Poems (Barrett)/Wine of Cyprus

by Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

Wine of Cyprus.

GIVEN TO ME BY H. S. BOYD, ESQ., AUTHOR OF "SELECT
PASSAGES FROM THE GREEK FATHERS," ETC., TO
WHOM THESE STANZAS ARE ADDRESSED.

If old Bacchus were the speaker,
 He would tell you with a sigh,
Of the Cyprus in this beaker,
 I am sipping like a fly,—
Like a fly or gnat on Ida
 At the hour of goblet-pledge,
By queen Juno brushed aside, a
 Full white arm-sweep, from the edge!

Sooth, the drinking should be ampler,
 When the drink is so divine;
And some deep-mouthed Greek exampler
 Would become your Cyprian wine!
Cyclops' mouth might plunge aright in,
 While his one eye over-leered—
Nor too large were mouth of Titan,
 Drinking rivers down his beard.

Pan might dip his head so deep in,
 That his ears alone pricked out;
Fauns around him, pressing, leaping,
 Each one pointing to his throat!
While the Naiads like Bacchantes,
 Wild, with urns thrown out to waste,
Cry—"O earth, that thou wouldst grant us
 Springs to keep, of such a taste!"

But for me, I am not worthy
 After gods and Greeks to drink;
And my lips are pale and earthy,
 To go bathing from this brink!
Since you heard them speak the last time,
 They have faded from their blooms;
And the laughter of my pastime
 Has learned silence at the tombs.

Ah, my friend! the antique drinkers
 Crowned the cup and crowned the brow!
Can I answer the old thinkers
 In the forms they thought of, now?
Who will fetch from garden-closes
 Some new garlands while I speak,
That the forehead, crowned with roses,
 May strike scarlet down the cheek?

Do not mock me! with my mortal,
 Suits no wreath again, indeed!
I am sad-voiced as the turtle,
 Which Anacreon used to feed:
Yet as that same bird demurely
 Wet her beak in cup of his,—
So, without a garland, surely
 I may touch the brim of this.

Go!—let others praise the Chian!—
 This is soft as Muses' string—
This is tawny as Rhea's lion,
 This is rapid as its spring,—
Bright as Paphia's eyes e'er met us,
 Light as ever trod her feet!
And the brown bees of Hymettus
 Make their honey not so sweet.

Very copious are my praises,
 Though I sip it like a fly!—
All! but, sipping,—times and places
 Change before me suddenly—
As Ulysses' old libation
 Drew the ghosts from every part,
So your Cyprian wine, dear Græcian,
 Stirs the Hades of my heart.

And I think of those long mornings
 Which my Thought goes far to seek,
When, betwixt the folio's turnings,
 Solemn flowed the rhythmic Greek.
Past the pane, the mountain spreading,
 Swept the sheep-bell's tinkling noise,
While a girlish voice was reading,—
 Somewhat low for αι's and οι's!

Then what golden hours were for us!—
 While we sate together there,
How the white vests of the chorus
 Seemed to wave up a live air!
How the cothurns trod majestic
 Down the deep iambic lines?
And the rolling anapæstic
 Curled, like vapour over shrines!

Oh, our Æschylus, the thundrous!
 How he drove the bolted breath
Through the cloud, to wedge it ponderous
 In the gnarled oak beneath.
Oh, our Sophocles, the royal!
 Who was born to monarch's place—
And who made the whole world loyal,
 Less by kingly power than grace.

Our Euripides, the human—
 With his droppings of warm tears;
And his touches of things common,
 Till they rose to touch the spheres!
Our Theocritus, our Bion,
 And our Pindar's shining goals!—
These were cup-bearers undying,
 Of the wine that's meant for souls.

And my Plato, the divine one,—
 If men know the gods aright
By their motions as they shine on
 With a glorious trail of light—
And your noble Christian bishops,
 Who mouthed grandly the last Greek:
Though the sponges on their hyssops
 Were distent with wine—too weak!

Yet, your Chrysostom, you praised him
 With his glorious mouth of gold—
And your Basil, you upraised him
 To the height of speakers old:
And we both praised Heliodorus
 For his secret of pure lies!—
Who forged first his linkèd stories
 In the heat of lady's eyes.

And we both praised your Synesius,
 For the lire shot up his odes!
Though the Church was scarce propitious,
 As he whistled dogs and gods,—
And we both praised Nazianzen,
 For the fervid heart and speech!
Only I eschewed his glancing
 At the lyre hung out of reach.

Do you mind that deed of Até
 Which you bound me to, so fast—
Beading "De Virginitate,"
 From the first line to the last?
How I said at ending, solemn,
 As I turned and looked at you,
That St. Simeon on the column
 Had had somewhat less to do?

For we sometimes gently wrangled;
 Very gently, be it said,—
For our thoughts were disentangled
 By no breaking of the thread!
And, I charged you with extortions
 On the nobler fames of old—
Ay, and sometimes thought your Porsons
 Stained the purple they would fold.

For the rest!—a mystic moaning,
 Kept Cassandra at the gate!
With wild eyes the vision shone in—
 And wide nostrils scenting fate!
And Prometheus, bound in passion
 By brute Force to the blind stone,
Showed us looks of invocation
 Turned to ocean and the sun.

And Medea we saw, burning
 At her nature's planted stake!
And proud Œdipus, fate-scorning,
 While the cloud came on to brake—
While the cloud came on slow—slower,
 Till he stood discrowned, resigned!—
But the reader's voice dropped lower,
 When the poet called him blind!

Ah, my gossip! you were older,
 And more learned, and a man!—
Yet that shadow,—the enfolder
 Of your quiet eyelids,—ran
Both our spirits to one level;
 And I turned from hill and lea
And the summer-sun's green revel,
 To your eyes, that could not see.

Now Christ bless you with the one light
 Which goes shining night and day!
May the flowers which grow in sunlight
 Shed the fragrance in your way!
Is it not right to remember
 All your kindness, friend of mine,—
When we two sate in the chamber,
 And the poets poured us wine?

So, to come back to the drinking
 Of this Cyprus!—it is well—
But those memories, to my thinking,
 Make a better œnomel!
And whoever be the speaker
 None can murmur with a sigh,—
That, in drinking from that beaker,
 I am sipping like a fly!