Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne (Illustrated) (Delphi Poets Series) Read online

  ALTHAEA.

  And with their healing herbs infect our blood.

  CHORUS.

  What ails thee to be jealous of their ways?

  ALTHAEA.

  What if they give us poisonous drinks for wine?

  CHORUS.

  They have their will; much talking mends it not.

  ALTHAEA.

  And gall for milk, and cursing for a prayer?

  CHORUS.

  Have they not given life, and the end of life?

  ALTHAEA.

  Lo, where they heal, they help not; thus they do,

  They mock us with a little piteousness,

  And we say prayers, and weep; but at the last,

  Sparing awhile, they smite and spare no whit.

  CHORUS.

  Small praise man gets dispraising the high gods:

  What have they done that thou dishonourest them?

  ALTHAEA.

  First Artemis for all this harried land

  I praise not; and for wasting of the boar

  That mars with tooth and tusk and fiery feet

  Green pasturage and the grace of standing corn

  And meadow and marsh with springs and unblown leaves,

  Flocks and swift herds and all that bite sweet grass,

  I praise her not, what things are these to praise?

  CHORUS.

  But when the king did sacrifice, and gave

  Each god fair dues of wheat and blood and wine,

  Her not with bloodshed nor burnt-offering

  Revered he, nor with salt or cloven cake;

  Wherefore being wroth she plagued the land, but now

  Takes off from us fate and her heavy things.

  Which deed of these twain were not good to praise?

  For a just deed looks always either way

  With blameless eyes, and mercy is no fault.

  ALTHAEA.

  Yea, but a curse she hath sent above all these

  To hurt us where she healed us; and hath lit

  Fire where the old fire went out, and where the wind

  Slackened, hath blown on us with deadlier air.

  CHORUS.

  What storm is this that tightens all our sail?

  ALTHAEA.

  Love, a thwart sea-wind full of rain and foam.

  CHORUS.

  Whence blown, and born under what stormier star?

  ALTHAEA.

  Southward across Euenus from the sea.

  CHORUS.

  Thy speech turns toward Arcadia like blown wind.

  ALTHAEA.

  Sharp as the north sets when the snows are out.

  CHORUS.

  Nay, for this maiden hath no touch of love.

  ALTHAEA.

  I would she had sought in some cold gulf of sea

  Love, or in dens where strange beasts lurk, or fire,

  Or snows on the extreme hills, or iron land

  Where no spring is; I would she had sought therein

  And found, or ever love had found her here.

  CHORUS.

  She is holier than all holy days or things,

  The sprinkled water or fume of perfect fire;

  Chaste, dedicated to pure prayers, and filled

  With higher thoughts than heaven; a maiden clean,

  Pure iron, fashioned for a sword, and man

  She loves not; what should one such do with love?

  ALTHAEA.

  Look you, I speak not as one light of wit,

  But as a queen speaks, being heart-vexed; for oft

  I hear my brothers wrangling in mid hall,

  And am not moved; and my son chiding them,

  And these things nowise move me, but I know

  Foolish and wise men must be to the end,

  And feed myself with patience; but this most,

  This moves me, that for wise men as for fools

  Love is one thing, an evil thing, and turns

  Choice words and wisdom into fire and air.

  And in the end shall no joy come, but grief,

  Sharp words and soul’s division and fresh tears

  Flower-wise upon the old root of tears brought forth,

  Fruit-wise upon the old flower of tears sprung up,

  Pitiful sighs, and much regrafted pain.

  These things are in my presage, and myself

  Am part of them and know not; but in dreams

  The gods are heavy on me, and all the fates

  Shed fire across my eyelids mixed with night,

  And burn me blind, and disilluminate

  My sense of seeing, and my perspicuous soul

  Darken with vision; seeing I see not, hear

  And hearing am not holpen, but mine eyes

  Stain many tender broideries in the bed

  Drawn up about my face that I may weep

  And the king wake not; and my brows and lips

  Tremble and sob in sleeping, like swift flames

  That tremble, or water when it sobs with heat

  Kindled from under; and my tears fill my breast

  And speck the fair dyed pillows round the king

  With barren showers and salter than the sea,

  Such dreams divide me dreaming; for long since

  I dreamed that out of this my womb had sprung

  Fire and a firebrand; this was ere my son,

  Meleager, a goodly flower in fields of fight,

  Felt the light touch him coming forth, and waited

  Childlike; but yet he was not; and in time

  I bare him, and my heart was great; for yet

  So royally was never strong man born,

  Nor queen so nobly bore as noble a thing

  As this my son was: such a birth God sent

  And such a grace to bear it. Then came in

  Three weaving women, and span each a thread,

  Saying This for strength and That for luck, and one

  Saying Till the brand upon the hearth burn down,

  So long shall this man see good days and live.

  And I with gathered raiment from the bed

  Sprang, and drew forth the brand, and cast on it

  Water, and trod the flame bare-foot, and crushed

  With naked hand spark beaten out of spark

  And blew against and quenched it; for I said,

  These are the most high Fates that dwell with us,

  And we find favour a little in their sight,

  A little, and more we miss of, and much time

  Foils us; howbeit they have pitied me, O son,

  And thee most piteous, thee a tenderer thing

  Than any flower of fleshly seed alive.

  Wherefore I kissed and hid him with my hands,

  And covered under arms and hair, and wept,

  And feared to touch him with my tears, and laughed;

  So light a thing was this man, grown so great

  Men cast their heads back, seeing against the sun

  Blaze the armed man carven on his shield, and hear

  The laughter of little bells along the brace

  Ring, as birds singing or flutes blown, and watch,

  High up, the cloven shadow of either plume

  Divide the bright light of the brass, and make

  His helmet as a windy and wintering moon

  Seen through blown cloud and plume-like drift, when ships

  Drive, and men strive with all the sea, and oars

  Break, and the beaks dip under, drinking death;

  Yet was he then but a span long, and moaned

  With inarticulate mouth inseparate words,

  And with blind lips and fingers wrung my breast

  Hard, and thrust out with foolish hands and feet,

  Murmuring; but those grey women with bound hair

  Who fright the gods frighted not him; he laughed

  Seeing them, and pushed out hands to feel and haul

  Distaff and thread, intangible; but they

  Passed, and I hid the bra
nd, and in my heart

  Laughed likewise, having all my will of heaven.

  But now I know not if to left or right

  The gods have drawn us hither; for again

  I dreamt, and saw the black brand burst on fire

  As a branch bursts in flower, and saw the flame

  Fade flower-wise, and Death came and with dry lips

  Blew the charred ash into my breast; and Love

  Trampled the ember and crushed it with swift feet

  This I have also at heart; that not for me,

  Not for me only or son of mine, O girls,

  The gods have wrought life, and desire of life,

  Heart’s love and heart’s division; but for all

  There shines one sun and one wind blows till night.

  And when night comes the wind sinks and the sun,

  And there is no light after, and no storm,

  But sleep and much forgetfulness of things.

  In such wise I gat knowledge of the gods

  Years hence, and heard high sayings of one most wise,

  Eurythemis my mother, who beheld

  With eyes alive and spake with lips of these

  As one on earth disfleshed and disallied

  From breath or blood corruptible; such gifts

  Time gave her, and an equal soul to these

  And equal face to all things, thus she said.

  But whatsoever intolerable or glad

  The swift hours weave and unweave, I go hence

  Full of mine own soul, perfect of myself,

  Toward mine and me sufficient; and what chance

  The gods cast lots for and shake out on us,

  That shall we take, and that much bear withal.

  And now, before these gather to the hunt,

  I will go arm my son and bring him forth,

  Lest love or some man’s anger work him harm.

  CHORUS.

  Before the beginning of years

  There came to the making of man

  Time, with a gift of tears,

  Grief, with a glass that ran;

  Pleasure, with pain for leaven;

  Summer, with flowers that fell;

  Remembrance fallen from heaven,

  And madness risen from hell;

  Strength without hands to smite,

  Love that endures for a breath,

  Night, the shadow of light,

  And life, the shadow of death.

  And the high gods took in hand

  Fire, and the falling of tears,

  And a measure of sliding sand

  From under the feet of the years,

  And froth and drift of the sea;

  And dust of the labouring earth;

  And bodies of things to be

  In the houses of death and of birth;

  And wrought with weeping and laughter,

  And fashioned with loathing and love,

  With life before and after

  And death beneath and above,

  For a day and a night and a morrow,

  That his strength might endure for a span

  With travail and heavy sorrow,

  The holy spirit of man.

  From the winds of the north and the south

  They gathered as unto strife;

  They breathed upon his mouth,

  They filled his body with life;

  Eyesight and speech they wrought

  For the veils of the soul therein,

  A time for labour and thought,

  A time to serve and to sin;

  They gave him light in his ways,

  And love, and a space for delight,

  And beauty and length of days,

  And night, and sleep in the night.

  His speech is a burning fire;

  With his lips he travaileth,

  In his heart is a blind desire,

  In his eyes foreknowledge of death;

  He weaves, and is clothed with derision;

  Sows, and he shall not reap,

  His life is a watch or a vision

  Between a sleep and a sleep.

  MELEAGER.

  O sweet new heaven and air without a star,

  Fair day, be fair and welcome, as to men

  With deeds to do and praise to pluck from thee,

  Come forth a child, born with clear sound and light,

  With laughter and swift limbs and prosperous looks;

  That this great hunt with heroes for the hounds

  May leave thee memorable and us well sped.

  ALTHAEA.

  Son, first I praise thy prayer, then bid thee speed;

  But the gods hear men’s hands before their lips,

  And heed beyond all crying and sacrifice

  Light of things done and noise of labouring men.

  But thou, being armed and perfect for the deed,

  Abide; for like rain-flakes in a wind they grow,

  The men thy fellows, and the choice of the world,

  Bound to root out the tusked plague, and leave

  Thanks and safe days and peace in Calydon.

  MELEAGER.

  For the whole city and all the low-lying land

  Flames, and the soft air sounds with them that come;

  The gods give all these fruit of all their works.

  ALTHAEA.

  Set thine eye thither and fix thy spirit and say

  Whom there thou knowest; for sharp mixed shadow and wind

  Blown up between the morning and the mist,

  With steam of steeds and flash of bridle or wheel,

  And fire, and parcels of the broken dawn,

  And dust divided by hard light, and spears

  That shine and shift as the edge of wild beasts’ eyes,

  Smite upon mine; so fiery their blind edge

  Burns, and bright points break up and baffle day.

  MELEAGER.

  The first, for many I know not, being far off,

  Peleus the Larissaean, couched with whom

  Sleeps the white sea-bred wife and silver-shod,

  Fair as fled foam, a goddess; and their son

  Most swift and splendid of men’s children born,

  Most like a god, full of the future fame.

  ALTHAEA.

  Who are these shining like one sundered star?

  MELEAGER.

  Thy sister’s sons, a double flower of men.

  ALTHAEA.

  O sweetest kin to me in all the world,

  O twin-born blood of Leda, gracious heads

  Like kindled lights in untempestuous heaven,

  Fair flower-like stars on the iron foam of fight,

  With what glad heart and kindliness of soul,

  Even to the staining of both eyes with tears

  And kindling of warm eyelids with desire,

  A great way off I greet you, and rejoice

  Seeing you so fair, and moulded like as gods.

  Far off ye come, and least in years of these,

  But lordliest, but worth love to look upon.

  MELEAGER.

  Even such (for sailing hither I saw far hence,

  And where Eurotas hollows his moist rock

  Nigh Sparta with a strenuous-hearted stream)

  Even such I saw their sisters; one swan-white,

  The little Helen, and less fair than she

  Fair Clytaemnestra, grave as pasturing fawns

  Who feed and fear some arrow; but at whiles,

  As one smitten with love or wrung with joy,

  She laughs and lightens with her eyes, and then

  Weeps; whereat Helen, having laughed, weeps too,

  And the other chides her, and she being chid speaks nought,

  But cheeks and lips and eyelids kisses her,

  Laughing; so fare they, as in their bloomless bud

  And full of unblown life, the blood of gods.

  ALTHAEA.

  Sweet days befall them and good loves and lords,

  And tender and t
emperate honours of the hearth,

  Peace, and a perfect life and blameless bed.

  But who shows next an eagle wrought in gold?

  That flames and beats broad wings against the sun

  And with void mouth gapes after emptier prey?

  MELEAGER.

  Know by that sign the reign of Telamon

  Between the fierce mouths of the encountering brine

  On the strait reefs of twice-washed Salamis.

  ALTHAEA.

  For like one great of hand he bears himself,

  Vine-chapleted, with savours of the sea,

  Glittering as wine and moving as a wave.

  But who girt round there roughly follows him?

  MELEAGER.

  Ancaeus, great of hand, an iron bulk,

  Two-edged for fight as the axe against his arm,

  Who drives against the surge of stormy spears

  Full-sailed; him Cepheus follows, his twin-born,

  Chief name next his of all Arcadian men.

  ALTHAEA.

  Praise be with men abroad; chaste lives with us,

  Home-keeping days and household reverences.

  MELEAGER.

  Next by the left unsandalled foot know thou

  The sail and oar of this Aetolian land,

  Thy brethren, Toxeus and the violent-souled

  Plexippus, over-swift with hand and tongue;

  For hands are fruitful, but the ignorant mouth

  Blows and corrupts their work with barren breath.

  ALTHAEA.

  Speech too bears fruit, being worthy; and air blows down

  Things poisonous, and high-seated violences,

  And with charmed words and songs have men put out

  Wild evil, and the fire of tyrannies.

  MELEAGER.

  Yea, all things have they, save the gods and love.

  ALTHAEA.

  Love thou the law and cleave to things ordained.

  MELEAGER.

  Law lives upon their lips whom these applaud.

  ALTHAEA.