watch and pray for,

  Keep a secret or go boast of, Sweet!

  VI.

  But for loving, why, you would not, Sweet,

  Though we prayed you,

  Paid you, brayed you

  In a mortar — for you could not, Sweet!

  VII.

  So, we leave the sweet
face fondly there:

  Be its beauty

  Its sole duty!

  Let all hope of grace beyond, lie there!

  VIII.

  And while the face lies quiet there,

  Who shall wonder

  That I ponder

  A conclusion? I will try it there.

  IX.

  As, — why must one, for the love foregone,

  Scout mere liking?

  Thunder-striking

  Earth, — the heaven, we looked above for, gone!

  X.

  Why, with beauty, needs there money be —

  Love with liking?

  Crush the fly-king

  In his gauze, because no honey-bee?

  XI.

  May not liking be so simple-sweet,

  If love grew there

  ’Twould undo there

  All that breaks the cheek to dimples sweet?

  XII.

  Is the creature too imperfect,

  Would you mend it

  And so end it?

  Since not all addition perfects aye!

  XIII.

  Or is it of its kind, perhaps,

  Just perfection —

  Whence, rejection

  Of a grace not to its mind, perhaps?

  XIV.

  Shall we burn up, tread that face at once

  Into tinder,

  And so hinder

  Sparks from kindling all the place at once?

  XV.

  Or else kiss away one’s soul on her?

  Your love-fancies! —

  A sick man sees

  Truer, when his hot eyes roll on her!

  XVI.

  Thus the craftsman thinks to grace the rose, —

  Plucks a mould-flower

  For his gold flower,

  Uses fine things that efface the rose:

  XVII.

  Rosy rubies make its cup more rose,

  Precious metals

  Ape the petals, —

  Last, some old king locks it up, morose!

  XVIII.

  Then how grace a rose? I know a way!

  Leave it, rather.

  Must you gather?

  Smell, kiss, wear it — at last, throw away!

  Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came

  MY FIRST thought was, he lied in every word,

  That hoary cripple, with malicious eye

  Askance to watch the working of his lie

  On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford

  Suppression of the glee that pursed and scored

  Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.

  What else should he be set for, with his staff?

  What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare

  All travellers who might find him posted there,

  And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh

  Would break, what crutch ‘gin write my epitaph

  For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,

  If at his counsel I should turn aside

  Into that ominous tract which, all agree,

  Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly

  I did turn as he pointed: neither pride

  Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,

  So much as gladness that some end might be.

  For, what with my whole world-wide wandering,

  What with my search drawn out thro’ years, my hope

  Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope

  With that obstreperous joy success would bring,

  I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring

  My heart made, finding failure in its scope.

  As when a sick man very near to death

  Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end

  The tears and takes the farewell of each friend,

  And hears one bid the other go, draw breath

  Freelier outside (“since all is o’er,” he saith,

  ”And the blow fallen no grieving can amend”;)

  While some discuss if near the other graves

  Be room enough for this, and when a day

  Suits best for carrying the corpse away,

  With care about the banners, scarves and staves:

  And still the man hears all, and only craves

  He may not shame such tender love and stay.

  Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,

  Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ

  So many times among “The Band” — to wit,

  The knights who to the Dark Tower’s search addressed

  Their steps — that just to fail as they, seemed best,

  And all the doubt was now — should I be fit?

  So, quiet as despair, I turned from him,

  That hateful cripple, out of his highway

  Into the path he pointed. All the day

  Had been a dreary one at best, and dim

  Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim

  Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.

  For mark! no sooner was I fairly found

  Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,

  Than, pausing to throw backward a last view

  O’er the safe road, ‘twas gone; grey plain all round:

  Nothing but plain to the horizon’s bound.

  I might go on; nought else remained to do.

  So, on I went. I think I never saw

  Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve:

  For flowers — as well expect a cedar grove!

  But cockle, spurge, according to their law

  Might propagate their kind, with none to awe,

  You’d think; a burr had been a treasure-trove.

  No! penury, inertness and grimace,

  In some strange sort, were the land’s portion. “See

  Or shut your eyes,” said Nature peevishly,

  “It nothing skills: I cannot help my case:

  ‘Tis the Last Judgment’s fire must cure this place,

  Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.”

  If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk

  Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents

  Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents

  In the dock’s harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk

  All hope of greenness? ‘Tis a brute must walk

  Pashing their life out, with a brute’s intents.

  As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair

  In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud

  Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.

  One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,

  Stood stupefied, however he came there:

  Thrust out past service from the devil’s stud!

  Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,

  With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,

  And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;

  Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;

  I never saw a brute I hated so;

  He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

  I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.

  As a man calls for wine before he fights,

  I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights,

  Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.

  Think first, fight afterwards — the soldier’s art:

  One taste of the old time sets all to rights.

  Not it! I fancied Cuthbert’s reddening face

  Beneath its garniture of curly gold,

  Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold

  An arm in mine to fix me to the place

  That way he used. Alas, one night’s disgrace!

  Out went my heart’s new fire and left it cold.

  Giles then, the soul of honour — there he stands

  Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.

  What honest men should dare (he said) he durst.

  Good — but the scene shifts — faugh! what hangman hands

  In to hi
s breast a parchment? His own bands

  Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!

  Better this present than a past like that;

  Back therefore to my darkening path again!

  No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.

  Will the night send a howlet or a bat?

  I asked: when something on the dismal flat

  Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.

  A sudden little river crossed my path

  As unexpected as a serpent comes.

  No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms;

  This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath

  For the fiend’s glowing hoof — to see the wrath

  Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.

  So petty yet so spiteful! All along

  Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;

  Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit

  Of mute despair, a suicidal throng:

  The river which had done them all the wrong,

  Whate’er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.

  Which, while I forded, — good saints, how I feared

  To set my foot upon a dead man’s cheek,

  Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek

  For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard!

  — It may have been a water-rat I speared,

  But, ugh! it sounded like a baby’s shriek.

  Glad was I when I reached the other bank.

  Now for a better country. Vain presage!

  Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage,

  Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank

  Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank,

  Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage —

  The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.

  What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?

  No foot-print leading to that horrid mews,

  None out of it. Mad brewage set to work

  Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk

  Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.

  And more than that — a furlong on — why, there!

  What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,

  Or brake, not wheel — that harrow fit to reel

  Men’s bodies out like silk? with all the air

  Of Tophet’s tool, on earth left unaware,

  Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.

  Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,

  Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth

  Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth,

  Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood

  Changes and off he goes!) within a rood —

  Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

  Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim,

  Now patches where some leanness of the soil’s

  Broke into moss or substances like boils;

  Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him

  Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim

  Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.