Oh, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas,
Oh, their Dante of the dread Inferno,
Wrote one song—and in my brain I sing it,
Drew one angel—borne, see, on my bosom!
“Men and Women,” a collection of fifty poems, first published in 1855,
is probably the best known of our author’s numerous volumes. Some of the
very finest of his work is in it. To this collection “One Word More” is
an appendix, in the form of a dedication of the fifty poems to his wife,
Elizabeth Barrett Browning. As we learn from stanza 13, this work
differs from all others in having been dashed off, the first time of
writing being also the last time; and yet (such is the inspiration of
love) it stands with the very highest of his works. It needs careful
reading, but presents no such difficulties as “Abt Vogler.”
Rafael, painter for the world, becomes for once a poet for his dearest.
If only these wonderful sonnets could be found, how we should prize
them; but the volume is hopelessly lost (stanzas 2-4).
Dante, poet for the world, prepares for once to paint an angel for _his_
dearest. But, alas! he is hindered by the breaking in of some “people of
importance” of the city, the sort of people who served as character
models for “the folk of his Inferno” (5-7).
There would evidently be less of art and more of nature in such an
outpouring of soul; and, therefore, the true artist would long to do it
“once, and only once, and for one only.” “The man’s joy” would be found
in the mere utterance of his soul to his dearest, without any thought of
art, which, to the true artist, lifts so high an ideal that his
shortcoming is always a “sorrow” (8).
So is it with the prophet, the exercise of whose high calling can never
be dissociated from its burdens and cares (9). If he dared, which he may
not (10), how gladly for the one that he loved would he “put off the
prophet” and provide water, not by the forth putting of power, but
simply as the man, through the self-denial of love (11).
Browning himself has only the one art, so cannot leave his poetry to
paint, or carve, or “make music” (12); but as the nearest equivalent
possible to him will write “once, and only once, and for one only,” a
purely extemporaneous production (13), which shall not, like his other
works, be dramatic in principle, but spoken in his own “true person”
(14).
Then follows the wonderful moon illustration, so marvellously wrought
out, based upon the familiar astronomical fact that, through all her
phases and movements she always presents exactly the same face to the
earth (15), the other remaining entirely concealed (“unseen of herdsman,
huntsman, steersman,” &c.), and therefore available as a new revelation
(who knows of what grandeur?) for the loved and specially-favoured
mortal (16).
The application of the illustration in stanzas 17 and 18 is exquisitely
beautiful, as is the gem-like quatrain with which the poem closes.
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