Selected Poems (Penguin Classics) (15 page)

Say, is it nothing that I know them all?

The wild flower was the larger; I have dashed

Rose-blood upon its petals, pricked its cup’s

Honey with wine, and driven its seed to fruit,

[150] And show a better flower if not so large:

I stand myself. Refer this to the gods

Whose gift alone it is! which, shall I dare

(All pride apart) upon the absurd pretext

That such a gift by chance lay in my hand,

Discourse of lightly or depreciate?

It might have fallen to another’s hand: what then?

I pass too surely: let at least truth stay!

And next, of what thou followest on to ask.

This being with me as I declare, O king,

[160] My works, in all these varicoloured kinds,

So done by me, accepted so by men –

Thou askest, if (my soul thus in men’s hearts)

I must not be accounted to attain

The very crown and proper end of life?

Inquiring thence how, now life closeth up,

I face death with success in my right hand:

Whether I fear death less than dost thyself

The fortunate of men? ‘For’ (writest thou)

‘Thou leavest much behind, while I leave naught.

[170] Thy life stays in the poems men shall sing,

The pictures men shall study; while my life,

Complete and whole now in its power and joy,

Dies altogether with my brain and arm,

Is lost indeed; since, what survives myself?

The brazen statue to o’erlook my grave,

Set on the promontory which I named.

And that – some supple courtier of my heir

Shall use its robed and sceptred arm, perhaps,

To fix the rope to, which best drags it down.

[180] I go then: triumph thou, who dost not go!’

Nay, thou art worthy of hearing my whole mind.

Is this apparent, when thou turn’st to muse

Upon the scheme of earth and man in chief,

That admiration grows as knowledge grows?

That imperfection means perfection hid,

Reserved in part, to grace the after-time?

If, in the morning of philosophy,

Ere aught had been recorded, nay perceived,

Thou, with the light now in thee, couldst have looked

[190] On all earth’s tenantry, from worm to bird,

Ere man, her last, appeared upon the stage –

Thou wouldst have seen them perfect, and deduced

The perfectness of others yet unseen.

Conceding which, – had Zeus then questioned thee

‘Shall I go on a step, improve on this,

Do more for visible creatures than is done?’

Thou wouldst have answered, ‘Ay, by making each

Grow conscious in himself – by that alone.

All’s perfect else: the shell sucks fast the rock,

[200] The fish strikes through the sea, the snake both swims

And slides, forth range the beasts, the birds take flight,

Till life’s mechanics can no further go –

And all this joy in natural life is put

Like fire from off thy finger into each,

So exquisitely perfect is the same.

But ’tis pure fire, and they mere matter are;

It has them, not they it: and so I choose

For man, thy last premeditated work

(If I might add a glory to the scheme)

[210] That a third thing should stand apart from both,

A quality arise within his soul,

Which, intro-active, made to supervise

And feel the force it has, may view itself,

And so be happy.’ Man might live at first

The animal life: but is there nothing more?
In due time, let him critically learn

How he lives; and, the more he gets to know

Of his own life’s adaptabilities,

The more joy-giving will his life become.

[220] Thus man, who hath this quality, is best.

But thou, king, hadst more reasonably said:

‘Let progress end at once, – man make no step

Beyond the natural man, the better beast,

Using his senses, not the sense of sense.’

In man there’s failure, only since he left

The lower and inconscious forms of life.

We called it an advance, the rendering plain

Man’s spirit might grow conscious of man’s life,

And, by new lore so added to the old,

[230] Take each step higher over the brute’s head.

This grew the only life, the pleasure-house,

Watch-tower and treasure-fortress of the soul,

Which whole surrounding flats of natural life

Seemed only fit to yield subsistence to;

A tower that crowns a country. But alas,

The soul now climbs it just to perish there!

For thence we have discovered (’tis no dream –

We know this, which we had not else perceived)

That there’s a world of capability

[240] For joy, spread round about us, meant for us,

Inviting us; and still the soul craves all,

And still the flesh replies, ‘Take no jot more

Than ere thou clombst the tower to look abroad!

Nay, so much less as that fatigue has brought

Deduction to it.’ We struggle, fain to enlarge

Our bounded physical recipiency,

Increase our power, supply fresh oil to life,

Repair the waste of age and sickness: no,

It skills not! life’s inadequate to joy,

[250] As the soul sees joy, tempting life to take.

They praise a fountain in my garden here

Wherein a Naiad sends the water-bow

Thin from her tube; she smiles to see it rise.

What if I told her, it is just a thread

From that great river which the hills shut up,

And mock her with my leave to take the same?

The artificer has given her one small tube

Past power to widen or exchange – what boots

To know she might spout oceans if she could?

[260] She cannot lift beyond her first thin thread:

And so a man can use but a man’s joy

While he sees God’s. Is it for Zeus to boast,

‘See, man, how happy I live, and despair –

That I may be still happier – for thy use!’

If this were so, we could not thank our lord,

As hearts beat on to doing; ’tis not so –

Malice it is not. Is it carelessness?

Still, no. If care – where is the sign? I ask,

And get no answer, and agree in sum,

[270] O king, with thy profound discouragement,

Who seest the wider but to sigh the more.

Most progress is most failure: thou sayest well.

The last point now: – thou dost except a case –

Holding joy not impossible to one

With artist-gifts – to such a man as I

Who leave behind me living works indeed;

For, such a poem, such a painting lives.

What? dost thou verily trip upon a word,

Confound the accurate view of what joy is

[280] (Caught somewhat clearer by my eyes than thine)

With feeling joy? confound the knowing how

And showing how to live (my faculty)

With actually living? – Otherwise

Where is the artist’s vantage o’er the king?

Because in my great epos I display

How divers men young, strong, fair, wise, can act –

Is this as though I acted? if I paint,

Carve the young Phoebus, am I therefore young?

Methinks I’m older that I bowed myself

[290]
The many years of pain that taught me art!

Indeed, to know is something, and to prove

How all this beauty might be enjoyed, is more:

But, knowing naught, to enjoy is something too.

Yon rower, with the moulded muscles there,

Lowering the sail, is nearer it than I.

I can write love-odes: thy fair slave’s an ode.

I get to sing of love, when grown too grey

For being beloved: she turns to that young man,

The muscles all a-ripple on his back.

[300] I know the joy of kingship: well, thou art king!

‘But,’ sayest thou – (and I marvel, I repeat

To find thee trip on such a mere word) ‘what

Thou writest, paintest, stays; that does not die:

Sappho survives, because we sing her songs,

And Aeschylus, because we read his plays!’

Why, if they live still, let them come and take

Thy slave in my despite, drink from thy cup,

Speak in my place. Thou diest while I survive?

Say rather that my fate is deadlier still,

[310] In this, that every day my sense of joy

Grows more acute, my soul (intensified

By power and insight) more enlarged, more keen;

While every day my hairs fall more and more,

My hand shakes, and the heavy years increase –

The horror quickening still from year to year,

The consummation coming past escape

When I shall know most, and yet least enjoy –

When all my works wherein I prove my worth,

Being present still to mock me in men’s mouths,

[320] Alive still, in the praise of such as thou,

I, I the feeling, thinking, acting man,

The man who loved his life so over-much,

Sleep in my urn. It is so horrible,

I dare at times imagine to my need

Some future state revealed to us by Zeus,

Unlimited in capability

For joy, as this is in desire for joy,

– To seek which, the joy-hunger forces us:

That, stung by straitness of our life, made strait

[330] On purpose to make prized the life at large –

Freed by the throbbing impulse we call death,

We burst there as the worm into the fly,

Who, while a worm still, wants his wings. But no!

Zeus has not yet revealed it; and alas,

He must have done so, were it possible!

Live long and happy, and in that thought die:

Glad for what was! Farewell. And for the rest,

I cannot tell thy messenger aright

Where to deliver what he bears of thine

[340] To one called Paulus; we have heard his fame

Indeed, if Christus be not one with him –

I know not, nor am troubled much to know.

Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew,

As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised,

Hath access to a secret shut from us?

Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king,

In stooping to inquire of such an one,

As if his answer could impose at all!

He writeth, doth he? well, and he may write.

[350] Oh, the Jew findeth scholars! certain slaves

Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ;

And (as I gathered from a bystander)

Their doctrine could be held by no sane man.

Two in the Campagna

I

I wonder do you feel today

As I have felt since, hand in hand,

We sat down on the grass, to stray

In spirit better through the land,

This morn of Rome and May?

II

For me, I touched a thought, I know,

Has tantalized me many times,

(Like turns of thread the spiders throw

Mocking across our path) for rhymes

[10] To catch at and let go.

III

Help me to hold it! First it left

The yellowing fennel, run to seed

There, branching from the brickwork’s cleft,

Some old tomb’s ruin: yonder weed

Took up the floating weft,

IV

Where one small orange cup amassed

Five beetles, – blind and green they grope

Among the honey-meal: and last,

Everywhere on the grassy slope

[20] I traced it. Hold it fast!

V

The champaign with its endless fleece

Of feathery grasses everywhere!

Silence and passion, joy and peace,

An everlasting wash of air –

Rome’s ghost since her decease.

VI

Such life here, through such lengths of hours,

Such miracles performed in play,

Such primal naked forms of flowers,

Such letting nature have her way

[30] While heaven looks from its towers!

VII

How say you? Let us, O my dove,

Let us be unashamed of soul,

As earth lies bare to heaven above!

How is it under our control

To love or not to love?

VIII

I would that you were all to me,

You that are just so much, no more.

Nor yours nor mine, nor slave nor free!

Where does the fault lie? What the core

[40] O’ the wound, since wound must be?

IX

I would I could adopt your will,

See with your eyes, and set my heart

Beating by yours, and drink my fill

At your soul’s springs, – your part my part

In life, for good and ill.

X

No. I yearn upward, touch you close,

Then stand away. I kiss your cheek,

Catch your soul’s warmth, – I pluck the rose

And love it more than tongue can speak –

[50] Then the good minute goes.

XI

Already how am I so far

Out of that minute? Must I go

Still like the thistle-ball, no bar,
Onward, whenever light winds blow,

Fixed by no friendly star?

XII

Just when I seemed about to learn!

Where is the thread now? Off again!

The old trick! Only I discern –

Infinite passion, and the pain

[60] Of finite hearts that yearn.

A Grammarian’s Funeral