III SONGS AND MEDITATIONS

BEHOLD in us the Multitudinous One, The myriad motions of Whose Being are Life and the pain of life! One Self we are, Though clothed in many forms. These laboring minds, These bodies, bruised and broken, are but strands In the eternal Body that through birth, Death, and the throes of travail without end, Renews Itself; and all our tumult is But the one Will among the many here When with fierce pity and remorseless love And with unutterable joy It strains, Seeking a passage through the bleeding web And tangled meshes of blind wills at war— God’s Being, in act, which is Man’s agony, And glory, too: for on that agony His rapture rests; our passion is His peace, And He is woven of us, as we of Him.

EVENING has quieted the wind, the night Is soft around me while I sit alone And reading by calm candle-light. The voice of a forgotten poet cries, From the clear page, up to my listening heart; And my heart listens, and replies. And yet, even in loveliness I find No refuge from old wonder; the old thoughts And the old questions come to mind. Was it for this the ravin and the rage, The lust and hunger of the centuries Clamored—to close in this calm page? What blood was shed for this? What roving herds In meadowy pastures, what brave things have died To feed the music of these words? Beauty is desolate, being the crown And end of all; to her the laboring years Lift yearning hands, and Time bows down. The ages travail with a great unrest, In agony and ecstasy, to build The frail arch of one dolorous breast. I will not think of this; I will read on In these calm pages. It is written here: The Song to the Belovèd One. The heart that wrought it, and the cunning hand, Are stilled forever, and the poet lies, Forgotten, in a far-off land. The iron bondage of old Time and Space Withholds me from him, whom I have not seen; Nor shall I look upon his face. He takes his ease in the dark earth, and there Has rest from all his labors, and the night Covers him with her heavy hair. If I could pierce into that hushed abode Of slumber and corruption, I should find The mouth from which this sorrow flowed. It would be quiet now, for all it cried— Quiet and imperturbable: it is With its own sleep preoccupied. Yet, surely, in this very room it sings Miraculously to my heart to-night. How shall I understand these things? I will not think of them; I will read on In these calm pages. It is written here: The Song to the Belovèd One. The night is hushed around me while I move Darkly, with dreamy thought, from page to page, From line to line, of grief and love. Now, in the silence of the night, I read These words, the opening of the final prayer: Song, for thy sake with Death I plead. The lonely splendor of Antares shines Through the barred window, and an aphis crawls Among the letters and the lines. He moves among them with uncertain will Fitfully, and between the words, “I plead,” Falters a moment—then is still. Little he guesses what these letters are, Nor I the meaning of the trembling Word Written beyond us, star on star. The night covers us both, and we are driven, Like leaves before the wind, through the immense And glittering wilderness of heaven. Earth takes us with her: silently she swings Through the old orbit, bearing in her breast The drowsy mouth—the mouth that sings. And yet, all this lives only in my mind; And when that darkens, the whole world will darken Suddenly—the whole world go blind. All I have touched, all I have loved and known Will fail me—and the breast of Life draw back, Leaving me in the dark, alone. O starry universe, hung in the clear Bell of my mind, be living in me now! Dwell in me for a moment here! How often in the many minds of men Have you been born, only to pass away— Dying with every mind again! This is a thought that is too hard for me: It is a bitter thing to think upon, That, to myself, all this shall be As if it had not been, when I am gone.

THE fish-hawk over the water and the gray fish that goes Glimmering through the water—the preyer and the prey— They follow or hasten ever; they wrestle together, they close In the old fearful fashion, in the old fierce way. Harsh are the rites of being, and bitter is the war Waged between life and life by the blind will-to-be: Yet all if they but knew it, are one—lovers they are Who strive, each with the other, in a great mystery.

SACRED is the communion of man with man Through speech: dearer than wine, dearer than bread Is the low talk around the open fire Or under the clear stars, whereby his heart Is mingled with the heart of his own kind. After the fret and turmoil of the day The tired seamstress leans into the twilight, And, in the alley, with her neighbor shares Grave nothings; while in billiard-room or bar, ’Mid thunder of laughter, the old joke goes ’round, Or ribald story. Wherever two are met, There speech is and the ancient fellowship, Making us one, who are but wanderers Upon a lonely way. And therefore men, That death itself may not divide them forever, Have whispered to each other across the years, In rune or rhyme, ballad, fable or myth, Their passions and their sorrows; and a glory Gathers about his memory who most Has shared with us, out of his love, himself. Blessèd beyond all others are the heads Upon whose front falls the immortal gleam— In distant lands perhaps, beyond far seas, From sun-washed islands or gray promontories, Lifted across the years to give us light— Spirits at which our groping youth was fed, The drowsy lips from which all dreams come down, Makers of music, whisperers of secrets, Though in the darkness of the centuries Hidden away—the hands folded, the heart Quiet—still musical, still murmuring, In many a legend, many a rustling page, Sad songs and dreams that drift about the world, The old incorrigible ecstasy— Despite all death, despite all doubt, all doom, Still passionate, still intimate with us, And full of a fierce love. And sweet it is To sit—echoing spirit and singing spirit— As friend with friend, by the wayside of the years, Above the dust of time and circumstance, And hear, in the lone hour of delight, The sacred things that man has said to man For comfort of his sad and wondering heart: News from a traveller on the common way— How lies the land, whether the hills be steep Or valleys fruitful, where the waters run, Or March hides the first flower—ponderings, Praise of the road, doubt for the journey’s end Or of the purpose of the pilgrimage, (If there be purpose in the pilgrimage) Questions, questions and reassurances, Words that the generations past have worn Upon their lips for love’s sake, that shall lie, Trembling, upon the lips we may not reach: The immortal Legend, the old tameless Song, Wherein, to us—who all too easily, Too often and too easily, forget— The splendor, the unimaginable splendor, Holy and stern, of all reality, In happy moments is revealed anew; Hints of a meaning, echoes of the high Sorrowful music to which all things move, With all their warring voices, to one end, Violently. Amen—so shall they move, Till Time’s lone harp fall silent, till the years Slumber, and all be as a tale long told.

I SHALL take flight from Death on sudden wings, In some swift song; he shall not have me here— For all his cunning, all his snares and slings, I shall escape him, whom I fear. Then, though he wander through all woods and ways, He will not reach to me, out of the strong Net of these tangled nights and days Escaped forever in a song. But now my wings are broken and I hide In this tall grass, to hear his foot go by Stealthily, stealthily— Searching the field on either side. Heal me, O Time, and I will rise again On swifter wings and for a surer flight, Remembering this pain! So, when he comes, he shall not find me here, By day or night— But search forever, and in vain.

MY dreams wear thinner as the years go by: The stony face of Fate into my own Stares, with that granite look of hers; and I Stare back, with a still face—but not of stone.

TAKE me down from this cross, for now my body is broken, And the feet pierced and the hands pierced, and in my side The heart fails me—it breaks, and the words that I have spoken Are as nothing; you were deceived in me, and I have lied. Take me down, lower me from the tree—yet slowly, My spirit is heavy and my heart sick, my flesh is sore From the bruising and from the bitter scourging, and the holy Dream that was in me once is in me now no more. There is no virtue left in me, there is not any Hope left in me to help you: if it must be done, As it was written in the old days, that one for many Should be uplifted—truly, I am not that one. The nails bite deep into my flesh—shall I endure it Longer? No longer! Loose me, take me down and lay My body in the cool tomb, and seal it up, secure it Against the faces, the proud faces, the blind day. For I am tired and have need of night to cover me, And secrecy wherein to hide my shame, and deep Silence and solitude forevermore, and over me, Darkness—and a lone resting-place and a long sleep. And yet, nevertheless, perhaps a little longer I may endure it. Father, if this thing must be, Give me the strength. Ah yet, perhaps, a little longer ... I will pour out Thy love upon them in my agony!

WHAT word of courage may I bring to you, What word of comfort—brothers and my friends— Now the returning season gathers us Into these folds and pastures of our youth, Come for an hour of high communion here! Frail and imperfect is the instrument, And yet perhaps through me that Self may speak Which is most wise, being woven of us all— And through the generations still endures, Shedding its generations like dead leaves, One Self—the spirit of Man; for we are one. For we are one, who are emprisoned here Upon this turning planet as it swings Through the lone waste and labyrinth of heaven— One in our plight, one in our common doom, One in our stubborn questioning, and one, Beyond all other creatures, in the sole Sad consciousness of our predicament— Pilgrims and outcasts between birth and death, Scanning the frontiers of the night for news; Probing the atom; challenging the cell; Knocking at every gate and every door Of the inexorable silences; Wondering; doubting; grieving; worshipping— Perplexed before the mystery of things. Now while the earth turns eastward, half in light And half in darkness; from the Himalayan snows And Mongol uplands to the Texan desert Or where the starry waters dawnward heave Out of the west from Asia—on blue hills, ’Mid iron cities or green solitudes, By land or sea, in darkness or in light— The restless Spirit moves in many ways, The multitudinous Being is abroad. We gather in theatres; we brood alone; We pour with laughter through the shining streets; We till the earth; we lift our towers to heaven; We watch beside the sick-bed; on grey capes, On crags and headlands of the world we set Our winking fires from coast to coast; or wander The wastes of ocean with a furrowing prow; We sleep; we turn the pages of a book, And move in silence out of space and time; We grapple each other; we hate; we fear; we kill; We cry aloud; we yearn, kneeling in prayer, Lifting our faces to the emptiness; In busy factories and teeming dens Weaving the fabric of the world’s desire; Lying in prisons; sitting upon thrones; Judging the earth in wisdom and in truth. Now while the earth turns eastward—even now, The divine tragedy of Man proceeds: The poet walks the room; the ballerina Advances to the footlights—on one body Is fixed the hunger of a thousand eyes; The priest moves to the altar; and the harlot Slinks through the alleys of the darkened town; The bride puts on her bridal-wreath; the judge Condemns the felon; and the dying man Coughs—and is silent, as the new-born babe Nestles in the exhausted mother’s arm. Over the death-bed now some head bows down; Somewhere the cry of the new soul is heard; While through the leafy lanes the lovers move With loitering step or pause among the shadows, Kindling between their lips the flame of life. Perpetual death, perpetual rebirth, Perpetual passion and perpetual pain! From shore to shore the violent Being rolls, With all its motions, all its warring wills— Vast as the sea, forever in unrest; The waves foam upward, and the waves subside, And the one ocean gives and gathers all. Now while the earth turns eastward, half in light And half in darkness, in her breast she bears Those other and much greater multitudes That are as one with us as our own blood— The nameless or the unforgotten dead, Whose faces we have never looked upon Or voices ever heard—our forefathers, Buried long since: farmers and merchants, kings, Discoverers and captains, voyagers On ocean solitudes, sages and seers, Poets and lovers of the truth of old, Whereof all history is but the tale, All legend but the rumor; and who still Are vehement, and from old books and songs, From saga or from chronicle, cry out, Across the ever-widening gulf of time And the unfathomable night, such words Of courage and assurance as they may, To us who follow after—breathing back A fading music from the fields of death. They, too, knew the good earth and the glad sun, The trembling kiss, the infinite farewell; The lips of longing and the breasts of life Were sweet to them, who grieved even as we, Loved and were loved as we are, laughed and sighed, And had their hour of happiness; they, too, Asked the old questions—and, like us, in vain; Were troubled or were sorrowful. But now To them the moonlight and the starlight are Less than a voice in a forgotten dream, At morning, or a flower cast away— So deep the oblivion that wraps them ’round, So dark the night that hides them. They sleep well, They take their fill of sleep; they have their rest As once, in the beginning, ere the womb Had travailed that conceived them. And us, too, The lonely and inevitable Voice Shall summon, and the silence take us home. All shall be gathered homeward—he that sang And he that listened, the lover and the loved, The lips that pleaded and the hands that blessed Lie mingled in the darkness, and these hearts That beauty haunted be a little dust, Blown ’round the narrow margins of the world; We shall be one with the revolving planet Throughout the ages, till the earth itself, With all its millions, all its sleeping sons, Pass like a cinder down the Void or mix With the primeval fires casting up The foam of future worlds along the dark. Perpetual death, perpetual rebirth, Perpetual passion and perpetual pain! Is there no respite from the wheel of things? Is there no refuge from eternity? The heavens grow old and hunger for their peace; The father founts, Antares and Arcturus, Vega, and Sirius, and the nursling flames— Ceaselessly dying, ceaselessly reborn— Tire of the one tune and find no way Out of the woven web of space and time In which the worlds are tangled; but all move Through the fierce throes and cycles of rebirth Laboriously, with groaning forces held In iron bondage, to the eternal Rhythm, Whose meaning and whose end we may not guess. What word of courage may I bring to you, What word of comfort! For the restless mind, Gnawing the riddle of eternity, Finds little solace there or sustenance. Our faiths have fallen from us and left us bare; The dream, fantastic and compassionate, That like a veil of love and glory hung Between us and the bitterness of things, Is lifted, and the universe has grown Vaster and much more lonely. Nor shall Thought— Crying into the dark, and listening, listening— Find any answer to her prayer: the night Is soundless, and the starry mouths are sealed. Yet be assured indeed that all is well And the truth greater than we dare to dream— Greater and more exalted! Though the mind, Fashioned for humbler uses, may not grasp The meaning of the mystery; though Thought— For all her longing, all her labor—gain Hardly the comfort of a hope, there is A self within us, wiser than the mind And deeper than all thought, that still endures Firm at the helm through all the storms of chance Forever, in unquenchable belief And courage, not to be abated: Life, In wrath and fear, in love and agony, Weaving her splendor from the dust of death, Bears in her breast—though inarticulate— A holier confidence; her running grass, Her herds trampling the uplands, her fierce wills In bush or brake, her ravening hosts that throng The fields of ocean and the aisles of air— Furious, furious for continuance— These answer, these bear witness all is well, These in indomitable joy affirm The wonder and glory of a universe Wherein all lusts, all hungers, all defeats, All agonies are woven to one Doom, Somehow sublime, somehow magnificent; And every heart-beat is an act of faith, Praising the hidden Purpose! Stern, my friends, Are the realities: the wheel of heaven Revolves, with all its motions, and the planet Heaves forward blindly, bearing us along Into the Void—we know not why nor where; Embattled between two oblivions We stand, for a brief moment, and lift up Our faces to the light—but in our blood The voices of the generations past Strive, and the generations still unborn Are urgent in us that we play our part, As actors in a stately tragedy To some triumphant close. Courage and faith, These are most needful. Surely they shall avail! Surely they have the truth! And as for Him Whom we have sought beyond the stars in vain, Perhaps He may be nearer than we know.

How little our true majesty is shown In these proud minds by which we are confessed Traitors so often, recreants at best— Unworthy of life’s greatness and our own. Not by the mind we shall be judged alone, Who are much more than in the mind is guessed. By faith we live. The heart in every breast Labors, believing, toward the end unknown. Through the shrill mind, in terror and defeat, The ancient flood of holy being roars; The gallant heart again and yet again— Jetting fierce streams of faith—with every beat, In sacramental affirmation, pours Life’s answer through the unbelieving brain.

“And yet at last, when all is said and done, Where is the triumph, truly: to have been Spectators of an immemorial scene, And then hurried into oblivion?” So speaks the mind, self-cheated, while the one Splendor in every mind, however mean, Works out Its purpose, secret and serene— And through all living things under the sun. His presence is the starry multitude, And in us also, surely, He abides: Our bodies are salt shores for the sharp flood That through creation rises and subsides With ebb and flow of everlasting tides, Or rhythms of the perishable blood.

Poor timid mind, so agile to defend Your own misgiving, patient to put out The light of hope within us and without, Your own best lover and your own worst friend— While over us the faithful heavens bend, While through our veins the justling life-streams shout Triumph and joy, still pondering the old doubt— Anxious and unpersuaded to the end! If it be truth indeed that life through you, Who are the front of her emergent will, Waking, asks for an answer and, denied, Resumes the primal sleep—if this be true, Dark is the truth. But we are greater still Than our own thoughts and wiser than our pride.

WE are all woven of the one weaving, Flower and bird and beast and tree— The gray kingfisher and the trout, The toad that spreads a tiny hand On the earth’s carpet quietly— Heaven, shaken with storm and thunder, Clouds and great waters, winds and snows, The starry firmament, the grieving Heart of man; through earth and sea, The moth, the tiger, and the rose, Flower and planet—strand on strand— The wandering threads wind in and out, With warp and woof, over and under, Weaving the ancient unity. We are all woven in one Story; One Legend like a sorrow runs Through creeds and crowns and buried wars, Prophets and saviours crucified, Great fortresses, and cities, once Crowded, now crumbled and forsaken, Captains and kings of old that spread Their sails upon the sea: one Glory Speaks through them all—through swords and guns, Battles and dreams and hearts that bled, Lovers, or rulers in their pride, Desolate lands, and the lone stars That by the wind of Time are shaken, And thronging worlds and flaming suns. We are all passing on together, In darkness, to the end unknown— Through all the ways and days of earth: The thief, the ploughman and the seer, The dog, the emperor on his throne, The eyes, bowed over eyes unseeing, The dying face, the broken heart, To the one end are moving, whether Evil or good—but not alone. Each in the other has a part. Each as he may, in hope or fear, Love, lust, or labor, death or birth, Works out the will of the One Being— For One is all, and all are One.

YOU, perhaps yet unborn, that some day shall read these rhymes— Know, that I was a man even as yourself, and from the womb Issued in nakedness—also, that I suffered the doom Common to all men, and that I pondered these things many times; And ceased. So shall you cease: brief are the days and few. I have made these songs, that we for a moment might partake Of the one dream. This is my spirit offered for your sake. Eat, drink; this is my spirit given for you. It is night, and we are alone together: your head Bends over the open book, your feeding eyes devour The substance of my dream. O sacred hour That makes us one—you, fleeting, and I, already fled! Here is my love, here is my sorrow, my heart’s rage, Poured out for you. What tenderness brooding above you Hallows these songs! I have made them all for you. I love you. What love, what longing, my brother, speaks to you from this page!