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

  How sayest thou these? what god applauds new things?

  MELEAGER.

  Zeus, who hath fear and custom under foot.

  ALTHAEA.

  But loves not laws thrown down and lives awry.

  MELEAGER.

  Yet is not less himself than his own law.

  ALTHAEA.

  Nor shifts and shuffles old things up and down.

  MELEAGER.

  But what he will remoulds and discreates.

  ALTHAEA.

  Much, but not this, that each thing live its life.

  MELEAGER.

  Nor only live, but lighten and lift up higher.

  ALTHAEA.

  Pride breaks itself, and too much gained is gone.

  MELEAGER.

  Things gained are gone, but great things done endure.

  ALTHAEA.

  Child, if a man serve law through all his life

  And with his whole heart worship, him all gods

  Praise; but who loves it only with his lips,

  And not in heart and deed desiring it

  Hides a perverse will with obsequious words,

  Him heaven infatuates and his twin-born fate

  Tracks, and gains on him, scenting sins far off,

  And the swift hounds of violent death devour.

  Be man at one with equal-minded gods,

  So shall he prosper; not through laws torn up,

  Violated rule and a new face of things.

  A woman armed makes war upon herself,

  Unwomanlike, and treads down use and wont

  And the sweet common honour that she hath,

  Love, and the cry of children, and the hand

  Trothplight and mutual mouth of marriages.

  This doth she, being unloved, whom if one love,

  Not fire nor iron and the wide-mouthed wars

  Are deadlier than her lips or braided hair.

  For of the one comes poison, and a curse

  Falls from the other and burns the lives of men.

  But thou, son, be not filled with evil dreams,

  Nor with desire of these things; for with time

  Blind love burns out; but if one feed it full

  Till some discolouring stain dyes all his life,

  He shall keep nothing praiseworthy, nor die

  The sweet wise death of old men honourable,

  Who have lived out all the length of all their years

  Blameless, and seen well-pleased the face of gods,

  And without shame and without fear have wrought

  Things memorable, and while their days held out

  In sight of all men and the sun’s great light

  Have gat them glory and given of their own praise

  To the earth that bare them and the day that bred,

  Home friends and far-off hospitalities,

  And filled with gracious and memorial fame

  Lands loved of summer or washed by violent seas,

  Towns populous and many unfooted ways,

  And alien lips and native with their own.

  But when white age and venerable death

  Mow down the strength and life within their limbs,

  Drain out the blood and darken their clear eyes,

  Immortal honour is on them, having past

  Through splendid life and death desirable

  To the clear seat and remote throne of souls,

  Lands indiscoverable in the unheard-of west,

  Round which the strong stream of a sacred sea

  Rolls without wind for ever, and the snow

  There shows not her white wings and windy feet,

  Nor thunder nor swift rain saith anything,

  Nor the sun burns, but all things rest and thrive;

  And these, filled full of days, divine and dead,

  Sages and singers fiery from the god,

  And such as loved their land and all things good

  And, best beloved of best men, liberty,

  Free lives and lips, free hands of men free-born,

  And whatsoever on earth was honourable

  And whosoever of all the ephemeral seed,

  Live there a life no liker to the gods

  But nearer than their life of terrene days.

  Love thou such life and look for such a death.

  But from the light and fiery dreams of love

  Spring heavy sorrows and a sleepless life,

  Visions not dreams, whose lids no charm shall close

  Nor song assuage them waking; and swift death

  Crushes with sterile feet the unripening ear,

  Treads out the timeless vintage; whom do thou

  Eschewing embrace the luck of this thy life,

  Not without honour; and it shall bear to thee

  Such fruit as men reap from spent hours and wear,

  Few men, but happy; of whom be thou, O son,

  Happiest, if thou submit thy soul to fate,

  And set thine eyes and heart on hopes high-born

  And divine deeds and abstinence divine.

  So shalt thou be toward all men all thy days

  As light and might communicable, and burn

  From heaven among the stars above the hours,

  And break not as a man breaks nor burn down:

  For to whom other of all heroic names

  Have the gods given his life in hand as thine?

  And gloriously hast thou lived, and made thy life

  To me that bare thee and to all men born

  Thankworthy, a praise for ever; and hast won fame

  When wild wars broke all round thy father’s house,

  And the mad people of windy mountain ways

  Laid spears against us like a sea, and all

  Aetolia thundered with Thessalian hoofs;

  Yet these, as wind baffles the foam, and beats

  Straight back the relaxed ripple, didst thou break

  And loosen all their lances, till undone

  And man from man they fell; for ye twain stood

  God against god, Ares and Artemis,

  And thou the mightier; wherefore she unleashed

  A sharp-toothed curse thou too shalt overcome;

  For in the greener blossom of thy life

  Ere the full blade caught flower, and when time gave

  Respite, thou didst not slacken soul nor sleep,

  But with great hand and heart seek praise of men

  Out of sharp straits and many a grievous thing,

  Seeing the strange foam of undivided seas

  On channels never sailed in, and by shores

  Where the old winds cease not blowing, and all the night

  Thunders, and day is no delight to men.

  CHORUS.

  Meleager, a noble wisdom and fair words

  The gods have given this woman, hear thou these.

  MELEAGER.

  O mother, I am not fain to strive in speech

  Nor set my mouth against thee, who art wise

  Even as they say and full of sacred words.

  But one thing I know surely, and cleave to this;

  That though I be not subtle of wit as thou

  Nor womanlike to weave sweet words, and melt

  Mutable minds of wise men as with fire,

  I too, doing justly and reverencing the gods,

  Shall not want wit to see what things be right.

  For whom they love and whom reject, being gods,

  There is no man but seeth, and in good time

  Submits himself, refraining all his heart.

  And I too as thou sayest have seen great things;

  Seen otherwhere, but chiefly when the sail

  First caught between stretched ropes the roaring west,

  And all our oars smote eastward, and the wind

  First flung round faces of seafaring men

  White splendid snow-flakes of the sundering foam,

  And the first furrow in virginal green sea

  Followed the pl
unging ploughshare of hewn pine,

  And closed, as when deep sleep subdues man’s breath

  Lips close and heart subsides; and closing, shone

  Sunlike with many a Nereid’s hair, and moved

  Round many a trembling mouth of doubtful gods,

  Risen out of sunless and sonorous gulfs

  Through waning water and into shallow light,

  That watched us; and when flying the dove was snared

  As with men’s hands, but we shot after and sped

  Clear through the irremeable Symplegades;

  And chiefliest when hoar beach and herbless cliff

  Stood out ahead from Colchis, and we heard

  Clefts hoarse with wind, and saw through narrowing reefs

  The lightning of the intolerable wave

  Flash, and the white wet flame of breakers burn

  Far under a kindling south-wind, as a lamp

  Burns and bends all its blowing flame one way;

  Wild heights untravelled of the wind, and vales

  Cloven seaward by their violent streams, and white

  With bitter flowers and bright salt scurf of brine;

  Heard sweep their sharp swift gales, and bowing bird-wise

  Shriek with birds’ voices, and with furious feet

  Tread loose the long skirts of a storm; and saw

  The whole white Euxine clash together and fall

  Full-mouthed, and thunderous from a thousand throats;

  Yet we drew thither and won the fleece and won

  Medea, deadlier than the sea; but there

  Seeing many a wonder and fearful things to men

  I saw not one thing like this one seen here,

  Most fair and fearful, feminine, a god,

  Faultless; whom I that love not, being unlike,

  Fear, and give honour, and choose from all the gods.

  OENEUS.

  Lady, the daughter of Thestius, and thou, son,

  Not ignorant of your strife nor light of wit,

  Scared with vain dreams and fluttering like spent fire,

  I come to judge between you, but a king

  Full of past days and wise from years endured.

  Nor thee I praise, who art fain to undo things done;

  Nor thee, who art swift to esteem them overmuch.

  For what the hours have given is given, and this

  Changeless; howbeit these change, and in good time

  Devise new things and good, not one thing still.

  Us have they sent now at our need for help

  Among men armed a woman, foreign born,

  Virgin, not like the natural flower of things

  That grows and bears and brings forth fruit and dies,

  Unlovable, no light for a husband’s house,

  Espoused; a glory among unwedded girls,

  And chosen of gods who reverence maidenhood.

  These too we honour in honouring her; but thou,

  Abstain thy feet from following, and thine eyes

  From amorous touch; nor set toward hers thine heart,

  Son, lest hate bear no deadlier fruit than love.

  ALTHAEA.

  O king, thou art wise, but wisdom halts, and just,

  But the gods love not justice more than fate,

  And smite the righteous and the violent mouth,

  And mix with insolent blood the reverent man’s,

  And bruise the holier as the lying lips.

  Enough; for wise words fail me, and my heart

  Takes fire and trembles flamewise, O my son,

  O child, for thine head’s sake; mine eyes wax thick,

  Turning toward thee, so goodly a weaponed man,

  So glorious; and for love of thine own eyes

  They are darkened, and tears burn them, fierce as fire,

  And my lips pause and my soul sinks with love.

  But by thine hand, by thy sweet life and eyes,

  By thy great heart and these clasped knees, O son,

  I pray thee that thou slay me not with thee.

  For there was never a mother woman-born

  Loved her sons better; and never a queen of men

  More perfect in her heart toward whom she loved.

  For what lies light on many and they forget,

  Small things and transitory as a wind o’ the sea,

  I forget never; I have seen thee all thine years

  A man in arms, strong and a joy to men

  Seeing thine head glitter and thine hand burn its way

  Through a heavy and iron furrow of sundering spears;

  But always also a flower of three suns old,

  The small one thing that lying drew down my life

  To lie with thee and feed thee; a child and weak,

  Mine, a delight to no man, sweet to me.

  Who then sought to thee? who gat help? who knew

  If thou wert goodly? nay, no man at all.

  Or what sea saw thee, or sounded with thine oar,

  Child? or what strange land shone with war through thee?

  But fair for me thou wert, O little life,

  Fruitless, the fruit of mine own flesh, and blind,

  More than much gold, ungrown, a foolish flower.

  For silver nor bright snow nor feather of foam

  Was whiter, and no gold yellower than thine hair,

  O child, my child; and now thou art lordlier grown,

  Not lovelier, nor a new thing in mine eyes,

  I charge thee by thy soul and this my breast,

  Fear thou the gods and me and thine own heart,

  Lest all these turn against thee; for who knows

  What wind upon what wave of altering time

  Shall speak a storm and blow calamity?

  And there is nothing stabile in the world

  But the gods break it; yet not less, fair son,

  If but one thing be stronger, if one endure,

  Surely the bitter and the rooted love

  That burns between us, going from me to thee,

  Shall more endure than all things. What dost thou,

  Following strange loves? why wilt thou kill mine heart?

  Lo, I talk wild and windy words, and fall

  From my clear wits, and seem of mine own self

  Dethroned, dispraised, disseated; and my mind,

  That was my crown, breaks, and mine heart is gone,

  And I am naked of my soul, and stand

  Ashamed, as a mean woman; take thou thought:

  Live if thou wilt, and if thou wilt not, look,

  The gods have given thee life to lose or keep,

  Thou shalt not die as men die, but thine end

  Fallen upon thee shall break me unaware.

  MELEAGER.

  Queen, my whole heart is molten with thy tears,

  And my limbs yearn with pity of thee, and love

  Compels with grief mine eyes and labouring breath:

  For what thou art I know thee, and this thy breast

  And thy fair eyes I worship, and am bound

  Toward thee in spirit and love thee in all my soul.

  For there is nothing terribler to men

  Than the sweet face of mothers, and the might

  But what shall be let be; for us the day

  Once only lives a little, and is not found.

  Time and the fruitful hour are more than we,

  And these lay hold upon us; but thou, God,

  Zeus, the sole steersman of the helm of things,

  Father, be swift to see us, and as thou wilt

  Help: or if adverse, as thou wilt, refrain.

  CHORUS.

  We have seen thee, O Love, thou art fair, thou art goodly, O Love,

  Thy wings make light in the air as the wings of a dove.

  Thy feet are as winds that divide the stream of the sea;

  Earth is thy covering to hide thee, the garment of thee.

  Thou art swift and subtle and blind as a flame of fire;

 
Before thee the laughter, behind thee the tears of desire;

  And twain go forth beside thee, a man with a maid;

  Her eyes are the eyes of a bride whom delight makes afraid;

  As the breath in the buds that stir is her bridal breath:

  But Fate is the name of her; and his name is Death.

  For an evil blossom was born

  Of sea-foam and the frothing of blood,

  Blood-red and bitter of fruit,

  And the seed of it laughter and tears,

  And the leaves of it madness and scorn;

  A bitter flower from the bud,

  Sprung of the sea without root,

  Sprung without graft from the years.

  The weft of the world was untorn

  That is woven of the day on the night,

  The hair of the hours was not white

  Nor the raiment of time overworn,

  When a wonder, a world’s delight,

  A perilous goddess was born,

  And the waves of the sea as she came

  Clove, and the foam at her feet,

  Fawning, rejoiced to bring forth

  A fleshly blossom, a flame

  Filling the heavens with heat

  To the cold white ends of the north.

  And in air the clamorous birds,

  And men upon earth that hear

  Sweet articulate words

  Sweetly divided apart,

  And in shallow and channel and mere

  The rapid and footless herds,

  Rejoiced, being foolish of heart.

  For all they said upon earth,

  She is fair, she is white like a dove,

  And the life of the world in her breath

  Breathes, and is born at her birth;

  For they knew thee for mother of love,

  And knew thee not mother of death.

  What hadst thou to do being born,

  Mother, when winds were at ease,

  As a flower of the springtime of corn,

  A flower of the foam of the seas?

  For bitter thou wast from thy birth,

  Aphrodite, a mother of strife;

  For before thee some rest was on earth,

  A little respite from tears,

  A little pleasure of life;

  For life was not then as thou art,

  But as one that waxeth in years

  Sweet-spoken, a fruitful wife;

  Earth had no thorn, and desire

  No sting, neither death any dart;

  What hadst thou to do amongst these,

  Thou, clothed with a burning fire,