I.

Rome.—A Hall in a Palace Alessandra and Castiglione.

Alessandra. Thou art sad, Castiglione.

Castiglione. Sad!—not I.

Oh, I’m the happiest, happiest man in Rome!

A few days more, thou knowest, my Alessandra,

Will make thee mine. Oh, I am very happy!

Aless. Methinks thou hast a singular way of showing

Thy happiness!—what ails thee, cousin of mine?

Why didst thou sigh so deeply?

Cas. Did I sign?

I was not conscious of it. It is a fashion,

A silly—a most silly fashion I have

When I am very happy. Did I sigh? (sighing.)

Aless. Thou didst. Thou art not well. Thou hast indulged

Too much of late, and I am vexed to see it.

Late hours and wine, Castiglione,—these

Will ruin thee! thou art already altered—

Thy looks are haggard—nothing so wears away

The constitution as late hours and wine.

Cas. (musing.) Nothing, fair cousin, nothing—not even deep

sorrow—

Wears it away like evil hours and wine.

I will amend.

Aless. Do it! I would have thee drop

Thy riotous company, too—fellows low born—

Ill suit the like with old Di Broglio’s heir

And Alessandra’s husband.

Cas. I will drop them.

Aless. Thou wilt—thou must. Attend thou also more

To thy dress and equipage—they are over plain

For thy lofty rank and fashion—much depends

Upon appearances.

Cas. I’ll see to it.

Aless. Then see to it!—pay more attention, sir,

To a becoming carriage—much thou wantest

In dignity.

Cas. Much, much, oh! much I want

In proper dignity.

Aless.(haughtily) Thou mockest me, sir!

Cas. (abstractedly.) Sweet, gentle Lalage!

Aless. Heard I aright?

I speak to him—he speaks of Lalage!

Sir Count! (places her hand on his shoulder) what art thou dreaming?

he’s not well!

What ails thee, sir?

Cas. (startling.) Cousin! fair cousin!—madam!

I crave thy pardon—indeed I am not well—

Your hand from off my shoulder, if you please.

This air is most oppressive!—Madam—the Duke!

Enter Di Broglio.

Di Broglio. My son, I’ve news for thee!—hey?—what’s the

matter? (observing Alessandra)

I’ the pouts? Kiss her, Castiglione! kiss her,

You dog! and make it up, I say, this minute!

I’ve news for you both. Politian is expected

Hourly in Rome—Politian, Earl of Leicester!

We’ll have him at the wedding. ’Tis his first visit

To the imperial city.

Aless. What! Politian

Of Britain, Earl of Leicester?

Di Brog. The same, my love.

We’ll have him at the wedding. A man quite young

In years, but grey in fame. I have not seen him,

But Rumour speaks of him as of a prodigy

Pre-eminent in arts and arms, and wealth,

And high descent. We’ll have him at the wedding.

Aless. I have heard much of this Politian.

Gay, volatile and giddy—is he not?

And little given to thinking.

Di Brog. Far from it, love.

No branch, they say, of all philosophy

So deep abstruse he has not mastered it.

Learned as few are learned.

Aless. ’Tis very strange!

I have known men have seen Politian

And sought his company. They speak of him

As of one who entered madly into life,

Drinking the cup of pleasure to the dregs.

Cas. Ridiculous! Now I have seen Politian

And know him well—nor learned nor mirthful he.

He is a dreamer and a man shut out

From common passions.

Di Brog. Children, we disagree.

Let us go forth and taste the fragrant air

Of the garden. Did I dream, or did I hear

Politian was a melancholy man? (exeunt.)

II

ROME. A Lady’s apartment, with a window open and looking into a garden.

Lalage, in deep mourning, reading at a table on which lie some books and a

hand mirror. In the background Jacinta (a servant maid) leans carelessly

upon a chair.

Lal. [Lalage] Jacinta! is it thou?

Jac. [Jacinta] (pertly.) Yes, Ma’am, I’m here.

Lal. I did not know, Jacinta, you were in waiting.

Sit down!—Let not my presence trouble you—

Sit down!—for I am humble, most humble.

Jac. (aside.) ’Tis time.

(Jacinta seats herself in a side-long manner upon the chair, resting her

elbows upon the back, and regarding her mistress with a contemptuous look.

Lalage continues to read. )

Lal. “It in another climate, so he said,

“Bore a bright golden flower, but not i’ this soil!”

(pauses—turns over some leaves, and resumes)

“No lingering winters there, nor snow, nor shower—

“But Ocean ever to refresh mankind

“Breathes the shrill spirit of the western wind.”

O, beautiful!—most beautiful—how like

To what my fevered soul doth dream of Heaven!

O happy land (pauses) She died!—the maiden died!

A still more happy maiden who couldst die!

Jacinta!

(Jacinta returns no answer, and Lalage presently resumes.)

Again!—a similar tale

Told of a beauteous dame beyond the sea!

Thus speaketh one Ferdinand in the words of the play—

“She died full young”—one Bossola answers him—

“I think not so—her infelicity

“Seemed to have years too many”—Ah luckless lady!

Jacinta! (still no answer)

Here ‘s a far sterner story,

But like—oh, very like in its despair—

Of that Egyptian queen, winning so easily

A thousand hearts—losing at length her own.

She died. Thus endeth the history—and her maids

Lean over and weep—two gentle maids

With gentle names—Eiros and Charmion!

Rainbow and Dove!——Jacinta!

Jac. (pettishly.) Madam, what is it?

Lal. Wilt thou, my good Jacinta, be so kind

As go down in the library and bring me

The Holy Evangelists.

Jac. Pshaw! (exit.)

Lal. If there be balm

For the wounded spirit in Gilead it is there!

Dew in the night time of my bitter trouble

Will there be found—“dew sweeter far than that

Which hangs like chains of pearl on Hermon hill.”

(re-enter Jacinta, and throws a volume on the table.)

There, ma’am, ‘s the book. Indeed she is very troublesome. (aside.)

Lal. (astonished.) What didst thou say, Jacinta? Have I done aught

To grieve thee or to vex thee?—I am sorry.

For thou hast served me long and ever been

Trust-worthy and respectful. (resumes her reading.)

Jac. I can’t believe

She has any more jewels—no—no—she gave me all. (aside.)

Lal. What didst thou say, Jacinta? Now I bethink me

Thou hast not spoken lately of thy wedding.

How fares good Ugo?—and when is it to be?

Can I do aught?—is there no farther aid

Thou needest, Jacinta?

Jac. Is there no farther aid!

That’s meant for me. (aside) I’m sure, madam, you need not

Be always throwing those jewels in my teeth.

Lal. Jewels! Jacinta,—now indeed, Jacinta,

I thought not of the jewels.

Jac. Oh! perhaps not!

But then I might have sworn it. After all,

There ‘s Ugo says the ring is only paste,

For he ‘s sure the Count Castiglione never

Would have given a real diamond to such as you;

And at the best I’m certain, Madam, you cannot

Have use for jewels now. But I might have sworn it. (exit.)

(Lalage bursts into tears and leans her head upon the table—after a

short pause raises it.)

Lal. Poor Lalage!—and is it come to this?

Thy servant maid!—but courage!—’tis but a viper

Whom thou hast cherished to sting thee to the soul!

(taking up the mirror)

Ha! here at least ‘s a friend—too much a friend

In earlier days—a friend will not deceive thee.

Fair mirror and true! now tell me (for thou canst)

A tale—a pretty tale—and heed thou not

Though it be rife with woe: It answers me.

It speaks of sunken eyes, and wasted cheeks,

And Beauty long deceased—remembers me

Of Joy departed—Hope, the Seraph Hope,

Inurned and entombed:—now, in a tone

Low, sad, and solemn, but most audible,

Whispers of early grave untimely yawning

For ruined maid. Fair mirror and true—thou liest not!

Thou hast no end to gain—no heart to break—

Castiglione lied who said he loved—

Thou true—he false!—false!—false!

(While she speaks, a monk enters her apartment, and approaches

unobserved.)

Monk. Refuge thou hast,

Sweet daughter, in Heaven. Think of eternal things!

Give up thy soul to penitence, and pray!

Lal. (arising hurriedly.) I cannot pray!—My soul is at war

with God!

The frightful sounds of merriment below

Disturb my senses—go! I cannot pray—

The sweet airs from the garden worry me!

Thy presence grieves me—go!—thy priestly raiment

Fills me with dread—thy ebony crucifix

With horror and awe!

Monk. Think of thy precious soul!

Lal. Think of my early days!—think of my father

And mother in Heaven think of our quiet home,

And the rivulet that ran before the door!

Think of my little sisters!—think of them!

And think of me!—think of my trusting love

And confidence—his vows—my ruin—think—think

Of my unspeakable misery!—begone!

Yet stay! yet stay!—what was it thou saidst of prayer

And penitence? Didst thou not speak of faith

And vows before the throne?

Monk. I did.

Lal. Lal. ’Tis well.

There is a vow were fitting should be made—

A sacred vow, imperative, and urgent,

A solemn vow!

Monk. Daughter, this zeal is well!

Lal. Father, this zeal is anything but well!

Hast thou a crucifix fit for this thing?

A crucifix whereon to register

This sacred vow? (he hands her his own)

Not that—Oh! no!—no!—no! (shuddering)

Not that! Not that!—I tell thee, holy man,

Thy raiments and thy ebony cross affright me!

Stand back! I have a crucifix myself,—

I have a crucifix Methinks ’twere fitting

The deed—the vow—the symbol of the deed—

And the deed’s register should tally, father!

(draws a cross-handled dagger, and raises it on high)

Behold the cross wherewith a vow like mine

Is written in Heaven!

Monk. Thy words are madness, daughter,

And speak a purpose unholy—thy lips are livid—

Thine eyes are wild—tempt not the wrath divine!

Pause ere too late!—oh, be not—be not rash!

Swear not the oath—oh, swear it not!

Lal. ’Tis sworn!

III.

An apartment in a Palace. Politian and Baldazzar.

Baldazzar.———Arouse thee now, Politian!

Thou must not—nay indeed, indeed, shalt not

Give away unto these humors. Be thyself!

Shake off the idle fancies that beset thee,

And live, for now thou diest!

Politian. Not so, Baldazzar! Surely I live.

Bal. Politian, it doth grieve me

To see thee thus.

Pol. Baldazzar, it doth grieve me

To give thee cause for grief, my honoured friend.

Command me, sir! what wouldst thou have me do?

At thy behest I will shake off that nature

Which from my, forefathers I did inherit,

Which with my mother’s milk I did imbibe,

And be no more Politian, but some other.

Command me, sir!

Bal. To the field, then—to the field—

To the senate or the field.

Pol. Alas! Alas!

There is an imp would follow me even there!

There is an imp hath followed me even there!

There is—what voice was that?

Bal. I heard it not.

I heard not any voice except thine own,

And the echo of thine own.

Pol. Then I but dreamed.

Bal. Give not thy soul to dreams: the camp—the court,

Befit thee—Fame awaits thee—Glory calls—

And her the trumpet-tongued thou wilt not hear

In hearkening to imaginary sounds

And phantom voices.

Pol. It is a phantom voice!

Didst thou not hear it then?

Bal. I heard it not.

Pol. Thou heardst it not!—Baldazaar, speak no more

To me, Politian, of thy camps and courts.

Oh! I am sick, sick, sick, even unto death,

Of the hollow and high-sounding vanities

Of the populous Earth! Bear with me yet awhile!

We have been boys together—schoolfellows—

And now are friends—yet shall not be so long—

For in the eternal city thou shalt do me

A kind and gentle office, and a Power—

A Power august, benignant and supreme—

Shall then absolve thee of all further duties

Unto thy friend.

Bal. Thou speakest a fearful riddle

I will not understand.

Pol. Yet now as Fate

Approaches, and the Hours are breathing low,

The sands of Time are changed to golden grains,

And dazzle me, Baldazzar. Alas! alas!

I cannot die, having within my heart

So keen a relish for the beautiful

As hath been kindled within it. Methinks the air

Is balmier now than it was wont to be—

Rich melodies are floating in the winds—

A rarer loveliness bedecks the earth—

And with a holier lustre the quiet moon

Sitteth in Heaven.—Hist! hist! thou canst not say

Thou hearest not now, Baldazzar?

Bal. Indeed I hear not.

Pol. Not hear it!—listen now!—listen!—the faintest sound

And yet the sweetest that ear ever heard!

A lady’s voice!—and sorrow in the tone!

Baldazzar, it oppresses me like a spell!

Again!—again!—how solemnly it falls

Into my heart of hearts! that eloquent voice

Surely I never heard—yet it were well

Had I but heard it with its thrilling tones

In earlier days!

Bal. I myself hear it now.

Be still!—the voice, if I mistake not greatly,

Proceeds from yonder lattice—which you may see

Very plainly through the window—it belongs,

Does it not? unto this palace of the Duke.

The singer is undoubtedly beneath

The roof of his Excellency—and perhaps

Is even that Alessandra of whom he spoke

As the betrothed of Castiglione,

His son and heir.

Pol. Be still!—it comes again!

Voice “And is thy heart so strong

(very faintly) As for to leave me thus

Who hath loved thee so long

In wealth and woe among?

And is thy heart so strong

As for to leave me thus?

Say nay—say nay!”

Bal. The song is English, and I oft have heard it

In merry England—never so plaintively—

Hist! hist! it comes again!

Voice “Is it so strong

(more loudly) As for to leave me thus

Who hath loved thee so long

In wealth and woe among?

And is thy heart so strong

As for to leave me thus?

Say nay—say nay!”

Bal. ’Tis hushed and all is still!

Pol. All is not still!

Bal. Let us go down.

Pol. Go down, Baldazzar, go!

Bal. The hour is growing late—the Duke awaits use—

Thy presence is expected in the hall

Below. What ails thee, Earl Politian?

Voice “Who hath loved thee so long

(distinctly) In wealth and woe among,

And is thy heart so strong?

Say nay—say nay!”

Bal. Let us descend!—’tis time. Politian, give

These fancies to the wind. Remember, pray,

Your bearing lately savored much of rudeness

Unto the Duke. Arouse thee! and remember

Pol. Remember? I do. Lead on! I do remember.

(going.)

Let us descend. Believe me I would give,

Freely would give the broad lands of my earldom

To look upon the face hidden by yon lattice—

“To gaze upon that veiled face, and hear

Once more that silent tongue.”

Bal. Let me beg you, sir,

Descend with me—the Duke may be offended.

Let us go down, I pray you.

(Voice loudly) Say nay!—say nay!

Pol. (aside) ’Tis strange!—’tis very strange—methought the

voice

Chimed in with my desires, and bade me stay!

(approaching the window.)

Sweet voice! I heed thee, and will surely stay.

Now be this Fancy, by Heaven, or be it Fate,

Still will I not descend. Baldazzar, make

Apology unto the Duke for me;

I go not down to-night.

Bal. Your lordship’s pleasure

Shall be attended to. Good-night, Politian.

Pol. Good-night, my friend, good-night.

IV.

The gardens of a Palace—Moonlight Lalage and Politian.

Lalge. And dost thou speak of love

To me, Politian?—dost thou speak of love

To Lalage?—ah, woe—ah, woe is me!

This mockery is most cruel—most cruel indeed!

Politian. Weep not! oh, sob not thus!—thy bitter tears

Will madden me. Oh, mourn not, Lalage—

Be comforted! I know—I know it all,

And still I speak of love. Look at me, brightest

And beautiful Lalage!—turn here thine eyes!

Thou askest me if I could speak of love,

Knowing what I know, and seeing what I have seen.

Thou askest me that—and thus I answer thee—

Thus on my bended knee I answer thee. (kneeling.)

Sweet Lalage, I love thee—love thee—love thee;

Thro’ good and ill—thro’ weal and wo I love thee.

Not mother, with her first-born on her knee,

Thrills with intenser love than I for thee.

Not on God’s altar, in any time or clime,

Burned there a holier fire than burneth now

Within my spirit for thee. And do I love? (arising.)

Even for thy woes I love thee—even for thy woes-

Thy beauty and thy woes.

Lal. Alas, proud Earl,

Thou dost forget thyself, remembering me!

How, in thy father’s halls, among the maidens

Pure and reproachless of thy princely line,

Could the dishonored Lalage abide?

Thy wife, and with a tainted memory-

MY seared and blighted name, how would it tally

With the ancestral honors of thy house,

And with thy glory?

Pol. Speak not to me of glory!

I hate—I loathe the name; I do abhor

The unsatisfactory and ideal thing.

Art thou not Lalage and I Politian?

Do I not love—art thou not beautiful-

What need we more? Ha! glory!—now speak not of it.

By all I hold most sacred and most solemn-

By all my wishes now—my fears hereafter-

By all I scorn on earth and hope in heaven-

There is no deed I would more glory in,

Than in thy cause to scoff at this same glory

And trample it under foot. What matters it-

What matters it, my fairest, and my best,

That we go down unhonored and forgotten

Into the dust—so we descend together.

Descend together—and then—and then, perchance-

Lal. Why dost thou pause, Politian?

Pol. And then, perchance

Arise together, Lalage, and roam

The starry and quiet dwellings of the blest,

And still-

Lal. Why dost thou pause, Politian?

Pol. And still together—together.

Lal. Now Earl of Leicester!

Thou lovest me, and in my heart of hearts

I feel thou lovest me truly.

Pol. Oh, Lalage!

(throwing himself upon his knee.)

And lovest thou me?

Lal. Hist! hush! within the gloom

Of yonder trees methought a figure passed-

A spectral figure, solemn, and slow, and noiseless-

Like the grim shadow Conscience, solemn and noiseless.

(walks across and returns.)

I was mistaken—’twas but a giant bough

Stirred by the autumn wind. Politian!

Pol. My Lalage—my love! why art thou moved?

Why dost thou turn so pale? Not Conscience’ self,

Far less a shadow which thou likenest to it,

Should shake the firm spirit thus. But the night wind

Is chilly—and these melancholy boughs

Throw over all things a gloom.

Lal. Politian!

Thou speakest to me of love. Knowest thou the land

With which all tongues are busy—a land new found—

Miraculously found by one of Genoa—

A thousand leagues within the golden west?

A fairy land of flowers, and fruit, and sunshine,

And crystal lakes, and over-arching forests,

And mountains, around whose towering summits the winds

Of Heaven untrammelled flow—which air to breathe

Is Happiness now, and will be Freedom hereafter

In days that are to come?

Pol. O, wilt thou—wilt thou

Fly to that Paradise—my Lalage, wilt thou

Fly thither with me? There Care shall be forgotten,

And Sorrow shall be no more, and Eros be all.

And life shall then be mine, for I will live

For thee, and in thine eyes—and thou shalt be

No more a mourner—but the radiant Joys

Shall wait upon thee, and the angel Hope

Attend thee ever; and I will kneel to thee

And worship thee, and call thee my beloved,

My own, my beautiful, my love, my wife,

My all;—oh, wilt thou—wilt thou, Lalage,

Fly thither with me?

Lal. A deed is to be done—

Castiglione lives!

Pol. And he shall die! (exit)

Lal. (after a pause.) And—he—shall—die!—alas!

Castiglione die? Who spoke the words?

Where am I?—what was it he said?—Politian!

Thou art not gone—thou are not gone, Politian!

I feel thou art not gone—yet dare not look,

Lest I behold thee not; thou couldst not go

With those words upon thy lips—O, speak to me!

And let me hear thy voice—one word—one word,

To say thou art not gone,—one little sentence,

To say how thou dost scorn—how thou dost hate

My womanly weakness. Ha! ha! thou art not gone-

O speak to me! I knew thou wouldst not go!

I knew thou wouldst not, couldst not, durst not go.

Villain, thou art not gone—thou mockest me!

And thus I clutch thee—thus!—He is gone, he is gone

Gone—gone. Where am I?—’tis well—’tis very well!

So that the blade be keen—the blow be sure,

’Tis well, ’tis very well—alas! alas!

V.

The suburbs. Politian alone.

Politian. This weakness grows upon me. I am faint,

And much I fear me ill—it will not do

To die ere I have lived!—Stay, stay thy hand,

O Azrael, yet awhile!—Prince of the Powers

Of Darkness and the Tomb, O pity me!

O pity me! let me not perish now,

In the budding of my Paradisal Hope!

Give me to live yet—yet a little while:

’Tis I who pray for life—I who so late

Demanded but to die!—what sayeth the Count?

Enter Baldazzar.

Baldazzar. That knowing no cause of quarrel or of feud

Between the Earl Politian and himself.

He doth decline your cartel.

Pol. What didst thou say?

What answer was it you brought me, good Baldazzar?

With what excessive fragrance the zephyr comes

Laden from yonder bowers!—a fairer day,

Or one more worthy Italy, methinks

No mortal eyes have seen!—what said the Count?

Bal. That he, Castiglione’ not being aware

Of any feud existing, or any cause

Of quarrel between your lordship and himself,

Cannot accept the challenge.

Pol. It is most true—

All this is very true. When saw you, sir,

When saw you now, Baldazzar, in the frigid

Ungenial Britain which we left so lately,

A heaven so calm as this—so utterly free

From the evil taint of clouds?—and he did say?

Bal. No more, my lord, than I have told you, sir:

The Count Castiglione will not fight,

Having no cause for quarrel.

Pol. Now this is true-

All very true. Thou art my friend, Baldazzar,

And I have not forgotten it—thou’lt do me

A piece of service; wilt thou go back and say

Unto this man, that I, the Earl of Leicester,

Hold him a villain?—thus much, I prythee, say

Unto the Count—it is exceeding just

He should have cause for quarrel.

Bal. My lord!—my friend!-

Pol. (aside.) ’Tis he!—he comes himself? (aloud) Thou reasonest

well.

I know what thou wouldst say—not send the message-

Well!—I will think of it—I will not send it.

Now prythee, leave me—hither doth come a person

With whom affairs of a most private nature

I would adjust.

Bal. I go—to-morrow we meet,

Do we not?—at the Vatican.

Pol. At the Vatican. (exit

Bal.)

Enter Castigilone.

Cas. The Earl of Leicester here!

Pol. I am the Earl of Leicester, and thou seest,

Dost thou not? that I am here.

Cas. My lord, some strange,

Some singular mistake—misunderstanding—

Hath without doubt arisen: thou hast been urged

Thereby, in heat of anger, to address

Some words most unaccountable, in writing,

To me, Castiglione; the bearer being

Baldazzar, Duke of Surrey. I am aware

Of nothing which might warrant thee in this thing,

Having given thee no offence. Ha!—am I right?

’Twas a mistake?—undoubtedly—we all

Do err at times.

Pol. Draw, villain, and prate no more!

Cas. Ha!—draw?—and villain? have at thee then at once,

Proud Earl! (draws.)

Pol. (drawing.) Thus to the expiatory tomb,

Untimely sepulchre, I do devote thee

In the name of Lalage!

Cas. (letting fall his sword and recoiling to the extremity of the

stage)

Of Lalage!

Hold off—thy sacred hand!—avaunt, I say!

Avaunt—I will not fight thee—indeed I dare not.

Pol. Thou wilt not fight with me didst say, Sir Count?

Shall I be baffled thus?—now this is well;

Didst say thou darest not? Ha!

Cas. I dare not—dare not—

Hold off thy hand—with that beloved name

So fresh upon thy lips I will not fight thee—

I cannot—dare not.

Pol. Now by my halidom

I do believe thee!—coward, I do believe thee!

Cas. Ha!—coward!—this may not be!

(clutches his sword and staggers towards POLITIAN, but his purpose

is changed before reaching him, and he falls upon his knee at the feet of

the Earl)

Alas! my lord,

It is—it is—most true. In such a cause

I am the veriest coward. O pity me!

Pol. (greatly softened.) Alas!—I do—indeed I pity thee.

Cas. And Lalage-

Pol. Scoundrel!—arise and die!

Cas. It needeth not be—thus—thus—O let me die

Thus on my bended knee. It were most fitting

That in this deep humiliation I perish.

For in the fight I will not raise a hand

Against thee, Earl of Leicester. Strike thou home—

(baring his bosom.)

Here is no let or hindrance to thy weapon-

Strike home. I will not fight thee.

Pol. Now, s’ Death and Hell!

Am I not—am I not sorely—grievously tempted

To take thee at thy word? But mark me, sir,

Think not to fly me thus. Do thou prepare

For public insult in the streets—before

The eyes of the citizens. I’ll follow thee

Like an avenging spirit I’ll follow thee

Even unto death. Before those whom thou lovest-

Before all Rome I’ll taunt thee, villain,—I’ll taunt thee,

Dost hear? with cowardice—thou wilt not fight me?

Thou liest! thou shalt! (exit.)

Cas. Now this indeed is just!

Most righteous, and most just, avenging Heaven!

{In the book there is a gap in numbering the notes between 12 and 29.

—ED}

NOTE

29. Such portions of “Politian” as are known to the public first saw the

light of publicity in the “Southern Literary Messenger” for December,

1835, and January, 1836, being styled “Scenes from Politian: an

unpublished drama.” These scenes were included, unaltered, in the 1845

collection of Poems, by Poe. The larger portion of the original draft

subsequently became the property of the present editor, but it is not

considered just to the poet’s memory to publish it. The work is a hasty

and unrevised production of its author’s earlier days of literary labor;

and, beyond the scenes already known, scarcely calculated to enhance his

reputation. As a specimen, however, of the parts unpublished, the

following fragment from the first scene of Act II. may be offered. The

Duke, it should be premised, is uncle to Alessandra, and father of

Castiglione her betrothed.

Duke. Why do you laugh?

Castiglione. Indeed

I hardly know myself. Stay! Was it not

On yesterday we were speaking of the Earl?

Of the Earl Politian? Yes! it was yesterday.

Alessandra, you and 1, you must remember!

We were walking in the garden.

Duke, Perfectly.

I do remember it-what of it-what then?

Cas. 0 nothing-nothing at all.

Duke. Nothing at all!

It is most singular that you should laugh

‘At nothing at all!

Cas. Most singular-singular!

Duke. Look you, Castiglione, be so kind

As tell me, sir, at once what ’tis you mean.

What are you talking of?

Cas. Was it not so?

We differed in opinion touching him.

Duke. Him!—Whom?

Cas. Why, sir, the Earl Politian.

Duke. The Earl of Leicester! Yes!—is it he you mean?

We differed, indeed. If I now recollect

The words you used were that the Earl you knew

Was neither learned nor mirthful.

Cas. Ha! ha!—now did I?

Duke. That did you, sir, and well I knew at the time

You were wrong, it being not the character

Of the Earl-whom all the world allows to be

A most hilarious man. Be not, my son,

Too positive again.

Cas. ’Tis singular!

Most singular! I could not think it possible

So little time could so much alter one!

To say the truth about an hour ago,

As I was walking with the Count San Ozzo,

All arm in arm, we met this very man

The Earl-he, with his friend Baldazzar,

Having just arrived in Rome. Hal ha! he is altered!

Such an account he gave me of his journey!

’Twould have made you die with laughter-such tales he told

Of his caprices and his merry freaks

Along the road-such oddity-such humor—

Such wit-such whim-such flashes of wild merriment

Set off too in such full relief by the grave

Demeanor of his friend-who, to speak the truth,

Was gravity itself—

Duke. Did I not tell you?

Cas. You did-and yet ’tis strange! but true as strange,

How much I was mistaken! I always thought

The Earl a gloomy man.

Duke. So, so, you see! Be not too positive. Whom have we here?

It can not be the Earl?

Cas. The Earl! Oh, no! ’Tis not the Earl-but yet it is-and leaning

Upon his friend Baldazzar. AM welcome, sir!

(Enter Politian and Baldazzar.)

My lord, a second welcome let me give you

To Rome-his Grace the Duke of Broglio.

Father! this is the Earl Politian, Earl

Of Leicester in Great Britain. [Politian bows haughtily.]

That, his friend

Baldazzar, Duke of Surrey. The Earl has letters,

So please you, for Your Grace.

Duke. Hal ha! Most welcome

To Rome and to our palace, Earl Politian!

And you, most noble Duke! I am glad to see you!

I knew your father well, my Lord Politian.

Castiglione! call your cousin hither,

And let me make the noble Earl acquainted

With your betrothed. You come, sir, at a time

Most seasonable. The wedding—

Politian. Touching those letters, sir,

Your son made mention of—your son, is he not?

Touching those letters, sir, I wot not of them.

If such there be, my friend Baldazzar here—

Baldazzar! ah!—my friend Baldazzar here

Will hand them to Your Grace. I would retire.

Duke. Retire!—So soon?

Came What ho! Benito! Rupert!

His lordship’s chambers-show his lordship to them!

His lordship is unwell. (Enter Benito.)

Ben. This way, my lord! (Exit, followed by Politian.)

Duke. Retire! Unwell!

Bal. So please you, sir. I fear me

’Tis as you say—his lordship is unwell.

The damp air of the evening-the fatigue

Of a long journey—the—indeed I had better

Follow his lordship. He must be unwell.

I will return anon.

Duke. Return anon!

Now this is very strange! Castiglione!

This way, my son, I wish to speak with thee.

You surely were mistaken in what you said

Of the Earl, mirthful, indeed!—which of us said

Politian was a melancholy man? (Exeunt.)

POEMS OF YOUTH

INTRODUCTION TO POEMS—1831

_LETTER TO MR. B—._

“WEST POINT, 1831.

“Dear B......... Believing only a portion of my former volume to be worthy

a second edition-that small portion I thought it as well to include in the

present book as to republish by itself. I have therefore herein combined

‘Al Aaraaf’ and ‘Tamerlane’ with other poems hitherto unprinted. Nor have

I hesitated to insert from the ‘Minor Poems,’ now omitted, whole lines,

and even passages, to the end that being placed in a fairer light, and the

trash shaken from them in which they were imbedded, they may have some

chance of being seen by posterity.

“It has been said that a good critique on a poem may be written by one who

is no poet himself. This, according to your idea and _mine _of

poetry, I feel to be false-the less poetical the critic, the less just the

critique, and the converse. On this account, and because there are but few

B-’s in the world, I would be as much ashamed of the world’s good opinion

as proud of your own. Another than yourself might here observe,

‘Shakespeare is in possession of the world’s good opinion, and yet

Shakespeare is the greatest of poets. It appears then that the world judge

correctly, why should you be ashamed of their favorable judgment?’ The

difficulty lies in the interpretation of the word ‘judgment’ or ‘opinion.’

The opinion is the world’s, truly, but it may be called theirs as a man

would call a book his, having bought it; he did not write the book, but it

is his; they did not originate the opinion, but it is theirs. A fool, for

example, thinks Shakespeare a great poet-yet the fool has never read

Shakespeare. But the fool’s neighbor, who is a step higher on the Andes of

the mind, whose head (that is to say, his more exalted thought) is too far

above the fool to be seen or understood, but whose feet (by which I mean

his everyday actions) are sufficiently near to be discerned, and by means

of which that superiority is ascertained, which but for them would never

have been discovered-this neighbor asserts that Shakespeare is a great

poet—the fool believes him, and it is henceforward his _opinion.

_This neighbor’s own opinion has, in like manner, been adopted from one

above him, and so, ascendingly, to a few gifted individuals who kneel

around the summit, beholding, face to face, the master spirit who stands

upon the pinnacle.

“You are aware of the great barrier in the path of an American writer. He

is read, if at all, in preference to the combined and established wit of

the world. I say established; for it is with literature as with law or

empire-an established name is an estate in tenure, or a throne in

possession. Besides, one might suppose that books, like their authors,

improve by travel-their having crossed the sea is, with us, so great a

distinction. Our antiquaries abandon time for distance; our very fops

glance from the binding to the bottom of the title-page, where the mystic

characters which spell London, Paris, or Genoa, are precisely so many

letters of recommendation.

“I mentioned just now a vulgar error as regards criticism. I think the

notion that no poet can form a correct estimate of his own writings is

another. I remarked before that in proportion to the poetical talent would

be the justice of a critique upon poetry. Therefore a bad poet would, I

grant, make a false critique, and his self-love would infallibly bias his

little judgment in his favor; but a poet, who is indeed a poet, could not,

I think, fail of making-a just critique; whatever should be deducted on

the score of self-love might be replaced on account of his intimate

acquaintance with the subject; in short, we have more instances of false

criticism than of just where one’s own writings are the test, simply

because we have more bad poets than good. There are, of course, many

objections to what I say: Milton is a great example of the contrary; but

his opinion with respect to the ‘Paradise Regained’ is by no means fairly

ascertained. By what trivial circumstances men are often led to assert

what they do not really believe! Perhaps an inadvertent word has descended

to posterity. But, in fact, the ‘Paradise Regained’ is little, if at all,

inferior to the ‘Paradise Lost,’ and is only supposed so to be because men

do not like epics, whatever they may say to the contrary, and, reading

those of Milton in their natural order, are too much wearied with the

first to derive any pleasure from the second.

“I dare say Milton preferred ‘Comus’ to either-. if so-justly.

“As I am speaking of poetry, it will not be amiss to touch slightly upon

the most singular heresy in its modern history-the heresy of what is

called, very foolishly, the Lake School. Some years ago I might have been

induced, by an occasion like the present, to attempt a formal refutation

of their doctrine; at present it would be a work of supererogation. The

wise must bow to the wisdom of such men as Coleridge and Southey, but,

being wise, have laughed at poetical theories so prosaically exemplifled.

“Aristotle, with singular assurance, has declared poetry the most

philosophical of all writings*-but it required a Wordsworth to pronounce

it the most metaphysical. He seems to think that the end of poetry is, or

should be, instruction; yet it is a truism that the end of our existence

is happiness; if so, the end of every separate part of our existence,

everything connected with our existence, should be still happiness.

Therefore the end of instruction should be happiness; and happiness is

another name for pleasure;-therefore the end of instruction should be

pleasure: yet we see the above-mentioned opinion implies precisely the

reverse.

“To proceed: _ceteris paribus,_ he who pleases is of more importance

to his fellow-men than he who instructs, since utility is happiness, and

pleasure is the end already obtained which instruction is merely the means

of obtaining.

“I see no reason, then, why our metaphysical poets should plume themselves

so much on the utility of their works, unless indeed they refer to

instruction with eternity in view; in which case, sincere respect for

their piety would not allow me to express my contempt for their judgment;

contempt which it would be difficult to conceal, since their writings are

professedly to be understood by the few, and it is the many who stand in

need of salvation. In such case I should no doubt be tempted to think of

the devil in ‘Melmoth.’ who labors indefatigably, through three octavo

volumes, to accomplish the destruction of one or two souls, while any

common devil would have demolished one or two thousand.

“Against the subtleties which would make poetry a study-not a passion-it

becomes the metaphysician to reason-but the poet to protest.

Yet Wordsworth and Coleridge are men in years; the one imbued in

contemplation from his childhood; the other a giant in intellect and

learning. The diffidence, then, with which I venture to dispute their

authority would be overwhelming did I not feel, from the bottom of my

heart, that learning has little to do with the imagination-intellect

with the passions-or age with poetry.

“‘Trifles, like straws, upon the surface flow;

He who would search for pearls must dive below,’

are lines which have done much mischief. As regards the greater truths,

men oftener err by seeking them at the bottom than at the top; Truth lies

in the huge abysses where wisdom is sought-not in the palpable palaces

where she is found. The ancients were not always right in hiding—the

goddess in a well; witness the light which Bacon has thrown upon

philosophy; witness the principles of our divine faith—that moral

mechanism by which the simplicity of a child may overbalance the wisdom of

a man.

“We see an instance of Coleridge’s liability to err, in his ‘Biographia

Literaria’—professedly his literary life and opinions, but, in fact,

a treatise _de omni scibili et quibusdam aliis. _He goes wrong by

reason of his very profundity, and of his error we have a natural type in

the contemplation of a star. He who regards it directly and intensely

sees, it is true, the star, but it is the star without a ray-while he who

surveys it less inquisitively is conscious of all for which the star is

useful to us below-its brilliancy and its beauty.

“As to Wordsworth, I have no faith in him. That he had in youth the

feelings of a poet I believe-for there are glimpses of extreme delicacy in

his writings-(and delicacy is the poet’s own kingdom-his _El Dorado)-but

they _have the appearance of a better day recollected; and glimpses, at

best, are little evidence of present poetic fire; we know that a few

straggling flowers spring up daily in the crevices of the glacier.

“He was to blame in wearing away his youth in contemplation with the end

of poetizing in his manhood. With the increase of his judgment the light

which should make it apparent has faded away. His judgment consequently is

too correct. This may not be understood-but the old Goths of Germany would

have understood it, who used to debate matters of importance to their

State twice, once when drunk, and once when sober-sober that they might

not be deficient in formality—drunk lest they should be destitute of

vigor.

“The long wordy discussions by which he tries to reason us into admiration

of his poetry, speak very little in his favor: they are full of such

assertions as this (I have opened one of his volumes at random)—‘Of

genius the only proof is the act of doing well what is worthy to be done,

and what was never done before;’-indeed? then it follows that in doing

what is unworthy to be done, or what _has _been done before, no

genius can be evinced; yet the picking of pockets is an unworthy act,

pockets have been picked time immemorial, and Barrington, the pickpocket,

in point of genius, would have thought hard of a comparison with William

Wordsworth, the poet.

“Again, in estimating the merit of certain poems, whether they be Ossian’s

or Macpherson’s can surely be of little consequence, yet, in order to

prove their worthlessness, Mr. W. has expended many pages in the

controversy. _Tantaene animis? _Can great minds descend to such

absurdity? But worse still: that he may bear down every argument in favor

of these poems, he triumphantly drags forward a passage, in his

abomination with which he expects the reader to sympathize. It is the

beginning of the epic poem ‘Temora.’ ‘The blue waves of Ullin roll in

light; the green hills are covered with day; trees shake their dusty heads

in the breeze.’ And this this gorgeous, yet simple imagery, where all is

alive and panting with immortality-this, William Wordsworth, the author of

‘Peter Bell,’ has _selected _for his contempt. We shall see what

better he, in his own person, has to offer. Imprimis:

“‘And now she’s at the pony’s tail,

And now she’s at the pony’s head,

On that side now, and now on this;

And, almost stifled with her bliss,

A few sad tears does Betty shed....

She pats the pony, where or when

She knows not.... happy Betty Foy!

Oh, Johnny, never mind the doctor!’

Secondly:

“‘The dew was falling fast, the-stars began to blink;

I heard a voice: it said-“Drink, pretty creature, drink!”

And, looking o’er the hedge, be-fore me I espied

A snow-white mountain lamb, with a-maiden at its side.

No other sheep was near,—the lamb was all alone,

And by a slender cord was-tether’d to a stone.’

“Now, we have no doubt this is all true: we will believe it, indeed we

will, Mr. W. Is it sympathy for the sheep you wish to excite? I love a

sheep from the bottom of my heart.

“But there are occasions, dear B-, there are occasions when even

Wordsworth is reasonable. Even Stamboul, it is said, shall have an end,

and the most unlucky blunders must come to a conclusion. Here is an

extract from his preface:-

“‘Those who have been accustomed to the phraseology of modem writers, if

they persist in reading this book to a conclusion _(impossible!) will,

_no doubt, have to struggle with feelings of awkwardness; (ha! ha! ha!)

they will look round for poetry (ha! ha! ha! ha!), and will be induced to

inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts have been permitted to

assume that title.’ Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!

“Yet, let not Mr. W. despair; he has given immortality to a wagon, and the

bee Sophocles has transmitted to eternity a sore toe, and dignified a

tragedy with a chorus of turkeys.

“Of Coleridge, I can not speak but with reverence. His towering intellect!

his gigantic power! To use an author quoted by himself, _‘Tai trouvé

souvent que la plupart des sectes ont raison dans une bonne partie de ce

qu’elles avancent, mais non pas en ce qu’elles nient,’ and _to employ

his own language, he has imprisoned his own conceptions by the barrier he

has erected against those of others. It is lamentable to think that such a

mind should be buried in metaphysics, and, like the Nyctanthes, waste its

perfume upon the night alone. In reading that man’s poetry, I tremble like

one who stands upon a volcano, conscious from the very darkness bursting

from the crater, of the fire and the light that are weltering below.

“What is poetry?—Poetry! that Proteus-like idea, with as many

appellations as the nine-titled Corcyra! ‘Give me,’ I demanded of a

scholar some time ago, ‘give me a definition of poetry.’ _‘Trèsvolontiers;’

_and he proceeded to his library, brought me a Dr. Johnson, and

overwhelmed me with a definition. Shade of the immortal Shakespeare! I

imagine to myself the scowl of your spiritual eye upon the profanity of

that scurrilous Ursa Major. Think of poetry, dear B-, think of poetry, and

then think of Dr. Samuel Johnson! Think of all that is airy and

fairy-like, and then of all that is hideous and unwieldy; think of his

huge bulk, the Elephant! and then-and then think of the ‘Tempest’—the

‘Midsummer-Night’s Dream’—Prospero Oberon—and Titania!

“A poem, in my opinion, is opposed to a work of science by having, for its

_immediate _object, pleasure, not truth; to romance, by having, for

its object, an _indefinite _instead of a _definite _pleasure,

being a poem only so far as this object is attained; romance presenting

perceptible images with definite, poetry with indefinite sensations, to

which end music is an _essential, since _the comprehension of sweet

sound is our most indefinite conception. Music, when combined with a

pleasurable idea, is poetry; music, without the idea, is simply music; the

idea, wi thout the music, is prose, from its very definitiveness.

“What was meant by the invective against him who had no music in his soul?

“To sum up this long rigmarole, I have, dear B—, what you, no doubt,

perceive, for the metaphysical poets as poets, the most sovereign

contempt. That they have followers proves nothing-

“‘No Indian prince has to his palace

More followers than a thief to the gallows.

SONNET—TO SCIENCE

Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!

Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.

Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart,

Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?

How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,

Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering

To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies

Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?

Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car?

And driven the Hamadryad from the wood

To seek a shelter in some happier star?

Hast thous not torn the Naiad from her flood,

The Elfin from the green grass, and from me

The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

AL AARAAF (*)

PART I.

O! nothing earthly save the ray

(Thrown back from flowers) of Beauty’s eye,

As in those gardens where the day

Springs from the gems of Circassy—

O! nothing earthly save the thrill

Of melody in woodland rill—

Or (music of the passion-hearted)

Joy’s voice so peacefully departed

That like the murmur in the shell,

Its echo dwelleth and will dwell—

Oh, nothing of the dross of ours—

Yet all the beauty—all the flowers

That list our Love, and deck our bowers—

Adorn yon world afar, afar—

The wandering star.

’Twas a sweet time for Nesace—for there

Her world lay lolling on the golden air,

Near four bright suns—a temporary rest—

An oasis in desert of the blest.

* A star was discovered by Tycho Brahe which appeared

suddenly in the heavens—attained, in a few days, a

brilliancy surpassing that of Jupiter—then as suddenly

disappeared, and has never been seen since.

Away—away—‘mid seas of rays that roll

Empyrean splendor o’er th’ unchained soul—

The soul that scarce (the billows are so dense)

Can struggle to its destin’d eminence—

To distant spheres, from time to time, she rode,

And late to ours, the favour’d one of God—

But, now, the ruler of an anchor’d realm,

She throws aside the sceptre—leaves the helm,

And, amid incense and high spiritual hymns,

Laves in quadruple light her angel limbs.

Now happiest, loveliest in yon lovely Earth,

Whence sprang the “Idea of Beauty” into birth,

(Falling in wreaths thro’ many a startled star,

Like woman’s hair ‘mid pearls, until, afar,

It lit on hills Achaian, and there dwelt)

She look’d into Infinity—and knelt.

Rich clouds, for canopies, about her curled—

Fit emblems of the model of her world—

Seen but in beauty—not impeding sight

Of other beauty glittering thro’ the light—

A wreath that twined each starry form around,

And all the opal’d air in color bound.

All hurriedly she knelt upon a bed

Of flowers: of lilies such as rear’d the head

*On the fair Capo Deucato, and sprang

So eagerly around about to hang

Upon the flying footsteps of—deep pride—

**Of her who lov’d a mortal—and so died.

The Sephalica, budding with young bees,

Uprear’d its purple stem around her knees:

* On Santa Maura—olim Deucadia.

**And gemmy flower, of Trebizond misnam’d—

Inmate of highest stars, where erst it sham’d

All other loveliness: its honied dew

(The fabled nectar that the heathen knew)

Deliriously sweet, was dropp’d from Heaven,

And fell on gardens of the unforgiven

In Trebizond—and on a sunny flower

So like its own above that, to this hour,

It still remaineth, torturing the bee

With madness, and unwonted reverie:

In Heaven, and all its environs, the leaf

And blossom of the fairy plant, in grief

Disconsolate linger—grief that hangs her head,

Repenting follies that full long have fled,

Heaving her white breast to the balmy air,

Like guilty beauty, chasten’d, and more fair:

Nyctanthes too, as sacred as the light

She fears to perfume, perfuming the night:

**And Clytia pondering between many a sun,

While pettish tears adown her petals run:

***And that aspiring flower that sprang on Earth—

And died, ere scarce exalted into birth,

Bursting its odorous heart in spirit to wing

Its way to Heaven, from garden of a king:

* This flower is much noticed by Lewenhoeck and Tournefort.

The bee, feeding upon its blossom, becomes intoxicated.

** Clytia—The Chrysanthemum Peruvianum, or, to employ a

better-known term, the turnsol—which continually turns

towards the sun, covers itself, like Peru, the country from

which it comes, with dewy clouds which cool and refresh its

flowers during the most violent heat of the day.—_B. de St.

Pierre_.

*** There is cultivated in the king’s garden at Paris, a

species of serpentine aloes without prickles, whose large

and beautiful flower exhales a strong odour of the vanilla,

during the time of its expansion, which is very short. It

does not blow till towards the month of July—you then

perceive it gradually open its petals—expand them—fade

and die.—_St. Pierre_.

*And Valisnerian lotus thither flown

From struggling with the waters of the Rhone:

**And thy most lovely purple perfume, Zante!

Isola d’oro!—Fior di Levante!

***And the Nelumbo bud that floats for ever

With Indian Cupid down the holy river—

Fair flowers, and fairy! to whose care is given

****To bear the Goddess’ song, in odors, up to Heaven:

“Spirit! that dwellest where,

In the deep sky,

The terrible and fair,

In beauty vie!

Beyond the line of blue—

The boundary of the star

Which turneth at the view

Of thy barrier and thy bar—

Of the barrier overgone

By the comets who were cast

From their pride, and from their throne

To be drudges till the last—

To be carriers of fire

(The red fire of their heart)

With speed that may not tire

And with pain that shall not part—

* There is found, in the Rhone, a beautiful lily of the

Valisnerian kind. Its stem will stretch to the length of

three or four feet—thus preserving its head above water

in the swellings of the river.

** The Hyacinth.

*** It is a fiction of the Indians, that Cupid was first

seen floating in one of these down the river Ganges—and

that he still loves the cradle of his childhood.

**** And golden vials full of odors which are the prayers of the saints.

—Rev. St. John.

Who livest—_that_ we know—

In Eternity—we feel—

But the shadow of whose brow

What spirit shall reveal?

Tho’ the beings whom thy Nesace,

Thy messenger hath known

Have dream’d for thy Infinity

*A model of their own—

Thy will is done, Oh, God!

The star hath ridden high

Thro’ many a tempest, but she rode

Beneath thy burning eye;

And here, in thought, to thee—

In thought that can alone

Ascend thy empire and so be

A partner of thy throne—

* The Humanitarians held that God was to be understood as

having a really human form.—_Vide Clarke’s Sermons_, vol.

1, page 26, fol. edit.

The drift of Milton’s argument, leads him to employ language

which would appear, at first sight, to verge upon their

doctrine; but it will be seen immediately, that he guards

himself against the charge of having adopted one of the most

ignorant errors of the dark ages of the church.—_Dr.

Sumner’s Notes on Milton’s Christian Doctrine_.

This opinion, in spite of many testimonies to the contrary,

could never have been very general. Andeus, a Syrian of

Mesopotamia, was condemned for the opinion, as heretical. He

lived in the beginning of the fourth century. His disciples

were called Anthropmorphites.—_Vide Du Pin_.

Among Milton’s poems are these lines:—

Dicite sacrorum præsides nemorum Deæ, &c.

Quis ille primus cujus ex imagine

Natura solers finxit humanum genus?

Eternus, incorruptus, æquævus polo,

Unusque et universus exemplar Dei.—And afterwards,

Non cui profundum Cæcitas lumen dedit

Dircæus augur vidit hunc alto sinu, &c.

*By winged Fantasy,

My embassy is given,

Till secrecy shall knowledge be

In the environs of Heaven.”

She ceas’d—and buried then her burning cheek

Abash’d, amid the lilies there, to seek

A shelter from the fervour of His eye;

For the stars trembled at the Deity.

She stirr’d not—breath’d not—for a voice was there

How solemnly pervading the calm air!

A sound of silence on the startled ear

Which dreamy poets name “the music of the sphere.”

Ours is a world of words: Quiet we call

“Silence”—which is the merest word of all.

All Nature speaks, and ev’n ideal things

Flap shadowy sounds from visionary wings—

But ah! not so when, thus, in realms on high

The eternal voice of God is passing by,

And the red winds are withering in the sky!

** “What tho’ in worlds which sightless cycles run,

Link’d to a little system, and one sun—

Where all my love is folly and the crowd

Still think my terrors but the thunder cloud,

The storm, the earthquake, and the ocean-wrath—

(Ah! will they cross me in my angrier path?)

What tho’ in worlds which own a single sun

The sands of Time grow dimmer as they run,

* Seltsamen Tochter Jovis

Seinem Schosskinde

Der Phantasie.—_Göethe_.

** Sightless—too small to be seen—_Legge_.

Yet thine is my resplendency, so given

To bear my secrets thro’ the upper Heaven.

Leave tenantless thy crystal home, and fly,

With all thy train, athwart the moony sky—

*Apart—like fire-flies in Sicilian night,

And wing to other worlds another light!

Divulge the secrets of thy embassy

To the proud orbs that twinkle—and so be

To ev’ry heart a barrier and a ban

Lest the stars totter in the guilt of man!”

Up rose the maiden in the yellow night,

The single-mooned eve!—on Earth we plight

Our faith to one love—and one moon adore—

The birth-place of young Beauty had no more.

As sprang that yellow star from downy hours

Up rose the maiden from her shrine of flowers,

And bent o’er sheeny mountain and dim plain

**Her way—but left not yet her Therasæan reign.

* I have often noticed a peculiar movement of the fire-flies;

—they will collect in a body and fly off, from a common

centre, into innumerable radii.

** Therasæa, or Therasea, the island mentioned by Seneca,

which, in a moment, arose from the sea to the eyes of

astonished mariners.

Part II.

HIGH on a mountain of enamell’d head—

Such as the drowsy shepherd on his bed

Of giant pasturage lying at his ease,

Raising his heavy eyelid, starts and sees

With many a mutter’d “hope to be forgiven”

What time the moon is quadrated in Heaven—

Of rosy head, that towering far away

Into the sunlit ether, caught the ray

Of sunken suns at eve—at noon of night,

While the moon danc’d with the fair stranger light—

Uprear’d upon such height arose a pile

Of gorgeous columns on th’ unburthen’d air,

Flashing from Parian marble that twin smile

Far down upon the wave that sparkled there,

And nursled the young mountain in its lair.

*Of molten stars their pavement, such as fall

Thro’ the ebon air, besilvering the pall

Of their own dissolution, while they die—

Adorning then the dwellings of the sky.

A dome, by linked light from Heaven let down,

Sat gently on these columns as a crown—

A window of one circular diamond, there,

Look’d out above into the purple air,

* Some star which, from the ruin’d roof Of shak’d Olympus,

by mischance, did fall.—_Milton._

And rays from God shot down that meteor chain

And hallow’d all the beauty twice again,

Save when, between th’ Empyrean and that ring,

Some eager spirit flapp’d his dusky wing.

But on the pillars Seraph eyes have seen

The dimness of this world: that greyish green

That Nature loves the best for Beauty’s grave

Lurk’d in each cornice, round each architrave—

And every sculptur’d cherub thereabout

That from his marble dwelling peeréd out

Seem’d earthly in the shadow of his niche—

Achaian statues in a world so rich?

*Friezes from Tadmor and Persepolis—

From Balbec, and the stilly, clear abyss

**Of beautiful Gomorrah! O, the wave

Is now upon thee—but too late to save!

Sound loves to revel in a summer night:

Witness the murmur of the grey twilight

* Voltaire, in speaking of Persepolis, says, “Je connois

bien l’admiration qu’inspirent ces ruines—mais un palais

erigé au pied d’une chaine des rochers sterils—peut il

être un chef d’oevure des arts!” [_Voila les arguments de M.

Voltaire_.]

** “Oh! the wave”—Ula Degusi is the Turkish appellation;

but, on its own shores, it is called Bahar Loth, or

Almotanah. There were undoubtedly more than two cities

engluphed in the “dead sea.” In the valley of Siddim were

five—Adrah, Zeboin, Zoar, Sodom and Gomorrah. Stephen of

Byzantium mentions eight, and Strabo thirteeen, (engulphed)

—but the last is out of all reason.

It is said, (Tacitus, Strabo, Josephus, Daniel of St. Saba, Nau,

Maundrell, Troilo, D’Arvieux) that after an excessive drought, the

vestiges of columns, walls, &c. are seen above the surface. At _any_

season, such remains may be discovered by looking down into the

transparent lake, and at such distances as would argue the existence of

many settlements in the space now usurped by the ‘Asphaltites.’

*That stole upon the ear, in Eyraco,

Of many a wild star-gazer long ago—

That stealeth ever on the ear of him

Who, musing, gazeth on the distance dim.

And sees the darkness coming as a cloud—

***Is not its form—its voice—most palpable and loud?

But what is this?—it cometh—and it brings

A music with it—’tis the rush of wings—

A pause—and then a sweeping, falling strain

And Nesace is in her halls again.

From the wild energy of wanton haste

Her cheeks were flushing, and her lips apart;

And zone that clung around her gentle waist

Had burst beneath the heaving of her heart.

Within the centre of that hall to breathe

She paus’d and panted, Zanthe! all beneath,

The fairy light that kiss’d her golden hair

And long’d to rest, yet could but sparkle there!

***Young flowers were whispering in melody

To happy flowers that night—and tree to tree;

Fountains were gushing music as they fell

In many a star-lit grove, or moon-lit dell;

Yet silence came upon material things—

Fair flowers, bright waterfalls and angel wings—

And sound alone that from the spirit sprang

Bore burthen to the charm the maiden sang:

* Eyraco—Chaldea.

** I have often thought I could distinctly hear the sound of

the darkness as it stole over the horizon.

*** Fairies use flowers for their charactery.—_Merry Wives

of Windsor_. [William Shakespeare]

“’Neath blue-bell or streamer—

Or tufted wild spray

That keeps, from the dreamer,

*The moonbeam away—

Bright beings! that ponder,

With half closing eyes,

On the stars which your wonder

Hath drawn from the skies,

Till they glance thro’ the shade, and

Come down to your brow

Like—eyes of the maiden

Who calls on you now—

Arise! from your dreaming

In violet bowers,

To duty beseeming

These star-litten hours—

And shake from your tresses

Encumber’d with dew

The breath of those kisses

That cumber them too—

(O! how, without you, Love!

Could angels be blest?)

Those kisses of true love

That lull’d ye to rest!

Up!—shake from your wing

Each hindering thing:

The dew of the night—

It would weigh down your flight;

And true love caresses—

O! leave them apart!

* In Scripture is this passage—“The sun shall not harm

thee by day, nor the moon by night.” It is perhaps not

generally known that the moon, in Egypt, has the effect of

producing blindness to those who sleep with the face exposed

to its rays, to which circumstance the passage evidently

alludes.

They are light on the tresses,

But lead on the heart.

Ligeia! Ligeia!

My beautiful one!

Whose harshest idea

Will to melody run,

O! is it thy will

On the breezes to toss?

Or, capriciously still,

*Like the lone Albatross,

Incumbent on night

(As she on the air)

To keep watch with delight

On the harmony there?

Ligeia! whatever

Thy image may be,

No magic shall sever

Thy music from thee.

Thou hast bound many eyes

In a dreamy sleep—

But the strains still arise

Which _thy_ vigilance keep—

The sound of the rain

Which leaps down to the flower,

And dances again

In the rhythm of the shower—

**The murmur that springs

From the growing of grass

* The Albatross is said to sleep on the wing.

** I met with this idea in an old English tale, which I am

now unable to obtain and quote from memory:—“The verie

essence and, as it were, springe-heade, and origine of all

musiche is the verie pleasaunte sounde which the trees of

the forest do make when they growe.”

Are the music of things—

But are modell’d, alas!—

Away, then my dearest,

O! hie thee away

To springs that lie clearest

Beneath the moon-ray—

To lone lake that smiles,

In its dream of deep rest,

At the many star-isles

That enjewel its breast—

Where wild flowers, creeping,

Have mingled their shade,

On its margin is sleeping

Full many a maid—

Some have left the cool glade, and

* Have slept with the bee—

Arouse them my maiden,

On moorland and lea—

Go! breathe on their slumber,

All softly in ear,

The musical number

They slumber’d to hear—

For what can awaken

An angel so soon

* The wild bee will not sleep in the shade if there be

moonlight. The rhyme in this verse, as in one about sixty

lines before, has an appearance of affectation. It is,

however, imitated from Sir W. Scott, or rather from Claud

Halcro—in whose mouth I admired its effect:

O! were there an island,

Tho’ ever so wild

Where woman might smile, and

No man be beguil’d, &c.

Whose sleep hath been taken

Beneath the cold moon,

As the spell which no slumber

Of witchery may test,

The rythmical number

Which lull’d him to rest?”

Spirits in wing, and angels to the view,

A thousand seraphs burst th’ Empyrean thro’,

Young dreams still hovering on their drowsy flight—

Seraphs in all but “Knowledge,” the keen light

That fell, refracted, thro’ thy bounds, afar

O Death! from eye of God upon that star:

Sweet was that error—sweeter still that death—

Sweet was that error—ev’n with _us_ the breath

Of science dims the mirror of our joy—

To them ’twere the Simoom, and would destroy—

For what (to them) availeth it to know

That Truth is Falsehood—or that Bliss is Woe?

Sweet was their death—with them to die was rife

With the last ecstacy of satiate life—

Beyond that death no immortality—

But sleep that pondereth and is not “to be”—

And there—oh! may my weary spirit dwell—

*Apart from Heaven’s Eternity—and yet how far from Hell!

* With the Arabians there is a medium between Heaven and

Hell, where men suffer no punishment, but yet do not attain

that tranquil and even happiness which they suppose to be

characteristic of heavenly enjoyment.

Un no rompido sueno—

Un dia puro—allegre—libre

Quiera—

Libre de amor—de zelo—

De odio—de esperanza—de rezelo.—_Luis Ponce de Leon_.

Sorrow is not excluded from “Al Aaraaf,” but it is that

sorrow which the living love to cherish for the dead, and

which, in some minds, resembles the delirium of opium. The

passionate excitement of Love and the buoyancy of spirit

attendant upon intoxication are its less holy pleasures—

the price of which, to those souls who make choice of “Al

Aaraaf” as their residence after life, is final death and

annihilation.

What guilty spirit, in what shrubbery dim,

Heard not the stirring summons of that hymn?

But two: they fell: for Heaven no grace imparts

To those who hear not for their beating hearts.

A maiden-angel and her seraph-lover—

O! where (and ye may seek the wide skies over)

Was Love, the blind, near sober Duty known?

*Unguided Love hath fallen—‘mid “tears of perfect moan.”

He was a goodly spirit—he who fell:

A wanderer by moss-y-mantled well—

A gazer on the lights that shine above—

A dreamer in the moonbeam by his love:

What wonder? For each star is eye-like there,

And looks so sweetly down on Beauty’s hair—

And they, and ev’ry mossy spring were holy

To his love-haunted heart and melancholy.

The night had found (to him a night of wo)

Upon a mountain crag, young Angelo—

Beetling it bends athwart the solemn sky,

And scowls on starry worlds that down beneath it lie.

Here sate he with his love—his dark eye bent

With eagle gaze along the firmament:

Now turn’d it upon her—but ever then

It trembled to the orb of EARTH again.

“Iante, dearest, see! how dim that ray!

How lovely ’tis to look so far away!

* There be tears of perfect moan

Wept for thee in Helicon.—_Milton._

She seem’d not thus upon that autumn eve

I left her gorgeous halls—nor mourn’d to leave.

That eve—that eve—I should remember well—

The sun-ray dropp’d, in Lemnos, with a spell

On th’Arabesque carving of a gilded hall

Wherein I sate, and on the draperied wall—

And on my eye-lids—O the heavy light!

How drowsily it weigh’d them into night!

On flowers, before, and mist, and love they ran

With Persian Saadi in his Gulistan:

But O that light!—I slumber’d—Death, the while,

Stole o’er my senses in that lovely isle

So softly that no single silken hair

Awoke that slept—or knew that it was there.

The last spot of Earth’s orb I trod upon

*Was a proud temple call’d the Parthenon—

More beauty clung around her column’d wall

**Than ev’n thy glowing bosom beats withal,

And when old Time my wing did disenthral

Thence sprang I—as the eagle from his tower,

And years I left behind me in an hour.

What time upon her airy bounds I hung

One half the garden of her globe was flung

Unrolling as a chart unto my view—

Tenantless cities of the desert too!

Ianthe, beauty crowded on me then,

And half I wish’d to be again of men.”

“My Angelo! and why of them to be?

A brighter dwelling-place is here for thee—

* It was entire in 1687—the most elevated spot in Athens.

** Shadowing more beauty in their airy brows

Than have the white breasts of the Queen of Love.—_Marlowe._

And greener fields than in yon world above,

And women’s loveliness—and passionate love.”

“But, list, Ianthe! when the air so soft

*Fail’d, as my pennon’d spirit leapt aloft,

Perhaps my brain grew dizzy—but the world

I left so late was into chaos hurl’d—

Sprang from her station, on the winds apart,

And roll’d, a flame, the fiery Heaven athwart.

Methought, my sweet one, then I ceased to soar

And fell—not swiftly as I rose before,

But with a downward, tremulous motion thro’

Light, brazen rays, this golden star unto!

Nor long the measure of my falling hours,

For nearest of all stars was thine to ours—

Dread star! that came, amid a night of mirth,

A red Dædalion on the timid Earth.

“We came—and to thy Earth—but not to us

Be given our lady’s bidding to discuss:

We came, my love; around, above, below,

Gay fire-fly of the night we come and go,

Nor ask a reason save the angel-nod

She grants to us, as granted by her God—

But, Angelo, than thine grey Time unfurl’d

Never his fairy wing o’er fairier world!

Dim was its little disk, and angel eyes

Alone could see the phantom in the skies,

When first Al Aaraaf knew her course to be

Headlong thitherward o’er the starry sea—

But when its glory swell’d upon the sky,

As glowing Beauty’s bust beneath man’s eye,

* Pennon—for pinion.—_Milton_.

We paus’d before the heritage of men,

And thy star trembled—as doth Beauty then!”

Thus, in discourse, the lovers whiled away

The night that waned and waned and brought no day.

They fell: for Heaven to them no hope imparts

Who hear not for the beating of their hearts.

TAMERLANE

Kind solace in a dying hour!

Such, father, is not (now) my theme—

I will not madly deem that power

Of Earth may shrive me of the sin

Unearthly pride hath revell’d in—

I have no time to dote or dream:

You call it hope—that fire of fire!

It is but agony of desire:

If I _can_ hope—Oh God! I can—

Its fount is holier—more divine—

I would not call thee fool, old man,

But such is not a gift of thine.

Know thou the secret of a spirit

Bow’d from its wild pride into shame.

O! yearning heart! I did inherit

Thy withering portion with the fame,

The searing glory which hath shone

Amid the jewels of my throne,

Halo of Hell! and with a pain

Not Hell shall make me fear again—

O! craving heart, for the lost flowers

And sunshine of my summer hours!

Th’ undying voice of that dead time,

With its interminable chime,

Rings, in the spirit of a spell,

Upon thy emptiness—a knell.

I have not always been as now:

The fever’d diadem on my brow

I claim’d and won usurpingly—

Hath not the same fierce heirdom given

Rome to the Caesar—this to me?

The heritage of a kingly mind,

And a proud spirit which hath striven

Triumphantly with human kind.

On mountain soil I first drew life:

The mists of the Taglay have shed

Nightly their dews upon my head,

And, I believe, the winged strife

And tumult of the headlong air

Have nestled in my very hair.

So late from Heaven—that dew—it fell

(Mid dreams of an unholy night)

Upon me—with the touch of Hell,

While the red flashing of the light

From clouds that hung, like banners, o’er,

Appeared to my half-closing eye

The pageantry of monarchy,

And the deep trumpet-thunder’s roar

Came hurriedly upon me, telling

Of human battle, where my voice,

My own voice, silly child!—was swelling

(O! how my spirit would rejoice,

And leap within me at the cry)

The battle-cry of Victory!

The rain came down upon my head

Unshelter’d—and the heavy wind

Was giantlike—so thou, my mind!—

It was but man, I thought, who shed

Laurels upon me: and the rush—

The torrent of the chilly air

Gurgled within my ear the crush

Of empires—with the captive’s prayer—

The hum of suiters—and the tone

Of flattery ‘round a sovereign’s throne.

My passions, from that hapless hour,

Usurp’d a tyranny which men

Have deem’d, since I have reach’d to power;

My innate nature—be it so:

But, father, there liv’d one who, then,

Then—in my boyhood—when their fire

Burn’d with a still intenser glow,

(For passion must, with youth, expire)

E’en _then_ who knew this iron heart

In woman’s weakness had a part.

I have no words—alas!—to tell

The loveliness of loving well!

Nor would I now attempt to trace

The more than beauty of a face

Whose lineaments, upon my mind,

Are—shadows on th’ unstable wind:

Thus I remember having dwelt

Some page of early lore upon,

With loitering eye, till I have felt

The letters—with their meaning—melt

To fantasies—with none.

O, she was worthy of all love!

Love—as in infancy was mine—

’Twas such as angel minds above

Might envy; her young heart the shrine

On which my ev’ry hope and thought

Were incense—then a goodly gift,

For they were childish—and upright—

Pure—as her young example taught:

Why did I leave it, and, adrift,

Trust to the fire within, for light?

We grew in age—and love—together,

Roaming the forest, and the wild;

My breast her shield in wintry weather—

And, when the friendly sunshine smil’d,

And she would mark the opening skies,

_I_ saw no Heaven—but in her eyes.

Young Love’s first lesson is—the heart:

For ‘mid that sunshine, and those smiles,

When, from our little cares apart,

And laughing at her girlish wiles,

I’d throw me on her throbbing breast,

And pour my spirit out in tears—

There was no need to speak the rest—

No need to quiet any fears

Of her—who ask’d no reason why,

But turn’d on me her quiet eye!

Yet _more_ than worthy of the love

My spirit struggled with, and strove,

When, on the mountain peak, alone,

Ambition lent it a new tone—

I had no being—but in thee:

The world, and all it did contain

In the earth—the air—the sea—

Its joy—its little lot of pain

That was new pleasure—the ideal,

Dim, vanities of dreams by night—

And dimmer nothings which were real—

(Shadows—and a more shadowy light!)

Parted upon their misty wings,

And, so, confusedly, became

Thine image, and—a name—a name!

Two separate—yet most intimate things.

I was ambitious—have you known

The passion, father? You have not:

A cottager, I mark’d a throne

Of half the world as all my own,

And murmur’d at such lowly lot—

But, just like any other dream,

Upon the vapour of the dew

My own had past, did not the beam

Of beauty which did while it thro’

The minute—the hour—the day—oppress

My mind with double loveliness.

We walk’d together on the crown

Of a high mountain which look’d down

Afar from its proud natural towers

Of rock and forest, on the hills—

The dwindled hills! begirt with bowers

And shouting with a thousand rills.

I spoke to her of power and pride,

But mystically—in such guise

That she might deem it nought beside

The moment’s converse; in her eyes

I read, perhaps too carelessly—

A mingled feeling with my own—

The flush on her bright cheek, to me

Seem’d to become a queenly throne

Too well that I should let it be

Light in the wilderness alone.

I wrapp’d myself in grandeur then,

And donn’d a visionary crown—

Yet it was not that Fantasy

Had thrown her mantle over me—

But that, among the rabble—men,

Lion ambition is chain’d down—

And crouches to a keeper’s hand—

Not so in deserts where the grand

The wild—the terrible conspire

With their own breath to fan his fire.

Look ‘round thee now on Samarcand!—

Is not she queen of Earth? her pride

Above all cities? in her hand

Their destinies? in all beside

Of glory which the world hath known

Stands she not nobly and alone?

Falling—her veriest stepping-stone

Shall form the pedestal of a throne—

And who her sovereign? Timour—he

Whom the astonished people saw

Striding o’er empires haughtily

A diadem’d outlaw—

O! human love! thou spirit given,

On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!

Which fall’st into the soul like rain

Upon the Siroc wither’d plain,

And failing in thy power to bless

But leav’st the heart a wilderness!

Idea! which bindest life around

With music of so strange a sound

And beauty of so wild a birth—

Farewell! for I have won the Earth!

When Hope, the eagle that tower’d, could see

No cliff beyond him in the sky,

His pinions were bent droopingly—

And homeward turn’d his soften’d eye.

’Twas sunset: when the sun will part

There comes a sullenness of heart

To him who still would look upon

The glory of the summer sun.

That soul will hate the ev’ning mist,

So often lovely, and will list

To the sound of the coming darkness (known

To those whose spirits hearken) as one

Who, in a dream of night, _would_ fly

But _cannot_ from a danger nigh.

What tho’ the moon—the white moon

Shed all the splendour of her noon,

Her smile is chilly—and her beam,

In that time of dreariness, will seem

(So like you gather in your breath)

A portrait taken after death.

And boyhood is a summer sun

Whose waning is the dreariest one—

For all we live to know is known,

And all we seek to keep hath flown—

Let life, then, as the day-flower, fall

With the noon-day beauty—which is all.

I reach’d my home—my home no more—

For all had flown who made it so—

I pass’d from out its mossy door,

And, tho’ my tread was soft and low,

A voice came from the threshold stone

Of one whom I had earlier known—

O! I defy thee, Hell, to show

On beds of fire that burn below,

A humbler heart—a deeper wo—

Father, I firmly do believe—

I _know_—for Death, who comes for me

From regions of the blest afar,

Where there is nothing to deceive,

Hath left his iron gate ajar,

And rays of truth you cannot see

Are flashing thro’ Eternity—

I do believe that Eblis hath

A snare in ev’ry human path—

Else how, when in the holy grove

I wandered of the idol, Love,

Who daily scents his snowy wings

With incense of burnt offerings

From the most unpolluted things,

Whose pleasant bowers are yet so riven

Above with trelliced rays from Heaven

No mote may shun—no tiniest fly

The light’ning of his eagle eye—

How was it that Ambition crept,

Unseen, amid the revels there,

Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt

In the tangles of Love’s very hair?

1829.

TO HELEN

Helen, thy beauty is to me

Like those Nicean barks of yore,

That gently, o’er a perfumed sea,

The weary way-worn wanderer bore

To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,

Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,

Thy Naiad airs have brought me home

To the glory that was Greece,

And the grandeur that was Rome.

Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche

How statue-like I me thee stand,

The agate lamp within thy hand!

Ah, Psyche, from the regions which

Are Holy-land!

1831.

THE VALLEY OF UNREST

_Once_ it smiled a silent dell

Where the people did not dwell;

They had gone unto the wars,

Trusting to the mild-eyed stars,

Nightly, from their azure towers,

To keep watch above the flowers,

In the midst of which all day

The red sun-light lazily lay.

_Now_ each visitor shall confess

The sad valley’s restlessness.

Nothing there is motionless—

Nothing save the airs that brood

Over the magic solitude.

Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees

That palpitate like the chill seas

Around the misty Hebrides!

Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven

That rustle through the unquiet Heaven

Uneasily, from morn till even,

Over the violets there that lie

In myriad types of the human eye—

Over the lilies there that wave

And weep above a nameless grave!

They wave:—from out their fragrant tops

Eternal dews come down in drops.

They weep:—from off their delicate stems

Perennial tears descend in gems.

1831.

ISRAFEL*

In Heaven a spirit doth dwell

“Whose heart-strings are a lute;”

None sing so wildly well

As the angel Israfel,

And the giddy stars (so legends tell)

Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell

Of his voice, all mute.

Tottering above

In her highest noon

The enamoured moon

Blushes with love,

While, to listen, the red levin

(With the rapid Pleiads, even,

Which were seven,)

Pauses in Heaven

And they say (the starry choir

And all the listening things)

That Israfeli’s fire

Is owing to that lyre

By which he sits and sings—

The trembling living wire

Of those unusual strings.

* And the angel Israfel, whose heart-strings are a lut, and

who has the sweetest voice of all God’s creatures.—KORAN.

But the skies that angel trod,

Where deep thoughts are a duty—

Where Love’s a grown up God—

Where the Houri glances are

Imbued with all the beauty

Which we worship in a star.

Therefore, thou art not wrong,

Israfeli, who despisest

An unimpassion’d song:

To thee the laurels belong

Best bard, because the wisest!

Merrily live, and long!

The extacies above

With thy burning measures suit—

Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love,

With the fervor of thy lute—

Well may the stars be mute!

Yes, Heaven is thine; but this

Is a world of sweets and sours;

Our flowers are merely—flowers,

And the shadow of thy perfect bliss

Is the sunshine of ours.

If I could dwell

Where Israfel

Hath dwelt, and he where I,

He might not sing so wildly well

A mortal melody,

While a bolder note than this might swell

From my lyre within the sky.

1836.

TO ——

1

The bowers whereat, in dreams, I see

The wantonest singing birds

Are lips—and all thy melody

Of lip-begotten words—

2

Thine eyes, in Heaven of heart enshrin’d

Then desolately fall,

O! God! on my funereal mind

Like starlight on a pall—

3

Thy heart—_thy_ heart!—I wake and sigh,

And sleep to dream till day

Of truth that gold can never buy—

Of the trifles that it may.

1829.

TO ——

I heed not that my earthly lot

Hath-little of Earth in it—

That years of love have been forgot

In the hatred of a minute:—

I mourn not that the desolate

Are happier, sweet, than I,

But that you sorrow for my fate

Who am a passer-by.

1829.

TO THE RIVER——

Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow

Of crystal, wandering water,

Thou art an emblem of the glow

Of beauty—the unhidden heart—

The playful maziness of art

In old Alberto’s daughter;

But when within thy wave she looks—

Which glistens then, and trembles—

Why, then, the prettiest of brooks

Her worshipper resembles;

For in my heart, as in thy stream,

Her image deeply lies—

His heart which trembles at the beam

Of her soul-searching eyes.

1829.

SONG

I saw thee on thy bridal day—

When a burning blush came o’er thee,

Though happiness around thee lay,

The world all love before thee:

And in thine eye a kindling light

(Whatever it might be)

Was all on Earth my aching sight

Of Loveliness could see.

That blush, perhaps, was maiden shame—

As such it well may pass—

Though its glow hath raised a fiercer flame

In the breast of him, alas!

Who saw thee on that bridal day,

When that deep blush _would_ come o’er thee,

Though happiness around thee lay,

The world all love before thee.

1827.

SPIRITS OF THE DEAD

1

Thy soul shall find itself alone

‘Mid dark thoughts of the grey tomb-stone—

Not one, of all the crowd, to pry

Into thine hour of secrecy:

2

Be silent in that solitude

Which is not loneliness—for then

The spirits of the dead who stood

In life before thee are again

In death around thee—and their will

Shall then overshadow thee: be still.

3

For the night—tho’ clear—shall frown—

And the stars shall look not down,

From their high thrones in the Heaven,

With light like Hope to mortals given—

But their red orbs, without beam,

To thy weariness shall seem

As a burning and a fever

Which would cling to thee for ever:

4

Now are thoughts thou shalt not banish—

Now are visions ne’er to vanish—

From thy spirit shall they pass

No more—like dew-drop from the grass:

5

The breeze—the breath of God—is still—

And the mist upon the hill

Shadowy—shadowy—yet unbroken,

Is a symbol and a token—

How it hangs upon the trees,

A mystery of mysteries!—

1827.

A DREAM

In visions of the dark night

I have dreamed of joy departed—

But a waking dreams of life and light

Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day

To him whose eyes are cast

On things around him with a ray

Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream—that holy dream,

While all the world were chiding,

Hath cheered me as a lovely beam

A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro’ storm and night,

So trembled from afar-

What could there be more purely bright

In Truths day-star?

1827.

ROMANCE

Romance, who loves to nod and sing,

With drowsy head and folded wing,

Among the green leaves as they shake

Far down within some shadowy lake,

To me a painted paroquet

Hath been—a most familiar bird—

Taught me my alphabet to say—

To lisp my very earliest word

While in the wild wood I did lie,

A child—with a most knowing eye.

Of late, eternal Condor years

So shake the very Heaven on high

With tumult as they thunder by,

I have no time for idle cares

Through gazing on the unquiet sky.

And when an hour with calmer wings

Its down upon thy spirit flings—

That little time with lyre and rhyme

To while away—forbidden things!

My heart would feel to be a crime

Unless it trembled with the strings.

1829.

FAIRY-LAND

Dim vales—and shadowy floods—

And cloudy-looking woods,

Whose forms we can’t discover

For the tears that drip all over

Huge moons there wax and wane—

Again—again—again—

Every moment of the night—

Forever changing places—

And they put out the star-light

With the breath from their pale faces.

About twelve by the moon-dial

One, more filmy than the rest

(A kind which, upon trial,

They have found to be the best)

Comes down—still down—and down

With its centre on the crown

Of a mountain’s eminence,

While its wide circumference

In easy drapery falls

Over hamlets, over halls,

Wherever they may be—

O’er the strange woods—o’er the sea—

Over spirits on the wing—

Over every drowsy thing—

And buries them up quite

In a labyrinth of light—

And then, how deep!—O, deep!

Is the passion of their sleep.

In the morning they arise,

And their moony covering

Is soaring in the skies,

With the tempests as they toss,

Like—almost any thing—

Or a yellow Albatross.

They use that moon no more

For the same end as before—

Videlicet a tent—

Which I think extravagant:

Its atomies, however,

Into a shower dissever,

Of which those butterflies,

Of Earth, who seek the skies,

And so come down again

(Never-contented things!)

Have brought a specimen

Upon their quivering wings.

1831.

THE LAKE —— TO——

In spring of youth it was my lot

To haunt of the wide earth a spot

The which I could not love the less—

So lovely was the loneliness

Of a wild lake, with black rock bound,

And the tall pines that tower’d around.

But when the Night had thrown her pall

Upon that spot, as upon all,

And the mystic wind went by

Murmuring in melody—

Then—ah then I would awake

To the terror of the lone lake.

Yet that terror was not fright,

But a tremulous delight—

A feeling not the jewelled mine

Could teach or bribe me to define—

Nor Love—although the Love were thine.

Death was in that poisonous wave,

And in its gulf a fitting grave

For him who thence could solace bring

To his lone imagining—

Whose solitary soul could make

An Eden of that dim lake.

1827.

EVENING STAR

’Twas noontide of summer,

And midtime of night,

And stars, in their orbits,

Shone pale, through the light

Of the brighter, cold moon.

‘Mid planets her slaves,

Herself in the Heavens,

Her beam on the waves.

I gazed awhile

On her cold smile;

Too cold-too cold for me—

There passed, as a shroud,

A fleecy cloud,

And I turned away to thee,

Proud Evening Star,

In thy glory afar

And dearer thy beam shall be;

For joy to my heart

Is the proud part

Thou bearest in Heaven at night.,

And more I admire

Thy distant fire,

Than that colder, lowly light.

1827.

“THE HAPPIEST DAY.”

I

The happiest day-the happiest hour

My seared and blighted heart hath known,

The highest hope of pride and power,

I feel hath flown.

Of power! said I? Yes! such I ween

But they have vanished long, alas!

The visions of my youth have been

But let them pass.

III

And pride, what have I now with thee?

Another brow may ev’n inherit

The venom thou hast poured on me

Be still my spirit!

IV

The happiest day-the happiest hour

Mine eyes shall see-have ever seen

The brightest glance of pride and power

I feet have been:

V

But were that hope of pride and power

Now offered with the pain

Ev’n _then I _felt-that brightest hour

I would not live again:

VI

For on its wing was dark alloy

And as it fluttered-fell

An essence-powerful to destroy

A soul that knew it well.

1827.

IMITATION

A dark unfathom’d tide

Of interminable pride—

A mystery, and a dream,

Should my early life seem;

I say that dream was fraught

With a wild, and waking thought

Of beings that have been,

Which my spirit hath not seen,

Had I let them pass me by,

With a dreaming eye!

Let none of earth inherit

That vision on my spirit;

Those thoughts I would control

As a spell upon his soul:

For that bright hope at last

And that light time have past,

And my worldly rest hath gone

With a sigh as it pass’d on

I care not tho’ it perish

With a thought I then did cherish.

1827.

HYMN TO ARISTOGEITON AND HARMODIUS

Translation from the Greek

I

Wreathed in myrtle, my sword I’ll conceal

Like those champions devoted and brave,

When they plunged in the tyrant their steel,

And to Athens deliverance gave.

II

Beloved heroes! your deathless souls roam

In the joy breathing isles of the blest;

Where the mighty of old have their home

Where Achilles and Diomed rest

III

In fresh myrtle my blade I’ll entwine,

Like Harmodius, the gallant and good,

When he made at the tutelar shrine

A libation of Tyranny’s blood.

IV

Ye deliverers of Athens from shame!

Ye avengers of Liberty’s wrongs!

Endless ages shall cherish your fame,

Embalmed in their echoing songs!

1827.

DREAMS

Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!

My spirit not awak’ning, till the beam

Of an Eternity should bring the morrow:

Yes! tho’ that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,

’Twere better than the dull reality

Of waking life to him whose heart shall be,

And hath been ever, on the chilly earth,

A chaos of deep passion from his birth!

But should it be—that dream eternally

Continuing—as dreams have been to me

In my young boyhood—should it thus be given,

’Twere folly still to hope for higher Heaven!

For I have revell’d, when the sun was bright

In the summer sky; in dreamy fields of light,

And left unheedingly my very heart

In climes of mine imagining—apart

From mine own home, with beings that have been

Of mine own thought—what more could I have seen?

’Twas once & _only_ once & the wild hour

From my rememberance shall not pass—some power

Or spell had bound me—’twas the chilly wind

Came o’er me in the night & left behind

Its image on my spirit, or the moon

Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon

Too coldly—or the stars—howe’er it was

That dream was as that night wind—let it pass.

I have been happy—tho’ but in a dream

I have been happy—& I love the theme—

Dreams! in their vivid colouring of life—

As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife

Of semblance with reality which brings

To the delirious eye more lovely things

Of Paradise & Love—& all our own!

Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.

{From an earlier MS. Than in the book—ED.}

“IN YOUTH I HAVE KNOWN ONE”

_How often we forget all time, when lone

Admiring Nature’s universal throne;

Her woods—her wilds—her mountains-the intense

Reply of Hers to Our intelligence!_

I

IN youth I have known one with whom the Earth

In secret communing held-as he with it,

In daylight, and in beauty, from his birth:

Whose fervid, flickering torch of life was lit

From the sun and stars, whence he had drawn forth

A passionate light such for his spirit was fit

And yet that spirit knew-not in the hour

Of its own fervor-what had o’er it power.

II

Perhaps it may be that my mind is wrought

To a fever* by the moonbeam that hangs o’er,

But I will half believe that wild light fraught

With more of sovereignty than ancient lore

Hath ever told-or is it of a thought

The unembodied essence, and no more

That with a quickening spell doth o’er us pass

As dew of the night-time, o’er the summer grass?

III

Doth o’er us pass, when, as th’ expanding eye

To the loved object-so the tear to the lid

Will start, which lately slept in apathy?

And yet it need not be—(that object) hid

From us in life-but common-which doth lie

Each hour before us—but then only bid

With a strange sound, as of a harp-string broken

T’ awake us—’Tis a symbol and a token

IV

Of what in other worlds shall be—and given

In beauty by our God, to those alone

Who otherwise would fall from life and Heaven

Drawn by their heart’s passion, and that tone,

That high tone of the spirit which hath striven

Though not with Faith-with godliness—whose throne

With desperate energy ‘t hath beaten down;

Wearing its own deep feeling as a crown.

* Query “fervor”?—ED.

A PÆAN.

I.

How shall the burial rite be read?

The solemn song be sung?

The requiem for the loveliest dead,

That ever died so young?

II.

Her friends are gazing on her,

And on her gaudy bier,

And weep!—oh! to dishonor

Dead beauty with a tear!

III.

They loved her for her wealth—

And they hated her for her pride—

But she grew in feeble health,

And they _love_ her—that she died.

IV.

They tell me (while they speak

Of her “costly broider’d pall”)

That my voice is growing weak—

That I should not sing at all—

V.

Or that my tone should be

Tun’d to such solemn song

So mournfully—so mournfully,

That the dead may feel no wrong.

VI.

But she is gone above,

With young Hope at her side,

And I am drunk with love

Of the dead, who is my bride.—

VII.

Of the dead—dead who lies

All perfum’d there,

With the death upon her eyes,

And the life upon her hair.

VIII.

Thus on the coffin loud and long

I strike—the murmur sent

Through the grey chambers to my song,

Shall be the accompaniment.

IX.

Thou died’st in thy life’s June—

But thou did’st not die too fair:

Thou did’st not die too soon,

Nor with too calm an air.

X.

From more than fiends on earth,

Thy life and love are riven,

To join the untainted mirth

Of more than thrones in heaven—

XII.

Therefore, to thee this night

I will no requiem raise,

But waft thee on thy flight,

With a Pæan of old days.

NOTES

30. On the “Poems written in Youth” little comment is needed. This section

includes the pieces printed for first volume of 1827 (which was

subsequently suppressed), such poems from the first and second published

volumes of 1829 and 1831 as have not already been given in their revised

versions, and a few others collected from various sources. “Al Aaraaf”

first appeared, with the sonnet “To Silence” prefixed to it, in 1829, and

is, substantially, as originally issued. In the edition for 1831, however,

this poem, its author’s longest, was introduced by the following

twenty-nine lines, which have been omitted in—all subsequent

collections:

AL AARAAF

Mysterious star!

Thou wert my dream

All a long summer night—

Be now my theme!

By this clear stream,

Of thee will I write;

Meantime from afar

Bathe me in light I

Thy world has not the dross of ours,

Yet all the beauty-all the flowers

That list our love or deck our bowers

In dreamy gardens, where do lie

Dreamy maidens all the day;

While the silver winds of Circassy

On violet couches faint away.

Little—oh “little dwells in thee”

Like unto what on earth we see:

Beauty’s eye is here the bluest

In the falsest and untruest—On the sweetest

air doth float

The most sad and solemn note—

If with thee be broken hearts,

Joy so peacefully departs,

That its echo still doth dwell,

Like the murmur in the shell.

Thou! thy truest type of grief

Is the gently falling leaf!

Thy framing is so holy

Sorrow is not melancholy.

31. The earliest version of “Tamerlane” was included in the suppressed

volume of 1827, but differs very considerably from the poem as now

published. The present draft, besides innumerable verbal alterations and

improvements upon the original, is more carefully punctuated, and, the

lines being indented, presents a more pleasing appearance, to the eye at

least.

32. “To Helen” first appeared in the 1831 volume, as did also “The Valley

of Unrest” (as “The Valley Nis”), “Israfel,” and one or two others of the

youthful pieces. The poem styled “Romance,” constituted the Preface of the

1829 volume, but with the addition of the following lines:

Succeeding years, too wild for song,

Then rolled like tropic storms along,

Where, through the garish lights that fly

Dying along the troubled sky,

Lay bare, through vistas thunder-riven,

The blackness of the general Heaven,

That very blackness yet doth Ring

Light on the lightning’s silver wing.

For being an idle boy lang syne;

Who read Anacreon and drank wine,

I early found Anacreon rhymes

Were almost passionate sometimes—

And by strange alchemy of brain

His pleasures always turned to pain—

His naiveté to wild desire—

His wit to love-his wine to fire—

And so, being young and dipt in folly,

I fell in love with melancholy,

And used to throw my earthly rest

And quiet all away in jest—

I could not love except where Death

Was mingling his with Beauty’s breath—

Or Hymen, Time, and Destiny,

Were stalking between her and me.

But now my soul hath too much room—

Gone are the glory and the gloom—

The black hath mellow’d into gray,

And all the fires are fading away.

My draught of passion hath been deep—

I revell’d, and I now would sleep

And after drunkenness of soul

Succeeds the glories of the bowl

An idle longing night and day

To dream my very life away.

But dreams—of those who dream as I,

Aspiringly, are damned, and die:

Yet should I swear I mean alone,

By notes so very shrilly blown,

To break upon Time’s monotone,

While yet my vapid joy and grief

Are tintless of the yellow leaf—

Why not an imp the graybeard hath,

Will shake his shadow in my path—

And e’en the graybeard will o’erlook

Connivingly my dreaming-book.

DOUBTFUL POEMS

ALONE

From childhood’s hour I have not been

As others were—I have not seen

As others saw—I could not bring

My passions from a common spring—

From the same source I have not taken

My sorrow—I could not awaken

My heart to joy at the same tone—

And all I lov’d—_I_ lov’d alone—

_Then_—in my childhood—in the dawn

Of a most stormy life—was drawn

From ev’ry depth of good and ill

The mystery which binds me still—

From the torrent, or the fountain—

From the red cliff of the mountain—

From the sun that ‘round me roll’d

In its autumn tint of gold—

From the lightning in the sky

As it pass’d me flying by—

From the thunder, and the storm—

And the cloud that took the form

(When the rest of Heaven was blue)

Of a demon in my view—

{This poem is no longer considered doubtful as it was in 1903. Liberty has

been taken to replace the book version with an earlier, perhaps more

original manuscript version—Ed}

TO ISADORE

I

Beneath the vine-clad eaves,

Whose shadows fall before

Thy lowly cottage door

Under the lilac’s tremulous leaves—

Within thy snowy claspeèd hand

The purple flowers it bore..

Last eve in dreams, I saw thee stand,

Like queenly nymphs from Fairy-land—

Enchantress of the flowery wand,

Most beauteous Isadore!

II

And when I bade the dream

Upon thy spirit flee,

Thy violet eyes to me

Upturned, did overflowing seem

With the deep, untold delight

Of Love’s serenity;

Thy classic brow, like lilies white

And pale as the Imperial Night

Upon her throne, with stars bedight,

Enthralled my soul to thee!

III

Ah I ever I behold

Thy dreamy, passionate eyes,

Blue as the languid skies

Hung with the sunset’s fringe of gold;

Now strangely clear thine image grows,

And olden memories

Are startled from their long repose

Like shadows on the silent snows

When suddenly the night-wind blows

Where quiet moonlight ties.

IV

Like music heard in dreams,

Like strains of harps unknown,

Of birds forever flown

Audible as the voice of streams

That murmur in some leafy dell,

I hear thy gentlest tone,

And Silence cometh with her spell

Like that which on my tongue doth dwell,

When tremulous in dreams I tell

My love to thee alone!

V

In every valley heard,

Floating from tree to tree,

Less beautiful to, me,

The music of the radiant bird,

Than artless accents such as thine

Whose echoes never flee!

Ah! how for thy sweet voice I pine:—

For uttered in thy tones benign

(Enchantress!) this rude name of mine

Doth seem a melody!

THE VILLAGE STREET

In these rapid, restless shadows,

Once I walked at eventide,

When a gentle, silent maiden,

Wal ked in beauty at my side

She alone there walked beside me

All in beauty, like a bride.

Pallidly the moon was shining

On the dewy meadows nigh;

On the silvery, silent rivers,

On the mountains far and high

On the ocean’s star-lit waters,

Where the winds a-weary die.

Slowly, silently we wandered

From the open cottage door,

Underneath the elm’s long branches

To the pavement bending o’er;

Underneath the mossy willow

And the dying sycamore.

With the myriad stars in beauty

All bedight, the heavens were seen,

Radiant hopes were bright around me,

Like the light of stars serene;

Like the mellow midnight splendor

Of the Night’s irradiate queen.

Audibly the elm-leaves whispered

Peaceful, pleasant melodies,

Like the distant murmured music

Of unquiet, lovely seas:

While the winds were hushed in slumber

In the fragrant flowers and trees.

Wondrous and unwonted beauty

Still adorning all did seem,

While I told my love in fables

‘Neath the willows by the stream;

Would the heart have kept unspoken

Love that was its rarest dream!

Instantly away we wandered

In the shadowy twilight tide,

She, the silent, scornful maiden,

Walking calmly at my side,

With a step serene and stately,

All in beauty, all in pride.

Vacantly I walked beside her.

On the earth mine eyes were cast;

Swift and keen there came unto me

Ritter memories of the past

On me, like the rain in Autumn

On the dead leaves, cold and fast.

Underneath the elms we parted,

By the lowly cottage door;

One brief word alone was uttered

Never on our lips before;

And away I walked forlornly,

Broken-hearted evermore.

Slowly, silently I loitered,

Homeward, in the night, alone;

Sudden anguish bound my spirit,

That my youth had never known;

Wild unrest, like that which cometh

When the Night’s first dream hath flown.

Now, to me the elm-leaves whisper

Mad, discordant melodies,

And keen melodies like shadows

Haunt the moaning willow trees,

And the sycamores with laughter

Mock me in the nightly breeze.

Sad and pale the Autumn moonlight

Through the sighing foliage streams;

And each morning, midnight shadow,

Shadow of my sorrow seems;

Strive, 0 heart, forget thine idol!

And, 0 soul, forget thy dreams!

THE FOREST REVERIE

’Tis said that when

The hands of men

Tamed this primeval wood,

And hoary trees with groans of woe,

Like warriors by an unknown foe,

Were in their strength subdued,

The virgin Earth Gave instant birth

To springs that ne’er did flow

That in the sun Did rivulets run,

And all around rare flowers did blow

The wild rose pale Perfumed the gale

And the queenly lily adown the dale

(Whom the sun and the dew

And the winds did woo),

With the gourd and the grape luxuriant grew.

So when in tears

The love of years

Is wasted like the snow,

And the fine fibrils of its life

By the rude wrong of instant strife

Are broken at a blow

Within the heart

Do springs upstart

Of which it doth now know,

And strange, sweet dreams,

Like silent streams

That from new fountains overflow,

With the earlier tide

Of rivers glide

Deep in the heart whose hope has died—

Quenching the fires its ashes hide,—

Its ashes, whence will spring and grow

Sweet flowers, ere long,

The rare and radiant flowers of song!

NOTES

Of the many verses from time to time ascribed to the pen of Edgar Poe, and

not included among his known writings, the lines entitled “Alone” have the

chief claim to our notice. _Fac-simile _copies of this piece had been

in possession of the present editor some time previous to its publication

in “Scribner’s Magazine” for September, 1875; but as proofs of the

authorship claimed for it were not forthcoming, he refrained from

publishing it as requested. The desired proofs have not yet been adduced,

and there is, at present, nothing but internal evidence to guide us.

“Alone” is stated to have been written by Poe in the album of a Baltimore

lady (Mrs. Balderstone?), on March 17th, 1829, and the facsimile given in

“Scribner’s” is alleged to be of his handwriting. If the caligraphy be

Poe’s, it is different in all essential respects from all the many

specimens known to us, and strongly resembles that of the writer of the

heading and dating of the manuscript, both of which the contributor of the

poem acknowledges to have been recently added. The lines, however, if not

by Poe, are the most successful imitation of his early mannerisms yet made

public, and, in the opinion of one well qualified to speak, “are not

unworthy on the whole of the parentage claimed for them.”

While Edgar Poe was editor of the “Broadway Journal,” some lines “To

Isadore” appeared therein, and, like several of his known pieces, bore no

signature. They were at once ascribed to Poe, and in order to satisfy

questioners, an editorial paragraph subsequently appeared saying they were

by “A. Ide, junior.” Two previous poems had appeared in the “Broadway

journal” over the signature of “A. M. Ide,” and whoever wrote them was

also the author of the lines “To Isadore.” In order, doubtless, to give a

show of variety, Poe was then publishing some of his known works in his

journal over _noms de plume, _and as no other writings whatever can

be traced to any person bearing the name of “A. M. Ide,” it is not

impossible that the poems now republished in this collection may be by the

author of “The Raven.” Having been published without his usual elaborate

revision, Poe may have wished to _hide _his hasty work under an

assumed name. The three pieces are included in the present collection, so

the reader can judge for himself what pretensions they possess to be by

the author of “The Raven.”