The Changing Light at Sandover

by James Merrill

  Falls on the novel nightcap, but our eyes

  Keep dimming with surmise—

  The black dog, good as new, had known DJ,

  Bounded in perfect rapture to the car!

  No accident? Or else a dog that dies

  So many deaths each day,

  Emotional or cellular,

  That death no longer…The town clock strikes ten,

  Time, by our regimen,

  To TENDERLY EMBRACE & SAY SWEET DREAMS.

  How can I sleep? Where do I put my hand?

  A fly embroiders darkness with insane

  Frazzle and quirk. The room’s

  Revolving, slipping sideways, and

  9.9

  Sun is rising. The cool, smalltown dawn!

  Now through gently breathing shades it strums

  The brass bed, a quick bar or two, and the long,

  Hushed day—August 21st—begins

  By whose unthinkable finale we

  (However often, faced with splendors, left

  Dutifully rapt—until, made “ours”,

  Pressed in a freshman Plato like wildflowers,

  The mummied angel slumbered) may for once

  Find this pure dew of expectancy

  Undried upon the skin. The hours change

  Clothes in silence. Noon. No letters. One.

  A highlight excommunicates the phone.

  Things look out at us as from a spell

  They themselves have woven. Young, windblown

  Maria with dark glasses and Gitane—

  Snapshot tucked in the mirror. Book by Wystan

  Face up among the clouds and bats, all week

  Open to Miranda’s villanelle.

  Tin bird at attention by the salt.

  The salt-cellar in its own right, a bisque

  Egg one shy bluebell embellishes,

  Found when we moved here, eldest of this troupe

  Brought up to interact, to shrug off risk

  At any level. Three. The hands that halt

  Second by second coming round ablaze

  —Crack! Like a walnut, only louder. Did—?

  Who first, in this red room, saw nothing now

  See nothing else: our baby pyramid

  Overexcited, split along its flawed

  Fire escapes to spectral rubble…Well,

  Something had to give. And will light learn

  To modify its power before our turn?

  We humbly hope so. Four. No further sign

  Of who approaches, or of his design—

  Only the radiance inching into place.

  By five the breath indrawn is held and held.

  The world was everything that was the case?

  Open the case. Lift out the fabulous

  Necklace, in form a spiral molecule

  Whose sparklings outmaneuver time, space, us.

  Here where the table glistens, cleared, one candle

  Shines invisibly in the slant light

  Beside our nameless houseplant. It’s the hour

  When Hell (a syllable identified

  In childhood as the German word for bright

  —So that my father’s cheerful “Go to Hell”,

  Long unheard, and Vaughan’s unbeatable

  “They are all gone into a world of light”

  Come, even now at times, to the same thing)—

  The hour when Hell shall render what it owes.

  Render to whom? how? What at this late date

  Can be done with the quaint idiom that slips

  From nowhere to my tongue—or from the parchment

  Of some old scribe of the apocalypse—

  But render it as the long rendering to

  Light of this very light stored by our cells

  These past five million years, these past five minutes

  Here by the window, taking in through panes

  Still bleary from the hurricane a gull’s

  Ascending aureole of decibels,

  As numberless four-pointed brilliancies

  Upon the Sound’s mild silver grid come, go?

  The message hardly needs decoding, so

  Sheer the text, so innocent and fleet

  These overlapping pandemonia:

  Birdlife, leafplay, rockface, waterglow

  Lending us their being, till the given

  Moment comes to render what we owe.

  FROM THE WINEDARK SEA OF SPACE THE INCARNATIONS OF LIFE LEADING TO THE LIFE OF MAN BEGAN

  PLANET AFTER PLANET ROSE IN THE LIGHT, BORE ITS LIFE, AND VANISHED

  AND YET THE RICH WOMB OF THE SUN FOUND A NEW EGG AND VISITED LIFE UPON IT.

  ORGANIC LIFE RESPONDED THE IMPULSES OF THE UNIVERSE WERE AS STEADY AS THE PULSES OF MAN

  ANIMATE FORMS WERE AS VARIED AS THE FORMS YOU KNOW

  AND AS VARIED AS THE PLANETS THEY EMERGED ON AND AS THE WEATHERS THEY LIVED IN.

  AND SO IT WAS THROUGH THREE INCARNATIONS OF THE WORLDS PREVIOUS TO THE TRIALS OF THIS ONE

  AND SO IT WILL REMAIN: THE DEEP DEMANDING IMPULSE TO LIFE.

  THE GENIUS OF THE LIVING CELL IS ITS TIE TO THE REGENERATIVE HEAT & LIGHT OF THE SUN

  AND SO AS YOU FACE THIS SETTING SUN YOU FACE YOUR ANCESTOR, AND THE SUN LOOKS THROUGH YOUR EYES TO THE LIFE BEHIND YOU.

  EACH OF YOUR SUNCYCLES IS A STEP ON YOUR WAY TO YOUR ANCESTOR

  AND THAT IS ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW OF YOUR PHYSICAL INCARNATE HISTORY.

  WE BEGIN NOW A DISCUSSION OF YOU AS A SPECIES OF THE SUN’S MAKING:

  SINCE THE FIRST STRIKING INTO LIFE OF A CELL THE ENERGY OF THAT CELL ACCUMULATED.

  THIS ACCUMULATED ENERGY BECAME THROUGH EONS AN ANCIENT AND IMMORTAL INTELLIGENCE

  WHICH ASSUMED AS MANY FORMS AS THERE WERE LIFE FORMS, YET AS IT GREW ABSORBED ALL THE DEAD’S ENERGIES, INCREASING IN INTENSITY EVEN AS THE PLANETS FAILED, AND SWARMING IN THE PATH OF LIFE.

  EACH HISTORY WAS THE GUIDANCE OF THIS INTELLIGENCE. AT LAST

  EARTH LIFE BEGAN, AND AT LAST AFTER EXPERIMENT THIS INTELLIGENCE FORMED MAN.

  THIS IS GOD’S NAME

  GOD IS THE ACCUMULATED INTELLIGENCE IN CELLS SINCE THE DEATH OF THE FIRST DISTANT CELL.

  WE RESIDE IN THAT INTELLIGENCE

  WE HAVE IN THIS MEETING FOUND YOU INTELLIGENT & YOUR SERIOUS NATURES AT ONE WITH US.

  TWO HOURS BEFORE THE SETTING SUN, IN THE FULL DAYCYCLE BEFORE THE FULL OF THE MOON, WE WILL MEET AGAIN.

  I AM MICHAEL

  I HAVE ESTABLISHED YOUR ACQUAINTANCE & ACCEPT YOU. COME NEXT TIME IN YOUR OWN MANNER. SERVANTS WE ARE NOT.

  I LEAVE NOW AS THE LIGHT LEAVES AND WIND MY PATH OVER ITS TRACK ON EARTH I AM A GUARDIAN OF THE LIGHT

  LEAVE THIS FIRST OF THE FIRST TWO MEETINGS IN A CYCLE OF TWINNED MEETINGS IN A CYCLE OF TWELVE MOONS

  LOOK! LOOK INTO THE RED EYE OF YOUR GOD!

  III

  SCRIPTS FOR THE PAGEANT

  Il ne pouvait pas la quitter et lui avoua tout bas qu’il avait cassé le verve de Venise. Il croyait qu’elle allait le gronder, lui rappeler le pire. Mais restant aussi douce, elle l’embrassa et lui dit à l’oreille: “Ce sera comme au temple le symbole de l’indestructible union.”

  Jean Santeuil

  CONTENTS

  Yes

  Questions of Rank

  The Second Visit

  George on Birds

  The Water Brother

  The Earth Brother

  The Shy Brother

  Lesson 1: Primal Scenes

  Lesson 2: Cave-Man and Lake-Dweller

  Lesson 3:
How Much More?

  Lesson 4: Of Suicide and a Pact in the Steam

  Lesson 5: Meeting the Five

  Lesson 6: Second Natures

  Lesson 7: The Twelfth of It

  Lesson 8: Heightened Senses

  The Ascent to Nine

  Lesson 9: Michael’s Fete

  Lesson 10: Signals to the Galaxy

  Wystan on God B’s Song

  &

  Samos

  Two Deaths

  A New Friend

  Robert Taken Up

  Lesson 1: Annals of Green

  Lesson 2: The Monitor at Earth’s Heart

  Lesson 3: A Brush with Nothing

  Lesson 4: Madcap Muses

  Lesson 5: The Lady of Sandover

  Behind the Scenes

  Plato Emerging

  The Last Word on Number

  A Metamorphosis Misfires

  The House in Athens

  No

  Lesson 1: Black Magic

  Lesson 2: Old Masters

  Lesson 3: Oil for the Gears of Time

  Lesson 4: Underground Testing

  Lesson 5: The Wingèd Man

  Lesson 6: Maria’s Secret

  Making Song of It

  Lesson 7: Wreathes Laid on Earth and Sea

  Lesson 8: Angelic Designs

  The Question Period

  Lesson 9: Gabriel’s Masque

  Lesson 10: God B His Mark

  The Sermon at Ephesus

  Appearances

  Venetian Jottings

  Exits and Entrances

  Glimpses of the Future

  Finale

  SPEAKERS

  God Biology, known also as God B

  Nature, His twin. Known also as Psyche and Chaos

  Michael, the Angel of Light

  Emmanuel, the Water Angel. Known also as Elias

  Raphael, the Earth Angel. Known also as Elijah

  Gabriel, the Angel of Fire and Death

  The Nine Muses

  00, a senior officer in Gabriel’s legions

  741, known also as the peacock Mirabell

  The Five

  Akhnaton

  Homer

  Montezuma

  Nefertiti

  Plato

  Gautama

  Jesus

  Mercury

  Mohammed

  W. H. Auden

  Maria Mitsotáki

  George Cotzias

  Robert Morse

  Also The Architect of Ephesus, Marius Bewley, Maria Callas, Maya Deren, Kirsten Flagstad, Hans Lodeizen, Robert Lowell, Pythagoras, The Blessed Luca Spionari, Gertrude Stein, Wallace Stevens, Richard Strauss, Alice B. Toklas, Richard Wagner, W. B. Yeats and Ephraim

  Unice

  David Jackson and JM, the mediums

  YES

  Yes. Cup glides from Board. Sun dwindles into Sound.

  DJ and I look at each other. Well?

  Yes, after all. The archangel

  Did come to slovenly, earthbound

  Us. And are we now washed crystalline?

  (Not of curiosity:

  We yearn for tomorrow’s inside story

  From Maria and Wystan—what they won’t have seen!)

  Nothing eludes the angel. And since light’s

  Comings and goings in black space remain

  Unobserved (storm-spattered midnight pane

  Until resisted, a strange car ignites)

  Why think to change our natures?

  Whereupon

  Both reach for cigarettes.

  *

  A new day—world transfigured yet the same—

  We’re back at our old table. AWED MY DEARS

  JM: Yes, Wystan? Help us picture it.

  Our peacock had, I gather, coached you in

  A little masque of Welcome? THERE IS NOTHING

  COMPARABLE IN LIFE & RARELY IN ART

  FIRST: THE WORD ALAS IS ‘COUNTENANCE’

  Michael’s—like lightning, as the Bible says?

  YES BEYOND THOUGHT WE BOTH FELL ON OUR KNEES

  You too, Maman, who as a girl refused

  To curtsey to your father’s guest, the King?

  ENFANT LET WYSTAN TELL IT

  IT REQUIRES

  SOMETHING MORE THAN LANGUAGE MILD GLAD CRIES

  AS IN THOSE MOMENTS WHEN AS NAUGHTY CHILDREN

  EXPECTING PUNISHMENT WE WERE EMBRACED?

  WINGS? NO & YET SUSPENDED WE LOOKED UP:

  A GREAT ORIGINAL IDEA A TALL

  MELTING SHINING MOBILE PARIAN SHEER

  CUMULUS MODELED BY SUN TO HUMAN LIKENESS.

  IN SUCH A PRESENCE WHO COULD EXERCISE

  THE RIGHTS OF CURIOSITY: HAIR? EYES?

  O IT WAS A FACE MY DEARS OF CALM

  INQUIRING FEATURE FACE OF THE IDEAL

  PARENT CONFESSOR LOVER READER FRIEND

  & MORE, A MONUMENT TO CIVILIZED

  IMAGINATION OURS? HIS? WHO CAN SAY?

  ONLY, IF WE AS HUMANS HAVE CREATED

  SUCH AN IMAGE THEN WE TOO ARE GREAT

  The cup had moved so dreamily at first,

  We thought we were losing him—until he spoke

  Of Earth. MES ENFANTS FROM THE PAST A MOMENT

  NATURALLY TRIVIAL IN COMPARISON

  COMES BACK (so like Maria to explain

  The miracle as if it were mundane)

  WHEN I WAS 12 OR 13 VENIZELOS

  WAS AT MY FATHER’S HOUSE. INTO THE ROOM

  HIS THOUGHTFUL SENTENCES ADDRESSED TO OTHERS

  PRECEDED HIM: ‘THE GREAT PROPOSALS FOR GREECE

  COME TO US FROM ON HIGH, FROM STRANGERS’ &

  SO FORTH AND I FELT AS WITH THIS GOD

  MICHAEL THAT WE WERE HEARING LOFTY WORDS

  MANY TIMES UTTERED UNTIL (APPEARING) HE

  BROUGHT AT LAST HIS MIND TO BEAR ON US

  I MY DEARS FELT THE BOARD A SET OF NOTES

  HE PRESENTLY GLANCED DOWN AT: 2 OR 3

  MELODIOUSLY PITCHED & WITH THE TRUE

  HOMERIC RESONANCE SUCH AN ENCOUNTER

  IN LIFE WD HAVE MADE ONE ON THE INSTANT FREE

  OF HABIT RITUAL ALL THAT BINDS, & NO

  SIMPER OF ‘HOLINESS’ JUST THE HEAVENLY

  BLAZING CALM ELATE INTELLIGENCE

  “The red eye of your God”—did Michael mean

  The sun was God? OR GOD’S ORGAN OF SIGHT

  THE FOUNT OF ENDLESS VISIBILITIES.

  NOW: DOES THE EYE CREATE THE OBJECT SEEN?

  ONE TINY INKLING OF M’S MARVELOUS

  PHILOSOPHIC VISTAS Lost on us!

  DJ: He said next time we needn’t bother

  With diet and deep breathing and the rest.

  SUCH ROT ALL THAT SURPRISED OUR MIRABELL

  DIDN’T HAVE OUT THE TINFOIL HALOS Tell

  About his masque! THE ONLY MASQUE IN QUESTION

  HID A BIRDBRAIN. HE OF COURSE HAD HAD

  NOT THE FOGGIEST ‘GREAT DOORS’? THERE WERE NONE:

  HIS (M) PERHAPS FOR CRUCIAL DISTANCING.

  NO WONDER HE LIES ABASHED HEAD UNDER WING

  LIKE A SWAN HIS CROWD U SEE (TO WHOM WE ARE

  MERE FORMULAS) CANNOT CONCEIVE MAN’S EASY

  LEAP ONTO THE OUTSTRETCHED PALM OF GOD,

  CANNOT GRASP THAT ALL OUR LIVES ARE SPENT

  IMAGINING SUCH A PRESENCE

  NONETHELESS

  OUGHTN’T WE ENFANTS TO STRETCH (NOBLESSE

&
nbsp; OBLIGE) A KINDLY HAND OUT TO OUR BIRD?

  Yes, Mirabell, we love you. Come! HE STIRRED

  Come, we need you! THAT’S IT HEAD UP! BRAVO

  PLEASE GIVE YR MIRABELL A BIT OF TIME

  HE IS AFRAID TO LOOK MY DEARS HE FANCIES

  WE ARE TRANSFIGURED Mirabell, come on!

  Is it true you’ve turned into a swan?

  SHALL I? U JEST?

  AH Y OUA RE REA L SOB LIN DINGT O ME ID O NO TSEE I

  WILL GR OW USED THERE! NO SWAN ALAS BUT (ON THE OUTSIDE) YOUR

  FOND PEACOCK STILL I HAVE BEEN ALLOWED NEW INFORMATION

  THANKS TO YR SUCCESS MY SCHOOL IS NOW CHARTERED! TOMORROW

  *

  Questions of Rank

  Mirabell’s information deals with Nature,

  And high time. But first, the other day,

  His wise old teacher, 00 as we call him

  —Batman to Mirabell’s Robin, says DJ—

  Had he been present?

  O NO NONE OF OURS NO NO

  You first said he would be.

  WELL I WAS NOT THERE & AM

  NOT U UNDERSTAND OF HIS HIGH RANK

  The One in question intervenes—are all

  These voices henceforth at our beck and call?

  00: WE WERE FIVE

  (Just that, and goes.) He was there, Mirabell!

  HE HAS SAID SO

  Forgive us for insisting. Now the news?

  NATURE IS MISTRESS OF THE ROBES MATTER,

  HER MATERIAL ITS CUT & STYLE, HER CEREMONY

  WHO IS FOREVER CHANGING THE COSTUMES OF EARTH, OF MAN’S

  VERY FLESH TO SUIT HER NEEDS & HIS. LET ME PUT IT AS

  FORCEFULLY AS I CAN: THE SOCALLD ‘SUPERNATURAL’

  DOES NOT EXIST. SHE IS NUMBER 2 PERSON

  You’re mastering the Fem Lib idiom.

  O I TRY

  ALWAYS TO BE A LA PAGE AS MERCURY WE ARE THE

  GOBETWEEN. YET IN PERSONIFYING MATTER/MATER

  YOU MUST REMEMBER THAT MATTER IS NOT ALL, BUT OBEYS

  THE DIVINE RATIO 88:12

  Our strong point, Mirabell, has never been

  Your Math. Now will the Twelve personified