Poems (Blagden)/The wrecked life
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THE WRECKED LIFE.
The burning heart of red autumnal woods,—
The flushing pomp of sunset skies—a blaze
Of fierce, wild, hurrying fire, as when upbursts
Some city's conflagration, 'mid the hush
And darkness of the night—commingled flame
Of still pale glories and of lurid light—
So gorgeous, magical, and strangely fair
That lady's face!
None read the meaning of its smiles, and none
Could trace the passionate and haunting grief
Which wrote its sad defeature on her brow,
And hollowed out the opal arch whence shone
Inviolate the sorrows of her eyes.
Sometimes a thought like a warm Afric wind,
Which with its breath makes vermeil tardy blooms,
Hid from the sun in lone Sicilian vales,
Would redden o'er her cheek, then all too soon
The shadows darkened and the glow died out—
And a pale phantom of a perfect face,
Set lips, stern nostrils, and a white, cold cheek
Alone remained!
Her smile, it was so rare and marvellous,
And so became the mouth which palaced it,
That the proud curve became a gracious type,
Indelible in death—its radiance flashed
All Paradise upon me once; and when
Long years had passed away, and the fine brow,
And the large eyes (dark violets, sweet but sad,)
Were empty sockets, and the veined pearl
Of the transparent flesh was ashes, dust—
I recognised the parted line of that rare lip—
Its matchless sweetness, now left desolate,
And barren evermore of smiles,
Dost ask me wherefore she did smile or weep?
Know'st thou, O curious Questioner of Hearts,
That memories of balmy, vernal woods
Live in the Frost-King's thought, when with froze breath,
And icy touch, he traces o'er the panes,
In crystal characters, white mystic boughs,
With delicatest foliage, plumy sprays,
And all the tender secrets of the spring?
Or wherefore was she sad? Vain fool! dost know
The dark archangel, whose vast wings do sweep
Between the sea and sky, unseen by man,
Yet leaves his mighty shadow on the wave,
Which, like a great soul conscious of a fate,
And darkened by an omen, all ignore,
Accepts, but shudders at the prophecy?
None knew her, but all felt who saw her once
That this was Beauty—that their lives henceforth,
Their daily lives, were richer by this boon.
The eye which dwelt upon her gracious shape,—
The ear which listened to her rich, sweet voice,—
The senses, ravished by the soft perfume
Which hung around her,—did accept the gift,
As wondering beggars do receive rich alms,
With benedictions merged in ecstasy.
Some lives are like rare missals, golden-clasped,
And ruby-bound;—but open them, and read.
Within are pictured bleeding agonies
And expiations, struggles, martyrdoms,
All blazoned on the dainty vellum page.
And some, all luminous unto the eye,
Are in themselves lone, cold, and dark;—without
Glorious as that Archangel who does stand
Facing the east, the sunset on his wings,
Exalt o'er Rome,—within, impassive bronze.
And there are some whose sorrows give them palms;
Others, whose passion is of shame—who, 'stead
Of saintly aureole must wear a brand,
A stigma ineffaceable and drear,
In expiation of Ancestral wrong.
Whate'er it was—the burden of the heart
Which bled to death within that lady's breast
Remained for aye a solemn mystery.
She had no commune with the outer world;
But once some hurried, sudden tidings came—
A few brief words writ on a mourning scroll:
She read with breathless, fevered haste, then rose,
And tore off from her slender hand a ring,
So hastily the soft fair skin was grazed.
She smiled—a bitter, sad, self-pitying smile—
"The link has chafed me deeper here," she said,
And smote her breast—"Free—free—too late—my God!
A life-long sorrow, and a life-deep wrong,
For the blind error of a girl's vain choice—
Is this thy law—is this thy justice—God?"
And one large, heavy tear dropped slowly down,
(What argosies of hope that tear o'erwhelmed!)
And the eyes closed to prison back the tears
She would not shed; then all was calm again—
A plenitude of hopeless, lifeless calm—
As when, amid the desert, where stood tents
Only a heap of blank grey ashes tells
That life, and joy, and being have been there.
Beside her casement for long hours she sate;
It opened on brown, russet prairies, where
The tawny harvest spread its burnished sea.
She watched it as it rippled into gold,
Stirred by light winds, or slept in yellow flakes
Of yellow foam beneath the quiet stars.
Mute, motionless, and resolute, she sate,
As Rizpah in the time of harvest sate
Beside the corpses of her murdered sons,
Through the long, breathless, scorching summer days,
Through sultry nights lit by the Syrian moon,
Till she outwatched the ravening cruel beasts,
Who shrank before her eye, fierce with the woe,
"The mighty hunger" ne'er to be appeased—
The wild forlornness of a mother's heart—
And thus the Lady sate, and sate, and watched,
Not the stark visage of the unburied dead,
But by one wrecked, bereaved, and wasted life.
The late rose in her bosom mated well
Its beauty—fragrant flower and soft white breast—
Each peerless, and so frail—most fair the flower,
In its ripe harmony and fate fulfilled,
And loyal to the death unto its Queen.
Not so the Lady;—her sad life was jarred
With unaccomplished aims—discordant hopes.
She seemed as one to whom Fate owed a debt,
One never to be cancelled. Tender ties,
Sweet charities, and bounteous ministerings,
Were not for her. No father's hand had laid
A blessing on her brow;—no mother's kiss
Was as an amulet about her heart.
She seemed as if no childhood had been hers,—
Like some strong spirit, ever young and fair,
But who ignored the clinging weaknesses,
The debile and pathetic falterings
Of infancy and childhood. E'en that breast,
Which gave such promise, prodigal of love,
In its magnificent and queenly wave,
Looked marble cold;—no little child's caress
Had made it heave with soft, delicious pain,
As flowed its life to feed another's life!
And in the unbroken stillness of her voice,
Here was no tremulous and yearning tone,
Such as oft stirs the heart with echoes deep
Of loving welcomes and heart-wrung farewells!
And since that scroll there was a deeper shade—
A something of endurance and self-scorn
Around her—proud endurance blent with shame.
A chained captive might look thus, if doomed
To suffer in the presence of a foe. Was this remorse?
And with the swan-like plumage and soft down
Of her pure woman's heart, was she enforced
To satiate his serpent-sting? None knew.
And thus she lived. Perchance this lonely life
Was not all sorrow;—none can ever know.
The stars shine ever brightest unto one
Beneath whose toiling feet are arid sands.
The Ghebir's faith arose in burning wastes.
And when no flowers bloom round us, or beneath,
We gaze where piercing and eternal burn
The gentle lustre of the Sister Stars—
Steadfast Arcturus, with his solemn brow,
And armed Orion, with his blood-red sword.
But suddenly she grew more sad, more pale.
Was it God's mercy touched her secret woe,
And pitied it, and saved her? So she died. Alas!
Hast felt the thrilling and vibrating hush
When great resolves are born of words sublime
And promise of heroic deeds, struck out
From the warm depths of fiery beating hearts,
Till full the air with guardian angel wings?
Hast marked the strange, sweet, fluttering pause which comes
O'er night's fast-throbbing pulse—as if the stars,
All faint with adoration, lapsed in prayer?
So, with a darkness pregnant of the light—
A silence resonant of music—was
The sylvan spot she called her home;—its air
Was holy as a place of sanctuary—
Its empty chambers were instinct and rife
With influence from shining Presences,
Unseen, but felt with earnest, soothing power:
Her soul had loved it, and still lingered there!
The flushing pomp of sunset skies—a blaze
Of fierce, wild, hurrying fire, as when upbursts
Some city's conflagration, 'mid the hush
And darkness of the night—commingled flame
Of still pale glories and of lurid light—
So gorgeous, magical, and strangely fair
That lady's face!
None read the meaning of its smiles, and none
Could trace the passionate and haunting grief
Which wrote its sad defeature on her brow,
And hollowed out the opal arch whence shone
Inviolate the sorrows of her eyes.
Sometimes a thought like a warm Afric wind,
Which with its breath makes vermeil tardy blooms,
Hid from the sun in lone Sicilian vales,
Would redden o'er her cheek, then all too soon
The shadows darkened and the glow died out—
And a pale phantom of a perfect face,
Set lips, stern nostrils, and a white, cold cheek
Alone remained!
Her smile, it was so rare and marvellous,
And so became the mouth which palaced it,
That the proud curve became a gracious type,
Indelible in death—its radiance flashed
All Paradise upon me once; and when
Long years had passed away, and the fine brow,
And the large eyes (dark violets, sweet but sad,)
Were empty sockets, and the veined pearl
Of the transparent flesh was ashes, dust—
I recognised the parted line of that rare lip—
Its matchless sweetness, now left desolate,
And barren evermore of smiles,
Dost ask me wherefore she did smile or weep?
Know'st thou, O curious Questioner of Hearts,
That memories of balmy, vernal woods
Live in the Frost-King's thought, when with froze breath,
And icy touch, he traces o'er the panes,
In crystal characters, white mystic boughs,
With delicatest foliage, plumy sprays,
And all the tender secrets of the spring?
Or wherefore was she sad? Vain fool! dost know
The dark archangel, whose vast wings do sweep
Between the sea and sky, unseen by man,
Yet leaves his mighty shadow on the wave,
Which, like a great soul conscious of a fate,
And darkened by an omen, all ignore,
Accepts, but shudders at the prophecy?
None knew her, but all felt who saw her once
That this was Beauty—that their lives henceforth,
Their daily lives, were richer by this boon.
The eye which dwelt upon her gracious shape,—
The ear which listened to her rich, sweet voice,—
The senses, ravished by the soft perfume
Which hung around her,—did accept the gift,
As wondering beggars do receive rich alms,
With benedictions merged in ecstasy.
Some lives are like rare missals, golden-clasped,
And ruby-bound;—but open them, and read.
Within are pictured bleeding agonies
And expiations, struggles, martyrdoms,
All blazoned on the dainty vellum page.
And some, all luminous unto the eye,
Are in themselves lone, cold, and dark;—without
Glorious as that Archangel who does stand
Facing the east, the sunset on his wings,
Exalt o'er Rome,—within, impassive bronze.
And there are some whose sorrows give them palms;
Others, whose passion is of shame—who, 'stead
Of saintly aureole must wear a brand,
A stigma ineffaceable and drear,
In expiation of Ancestral wrong.
Whate'er it was—the burden of the heart
Which bled to death within that lady's breast
Remained for aye a solemn mystery.
She had no commune with the outer world;
But once some hurried, sudden tidings came—
A few brief words writ on a mourning scroll:
She read with breathless, fevered haste, then rose,
And tore off from her slender hand a ring,
So hastily the soft fair skin was grazed.
She smiled—a bitter, sad, self-pitying smile—
"The link has chafed me deeper here," she said,
And smote her breast—"Free—free—too late—my God!
A life-long sorrow, and a life-deep wrong,
For the blind error of a girl's vain choice—
Is this thy law—is this thy justice—God?"
And one large, heavy tear dropped slowly down,
(What argosies of hope that tear o'erwhelmed!)
And the eyes closed to prison back the tears
She would not shed; then all was calm again—
A plenitude of hopeless, lifeless calm—
As when, amid the desert, where stood tents
Only a heap of blank grey ashes tells
That life, and joy, and being have been there.
Beside her casement for long hours she sate;
It opened on brown, russet prairies, where
The tawny harvest spread its burnished sea.
She watched it as it rippled into gold,
Stirred by light winds, or slept in yellow flakes
Of yellow foam beneath the quiet stars.
Mute, motionless, and resolute, she sate,
As Rizpah in the time of harvest sate
Beside the corpses of her murdered sons,
Through the long, breathless, scorching summer days,
Through sultry nights lit by the Syrian moon,
Till she outwatched the ravening cruel beasts,
Who shrank before her eye, fierce with the woe,
"The mighty hunger" ne'er to be appeased—
The wild forlornness of a mother's heart—
And thus the Lady sate, and sate, and watched,
Not the stark visage of the unburied dead,
But by one wrecked, bereaved, and wasted life.
The late rose in her bosom mated well
Its beauty—fragrant flower and soft white breast—
Each peerless, and so frail—most fair the flower,
In its ripe harmony and fate fulfilled,
And loyal to the death unto its Queen.
Not so the Lady;—her sad life was jarred
With unaccomplished aims—discordant hopes.
She seemed as one to whom Fate owed a debt,
One never to be cancelled. Tender ties,
Sweet charities, and bounteous ministerings,
Were not for her. No father's hand had laid
A blessing on her brow;—no mother's kiss
Was as an amulet about her heart.
She seemed as if no childhood had been hers,—
Like some strong spirit, ever young and fair,
But who ignored the clinging weaknesses,
The debile and pathetic falterings
Of infancy and childhood. E'en that breast,
Which gave such promise, prodigal of love,
In its magnificent and queenly wave,
Looked marble cold;—no little child's caress
Had made it heave with soft, delicious pain,
As flowed its life to feed another's life!
And in the unbroken stillness of her voice,
Here was no tremulous and yearning tone,
Such as oft stirs the heart with echoes deep
Of loving welcomes and heart-wrung farewells!
And since that scroll there was a deeper shade—
A something of endurance and self-scorn
Around her—proud endurance blent with shame.
A chained captive might look thus, if doomed
To suffer in the presence of a foe. Was this remorse?
And with the swan-like plumage and soft down
Of her pure woman's heart, was she enforced
To satiate his serpent-sting? None knew.
And thus she lived. Perchance this lonely life
Was not all sorrow;—none can ever know.
The stars shine ever brightest unto one
Beneath whose toiling feet are arid sands.
The Ghebir's faith arose in burning wastes.
And when no flowers bloom round us, or beneath,
We gaze where piercing and eternal burn
The gentle lustre of the Sister Stars—
Steadfast Arcturus, with his solemn brow,
And armed Orion, with his blood-red sword.
But suddenly she grew more sad, more pale.
Was it God's mercy touched her secret woe,
And pitied it, and saved her? So she died. Alas!
Hast felt the thrilling and vibrating hush
When great resolves are born of words sublime
And promise of heroic deeds, struck out
From the warm depths of fiery beating hearts,
Till full the air with guardian angel wings?
Hast marked the strange, sweet, fluttering pause which comes
O'er night's fast-throbbing pulse—as if the stars,
All faint with adoration, lapsed in prayer?
So, with a darkness pregnant of the light—
A silence resonant of music—was
The sylvan spot she called her home;—its air
Was holy as a place of sanctuary—
Its empty chambers were instinct and rife
With influence from shining Presences,
Unseen, but felt with earnest, soothing power:
Her soul had loved it, and still lingered there!