Chapter VII

But, oh! the love, the wild delight,
The sweet romance of long ago,
All these have vanished, as the glow
Of eventide fades out at night.

KINGS OF MEN.

As hills seem Alps, when veiled in misty shroud,
Some men seem kings, through mists of ignorance;
Must we have darkness, then, and cloud on cloud,
To give our hills and pigmy kings a chance?
Must we conspire to curse the humbling light,
Lest some one, at whose feet our fathers bowed,
Should suddenly appear, full length, in sight,
Scaring to laughter the adoring crowd?
Oh, no! God send us light!--Who loses then?
The king of slaves and not the king of men.
True kings are kings for ever, crowned of God,
The King of Kings,--we need not fear for them.
’Tis only the usurper’s diadem
That shakes at touch of light, revealing fraud.

VASHTI.

“After these things, when the wrath of King Ahasuerus was appeased,
he remembered Vashti.”--_Book of Esther_ ii. 1.

I.

Is this all the love that he bore me, my husband, to publish my face
To the nobles of Media and Persia, whose hearts are besotted and base?
Did he think me a slave, me, Vashti, the Beautiful,[A] me,
Queen of Queens,
To summon me thus for a show to the midst of his bacchanal scenes?

[A] Vashti means “_Beautiful Woman_;” Esther means “_A Star_.”

II.

I stand like an image of brass, I, Vashti, in sight of such men!
No, sooner, a thousand times sooner, the mouth of the lioness’ den,
When she’s fiercest with hunger and love for the hungry
young lions that tear
Her breasts with sharp, innocent teeth, I would enter,
aye, sooner than there!

III.

Did he love me, or is he, too, though the King, but a brute like the rest?
I have seen him in wine, and I fancied ’twas then that he
loved me the best;
Though I think I would rather have one sweet, passionate
word from the heart
Than a year of caresses that may with the wine that creates them depart.

IV.

But ever before, in his wine, towards me he shewed honour and grace,--
He was King, I was Queen, and those nobles he made them
remember their place;
But now all is changed: I am vile, they are honoured,
they push me aside,--
A butt for Memucan, and Shethar, and Meres, gone mad in their pride!

* * * * *

V.

Shall I faint? shall I pine? shall I sicken and die for
the loss of his love?
Not I; I am queen of myself, though the stars fall from heaven above--
The stars! ha! the torment is there, for my light is put out by a _Star_,
That has dazzled the eyes of the King and his Court
and his Captains of War.

* * * * *

VI.

He was lonely, they say, and he looked, as he sat like
a ghost at his wine,
On the couch by his side, where, of yore, his Beautiful used to recline.
But the King is a slave to his pride, to his oath, and
the laws of the Medes,
And he cannot call Vashti again, though his poor heart
is wounded and bleeds.

VII.

So they ransacked the land for a wife, while the King
thought of me all the while--
I can see him, this moment, with eyes that are lost for
the loss of a smile,
Gazing dreamily on as each maiden is temptingly passed
in review,
While the love in his heart is awake with the thought
of a face that he knew!

* * * * *

VIII.

Then _she_ came, when his heart was grown weary with loving
the dream of the past!
She is fair--I could curse her for that, if I thought that
this passion would last!
But, e’en if it last, all the love is for me, and, through
good and through ill,
The King shall remember his Vashti, shall think of his
Beautiful still.

* * * * *

IX.

Oh! the day is a weary burden, the night is a restless strife,--
I am sick to the very heart of my soul of this life--this death in life!
Oh! that the glorious, changeless sun would draw me up in his might,
And quench my dreariness in the flood of his everlasting light!

* * * * *

X.

What is it? Oft, as I lie awake and my pillow is wet with tears,
There comes--it came to me just now--a flash, then disappears:
A flash of thought that makes this life a re-enacted scene,
That makes me dream what was, shall be, and what is now, has been.

XI.

And I, when age on age has rolled, shall sit on the royal throne,
And the King shall love his Vashti, his Beautiful, his own;
And for the joy of what has been and what again shall be,
I’ll try to bear this awful weight of lonely misery!

* * * * *

XII.

The star! the star! oh! blazing light that burns into my soul!
The star! the star! oh! flickering light of life beyond control!
O King! remember Vashti, thy Beautiful, thy own,
Who loved thee and shall love thee still, when Esther’s light has flown!

SHAKSPERE.

_April 23rd, 1864._

I.

To-day, three hundred years ago,
A common, English April morn,
In Stratford town a child was born,
Stratford, where Avon’s waters flow.

II.

No guns are fired, no joy-bell rings:
But neighbours call to see the boy
And mother, and to wish them joy,
And then--attend to other things.

III.

Some years glide by--the boy is man;
At school they thought him apt to learn;
And now he goes from home to earn
His livelihood, as best he can.

IV.

He takes the stage; he writes a play;
’Tis well received; he writes again;
His name is known, and courtly men
Are glad to hear what he may say.

V.

For he flings wreaths of pearls abroad,
Like shells or daisies idly strung;
Nor sparing brain, nor pen, nor tongue,
Nor waiting until men applaud;

VI.

But, like a bird, a noble song
He sings, as Genius teaches him--
Regardless of the critic’s whim--
Whether he think it right or wrong.

VII.

Great Nature’s book he wisely reads:
He solves the mystery of life,
And cuts, with philosophic knife,
The tangled knot of human deeds.

VIII.

Man’s passion--madness, hatred, guile,
Hope, mercy, friendship, honour, truth;
The griefs of age--the joys of youth;
The patriot’s tear--the villain’s smile;

IX.

The modest gem--the tinselled gaud,
Of noble worth or base pretence;
The glory bought at blood’s expense;
The power gained by force or fraud--

X.

On these his sun of genius shone,
Making a wondrous photograph,
Till even critics ceased to laugh,
And owned the picture nobly done.

XI.

The chromatrope of woman’s heart;
The words forgot with passion’s breath;
The vanity that conquers death;
The feathery smile that wings a dart;

XII.

The gentle care that makes man blest;
The truth far more than jewels worth;
The love that makes a heaven of earth--
All these to him were manifest.

XIII.

He touches the historic page--
The dead return to life again,
And feel and speak like real men,
Hero or lover, king or sage.

XIV.

The realms of air, with potent wand,
He enters boldly as a king;
And fays, that float on viewless wing,
Sing dreamy songs at his command!

XV.

And witches point, with palsied hand,
And blast the air with hellish chime;
And ghosts revisit earth a time,
With messages from spirit-land!

XVI.

He calls, and what men fancied dumb,
Hills, groves, and lakes, and brooks, and stones,
Answer him in a thousand tones,
Till silence makes a joyous hum.

XVII.

In fine, he made “the world a stage,”
And all upon it act their parts--
By Nature’s prompting and by Art’s--
For Art is Nature taught by age.

XVIII.

And, singing thus, he passed his days--
Not without honour, it is true--
Yet hardly understood by few,
And these were slow in giving praise.

XIX.

And men had lived in mist so long,
Some could not bear his blaze of light,
But shut their eyes, and said ’twas night,
When it ’twas just the noon of song.

XX.

But when his soul shook off its clay,
And hied, its labour done, to God,
Throughout the land that he had trod,
’Twas felt “A King is dead to-day!”

XXI.

And now, when centuries have flown,
Some shout, “Come, build a monument,
For all arrears of poet-rent,”--
As if _he_ needed brass or stone!

XXII.

O man! how oft thy acts have lied!
Thou crushest those who strive to live,
And makest poor pretence to give
Fame unto him thou can’st not hide.

XXIII.

And some are honoured, being dead,
By those who coldly turned aside,
And gave them, living, but their pride,
When they, perhaps, were needing bread!

XXIV.

Yet not to all such honour comes--
Only a few bright names are known
Of all the “simple, great ones gone”--
The most are only found on tombs.

XXV.

But one shall never pass away--
His, who was born in Stratford town,
When brave Queen Bess wore England’s crown,
Three hundred years ago to-day!

SPRING.

I.

O grand, old Earth of God’s and ours,
Once more thou doffest winter’s veil,
Once more the budding trees and flowers
And birds’ sweet music bid thee hail!

II.

Is it a time for joy or care,
O Earth?--a time to laugh or weep?
What myriads in thy bosom sleep,
And we shall soon lie sleeping there!

III.

O Earth! ’tis hard to understand
Why thou should’st thus thy children crave!
For art thou not a mighty grave,
Though strewn with flowers by God’s good hand?

IV.

Thou hearest not, amid thy mirth,
Nor carest though thy children die,
And senseless in thy bosom lie,
Cold and unthought of, cruel Earth!

V.

And yet, O Earth! a little seed,
Dropt by man’s hand within thy heart,
Thou makest great, and dost impart
To him again for every need!

VI.

O Earth! if seed that man lets fall
Into thy heart, thou givest thus
Back thirty, sixty-fold to us,
Thou art not cruel, after all!

VII.

Nor dost thou, Earth, thy children crave;
’Tis God that sows them as His seed,
And by and bye they shall be freed,
As beauteous flowers for him who gave.

VIII.

O gay, Spring Earth of God’s and ours,--
Nay, rather, thou and we are His,
And sun and stars and all that is,--
We bid thee hail with birds and flowers!

IN MEMORIAM.

I.

Our days of happiness Time hurries by,
As though in haste his envy found relief;
But in our nights of anguish his cold eye
Lingers upon us, gloating o’er our grief,--
Yet in the past we fain would live again,
Forgetting, for the gladness, all the pain.

II.

So pass our years. It seems a little while
Since, with wild throbbings in my boyish heart,
I westward gazed from my own western isle,
And saw the white-winged messengers depart.
Ah! little thought I then that o’er the sea
Lived any one that should be dear to me.

III.

Years fled--and other eyes were westward turned,
And I was on the bosom of the deep,
While strange emotions in my bosom burned--
A sorrow that I thought would never sleep:
For all that I had loved on earth was gone,--
Perhaps forever--and--I was alone;

IV.

Save that I heard the dear familiar noise
Of the old ocean, and can well recall
The bliss, the awe, the love without a voice
With which I felt that great heart rise and fall,
Like some untamed and tameless “thing of life”
That frets for something worthy of its strife.

V.

And then I was alone amid the din
Of ceaseless strugglers after wealth and power,
Content to hide the better soul within,
And pass in men’s applause a gaudy hour,--
To act out well a something they are not,--
To be admired and praised--despised, forgot.

VI.

I was alone, but in my fancy grew
A fair ideal, fashioned from the best
And purest feelings that my spirit knew;
And this ideal was the goddess-guest
In my heart’s temple; but I sought not then
To find my goddess in the haunts of men.

VII.

And yet I found her--all-personified
The goddess of my lonely-loving heart,
And--as an artist, when he stands beside
Some genius-fathered, beauteous child of art,
Worships it mutely, with enraptured gaze--
My love was far too deep for words of praise.

VIII.

But, ah! earth’s brightest joys are bought with pain:
Meeting with parting,--smiles with bitter tears,--
Hope ends in sorrow,--loss succeeds to gain,--
And youth’s gay spring-time leads to wintry years;
Nought lives that dies not in the world’s wide range,
And nothing is unchangeable but change.

IX.

My bliss was o’er. I was again alone
Amid the scenes that I had learned to love
For her dear sake; but, ah! the charm was gone
From river-side and mountain-slope and grove--
All, save the memory of happy hours
That lingered like the sweetness of dead flowers.

X.

And as the ground on which a temple stood
Is holy, though the temple stand no more,
So river, mountain, waterfall and wood
Wore something of the sacredness they wore
When her loved presence blessed them, and her face
Made all around her smile with her sweet grace.

XI.

And I am still alone, and years have fled,
And other scenes are ’round me, as I call
The past by Memory’s magic from the dead,
As Endor’s Sibyl brought the Seer to Saul.
(May _he_ not then have thought of that good time
When David’s music lulled his soul from crime?)

XII.

And I, with more of bitterness than bliss,
The summoned years of my past life review,
Till Hope’s red lips with love pale Sorrow’s kiss,
And all things good and beautiful and true,
Start rainbow-like from Sorrow’s falling tears,
Spanning with hues of Heaven all my years.

XIII.

And as I ope the temple of my heart
And seek its inmost and its holiest shrine,
Still there, my love, my darling one, thou art,--
There still I worship thee and call thee mine;
And this sweet anthem all that temple fills--
“Love cannot lose, ’tis loss of love that kills.”

[POSTSCRIPT.]

XIV.

What cry was that which woke me from my dream?
I stand upon my native, island shore,
And hear the startled curlews round me scream
O’er the mute cliffs that make the fierce waves roar;
I watch the “stately ships” go sailing by,
And wonder how my heart has learned to sigh.

XV.

Ah! _that_ was but a dream. A summer’s eve
Breathes all its balmy blessings on my brow;
I feel as though the earth had got reprieve
From its death-sentence. See, the sun sets now--
The blue of heaven grows gently dark above,--
Below, blue eyes are growing dark with love.