Chapter XXI

In hours like these, when through our dream of bliss So far from all things not ourselves we move, What lustral blood, what baptism is this That bathes our hearts, straining toward perfect love?

Our hands are clasped, and yet there is no prayer, Our arms outstretched, and yet no cry is there; Adoring something, what, we cannot say. More pure than we are and more far away, With spirit fervent and most guileless grown, How we are mingled and dissolved in one; Ah, how we live each other, in the unknown!

Oh, how absorbed and wholly lost before The presence of those hours supreme one lies! And how the soul would fain find other skies To seek therein new gods it might adore; Oh, marvellous and agonizing joy, Audacious hope whereon the spirit hangs, Of being one day Once more the prey, Beyond even death, of these deep, silent pangs.

From "LES APPARUS DANS MES CHEMINS"

ST. GEORGE

Opening the mists on a sudden through, An Avenue! Then, all one ferment of varied gold, With foam of plumes where the chamfrom bends Round his horse's head, that no bit doth hold, St. George descends!

The diamond-rayed caparison, Makes of his flight one declining path From Heaven's pity down upon Our waiting earth.

Hero and Lord Of the joyous, helpful virtues all. Sonorous, pure and crystalline! Let his radiance fall On my heart nocturnal and make it shine In the wheeling aureole of his sword!

Let the wind's soft silvern whispers sound And ring his coat of mail around, His battle-spurs amid the fight! --He--the St. George--who shines so bright And comes, 'mid the wailings of my desire. To seize and lift my poor hands higher Toward his dauntless valour's fire!

Like a cry great with faith, to God His lance St. George upraised doth hold; Crossing athwart my glance he trod. As 'twere one tumult of haggard gold. The chrism's glow on his forehead shone, The great St. George of duty high! Beautiful by his heart, and by Himself alone!

Ring, all my voices of hope, ring on! Ring forth in me Beneath fresh boughs of greenery, Down radiant pathways, full of sun; Ye glints of silvery mica, be Bright joy amid my stones--and ye White pebbles that the waters strew. Open your eyes in my brooklets, through The watery lids that cover you; Landscape of gushing springs and sun, With gold that quivers on misty blue, Landscape that dwells in me, hold thou The mirror now To the fiery flights, that flaming roll, Of the great St. George toward my soul!

'Gainst the black Dragon's teeth and claws, Against the armour of leprous sores, The miracle and sword is he; On his breast-plate burneth Charity, And his gentleness sends hurtling back. In dire defeat, the Instinct black. Fires flecked with gold, that flashing turn, Whirlwinds of stars, those glories meet, About his galloping horse's feet. Deep into my remembrance burn Their lightnings fleet!

He comes, a fair ambassador, From white lands built with marble o'er. Where grows, in glades beside the sea, Upon the tree Of goodness, fragrant gentleness. That haven, too, he knows no less Where wondrous ships rock, calm and still. That freights of sleeping angels fill; And those vast evenings, when below Upon the water, 'mid the skies' Reflected eyes. Islands flash sudden forth and glow. That kingdom fair Whereof the Virgin ariseth Queen, Its lowly, ardent joy is he; And his flaming sword in the ambient air Vibrates like an ostensory-- The suddenly flashing St. George! behold, He strikes through my soul like a fire of gold!

He knows from what far wanderings I come: what mists obscure my brain; What dagger marks have deeply scarred My thought, and with black crosses marred: With what spent force, what anger vain. What petty scorn of better things, --Yea, and with what a mask I came, Folly upon the lees of shame! A coward was I; the world I fled To hide my head Within a huge and futile Me; I builded, beneath domes of Night, The blocks of marble, gold be-starred, Of a hostile science, endlessly Towards a height By oracles of blackness barred. For Death alone is Queen of night. And human effort is brightest born Only at dawn. With opening flowers would prayer fain bloom, And their sweet lips hold the same perfume. The sunbeams shimmering white that fall On pearly water, are for all Like a caress Upon our life: the dawn unfolds A counsel fair of trustfulness; And whoso hearkens thereto is saved From his slough, where never a sin was laved.

St. George in radiant armour came Speeding along in leaps of flame 'Mid the sweet morning, through my soul. Young, beautiful by faith was he; He leaned the lower down toward me Even as I the lowlier knelt; Like some pure, golden cordial In secret felt. He filled me with his soaring strength, And with sweet fear most tenderly. Before that vision's dignity, Into his pale, proud hand at length I cast the blood my pain had spent. Then, laying upon me as he went A charge of valour, and the sign Of the cross on my brow from his lance divine, He sped upon his shining road Straight, with my heart, towards his God.

THE GARDENS

The landscape now reveals a change; A stair--that twinèd elm-boughs hold Enclosed 'mid hedges mystic, strange-- Inaugurates a green and gold Vision of gardens, range on range.

Each step's a hope, that doth ascend Stairwise to expectation's height; A weary way it is to wend While noonday suns are burning bright. But rest waits at the evening's end.

Streams, that wash white from sin, flow deep, And round about the fresh lawns twine; While there, beneath the green banks steep, Beside his cross, the Lamb Divine Lies tranquilly in peaceful sleep.

The daisied grass is glad, and gay With crystal butterflies the hedge. Where globes of fruit shine blue; here stray Peacocks beside the box-trees' edge: A shining lion bars the way.

Flowers, upright as the ecstasies And ardours of white spirits pure, With branches springing fountain-wise, Burst upward, and by impulse sure To their own soaring splendour rise.

Gently and very slowly swayed. The wind a wordless rhapsody Sings--and the shimm'ring air doth braid An aureole of filigree Round every disk with emerald laid.

Even the shade is but a flight Toward flickering radiances, that slip From space to space; and now the light Sleeps, with calmed rays, upon the lip Of lilac-blossoms golden-white.

SHE OF THE GARDEN

In such a spot, with radiant flowers for halo, I saw the Guardian Angel sit her down; Vine-branches fashioned a green shrine above her And sun-flowers rose behind her like a crown.

Her fingers, their white slenderness encircled With humble, fragile rings of coral round. Held, ranged in couples, sprays of faithful roses. Sealed with a clasp, with threads of woollen bound.

A shimmering air the golden calm was weaving, All filigree'd with dawn, that like a braid Surmounted her pure brow, which still was hidden Half in the shade.

Woven of linen were her veil and sandals. But, twined 'mid boughs of foliage, on their hem The theologic Virtues Three were painted; Hearts set about with gold encompassed them.

Her silken hair, slow rippling, from her shoulder Down to the mosses of the sward did reach; The childhood of her eyes disclosed a silence More sweet than speech.

My arms outstretched, and all my soul upstraining. Then did I rise, With haggard yearning, toward the soul suspended There in her eyes. Those eyes, they shone so vivid with remembrance, That they confessed days lived alike with me: Oh, in the grave inviolate can it change, then, The Long Ago, and live in the To Be?

Sure, she was one who, being dead, yet brought me. Miraculous, a strength that comforteth, And the Viaticum of her survival Guiding me from the further side of Death.

From "LA MULTIPLE SPLENDEUR"

THE GLORY OF THE HEAVENS

Shining in dim transparence, the whole of infinity lies Behind the veil that the finger of radiant winter weaves And down on us falls the foliage of stars in glittering sheaves; From out the depths of the forest, the forest obscure of the skies,

The wingèd sea with her shadowy floods as of dappled silk Speeds, 'neath the golden fires, her pale immensity o'er; And diamond-rayed, the moonlight, shining along the shore, Bathes the brow of the headlands in radiance as soft as milk.

Yonder there flow, untwining and twining their loops anew! The mighty, silvery rivers, through the translucent night; And a glint as of wondrous acids sparkles with magic light the cup that the lake outstretches towards the mountains blue.

Everywhere light seems breaking forth into flower and star, Whether on shore in stillness, or wavering on the deep. The islands are nests where silence inviolate doth deep; An ardent nimbus hovers o'er yon horizons far.

See, from Nadir to Zenith one aureole doth reach! Of yore, the souls exalted by faith's high mysteries Saw, in the domination of those star-clouded skies, Jehovah's hand resplendent and heard His silent speech.

But now the eyes that scan them no longer may there aspire To we some god self-banished--not so, but the intricate Tangle of marvellous problems, the messengers that wait On Measureless Force, and veil her, there on her couch of fire.

O cauldrons of life, where matter, adown the eternal day, Pours herself fruitful, seething through paths of scattering flame! O flux of worlds and reflux to other worlds the same! Unending oscillation betwixt newer and for aye!

Tumults consumed in whirlpools of speed and sound and light-- Violence we nought may reck of!--and yet there falls from thence The vast, unbroken silence, mysterious and intense That makes the peace, the calmness and beauty of the night!

O spheres of flame and golden, always more far and high; Abyss to abyss still floating, onward from shade to shade! So far, so high, all reck'ning the wisdom of man has made, Before those giddy numbers must shrink in his hands and die!

Shining in dim transparence, the whole of infinity lies Behind the veils that the finger of radiant winter weaves; And down on us falls the foliage of star in glittering sheaves, From out the depths of the forest, the forest obscure of the skies.

LIFE

To see beauty in all, is to lift our own Soul Up to loftier heights than do chose who aspire Through culpable suffering, vanquished desire. Harsh Reality, dread and ineffable Whole, Distils her red draught, enough tonic and stern To intoxicate heads and to make the heart burn.

O clean and pure grain, whence are purged all the tares! Clear torch, chosen out amid many whose flame; Though ancient in splendour, is false to its name! It is good to keep step, though beset with hard cares, With the life that is real, to the far distant goal, With no arm save the lucid, white pride of one's soul!

To march, thus intrepid in confidence, straight On the obstacle, holding the stubborn hope Of conquering, thanks to firm blows of the will, Of intelligence prompt, or of patience to wait; And to feel growing stronger within us the sense, Day by day, of a power superb and intense!

To love ourselves keenly those others within Who share a like strife with us, soar without fear Toward that one future, whose footsteps we hear; To love them, heart, brain, and because we are kin Because in some dark, maddened day they have known One anguish, one mourning, one string with our own!

To be drunk with the great human battle of wills-- --Pale, fleeting reflex of the monstrous assaults, Golden movements of planets in heaven's high vaults-- Till one lives in all that which acts, struggles, and thrills, And avidly opens one's heart to the law That rules, dread and stern, the whole universe o'er!

JOY

O splendid, spacious day, irradiate With flaming dawns, when earth shows yet more fair Her ardent beauty, proud, without alloy; And wakening life breathes out her perfume rare So potently, that, all intoxicate, Our ravished being rushes upon joy!

Be thanked, mine eyes, that now Ye still shine clear beneath my furrowed brow To see afar, the light vibrating there; And you my hands, that in the sun yet thrill, And you, my fingers, that glow golden still Among the golden fruit upon the wall Where hollyhocks stand tall.

Be thanked, my body, that thyself dost bear Yet firm and swift, and quivering to the touch Of the quick breezes or of winds profound; And you, straight frame, and lungs outbreathing wide, Along the shore or on the mountain-side, The sharp and radiant air That bathes and grips the mighty worlds around!

O festal mornings, calm in loveliness, Rose whose pure face the dewdrops all caress, Birds flying toward us, like some presage white, Gardens of sombre shade or frailest light!

What time the ample summer warms the glade, I love you, roads, by which came hither late She who held hidden in her hands my fate. I love you, distant marshes, woods austere, And to its depths, I love the earth, where here Beneath my feet, my dead to rest are laid.

So I exist in all that doth surround And penetrate me:--all this grassy ground, These hidden paths, and many a copse of beech: Clear water, that no clouding shadows reach: You have become to me Myself, because you are my memory.

In you my life prolonged for ever seems, I shape, I am, all that hath filled my dreams; In that horizon vast that dazzles me, Trees shimmering with gold, my pride are ye; And like the knots upon your trunk, my will Strengthens my power to sane, stanch labour still.

Rose of the pearl-hued gardens, when you kiss My brow, a touch of living flame it is; To me all seems One thrill of ardour, beauty, wild caress; And I, in this world-drunkenness, So multiply myself in all that gleams On dazzled eyes, That my heart, fainting, vents itself in cries.

O leaps of fervour, strong, profound, and sweet, As though some great wing swept thee off thy feet! If thou hast felt them upward hearing thee Toward infinity, Complain not, man, even in the evil day; Whate'er disaster takes thee for her prey Thou to thyself shalt say That once, for one short instant all supreme Which time may not destroy, Thou yet hast tasted, with quick-beating heart, Sweet, formidable joy; And that thy soul, beguiling thee to set As in a dream, Hath fused thy very being's inmost part With the unanimous great founts of power And that that day supreme, that single hour, Hath made a god of thee.