Herman Melville- Complete Poems

by Herman Melville

  669.32 Anak] Also a giant, as in Numbers 13:33.

  672.9 Bon Homme Dick] The Bonhomme Richard, Continental warship placed under John Paul Jones in 1779 and renamed in honor of Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanac.

  673.17 Bohea] Popular black Chinese tea (pronounced Boo-Hee).

  674.17 Sargasso] Seaweed, in the North Atlantic region known as the Sargasso Sea.

  674.19 Flying-Dutchman] The ghost ship that can never make port.

  674.31 shank-painters] Short ropes or chains holding anchors to the sides of a ship.

  677.15–17 By open ports . . . Plate Fleet] Portholes; plate means silver, and the Plate Fleet consists of several ships bound for England (including captured Spanish galleons manned by British crews). The English flagship carries treasure Spanish soldiers have seized in Central and South America. Historical battles like Admiral Robert Blake’s 1657 triumph over a Spanish Plate Fleet at Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands lie behind this poem.

  677.20 the red-cross Flag of the White.] The flagship of the fleet.

  678.12 Opher] Ophir, in India, the source of gold lavished upon Solomon by the Queen of Sheba (1 Kings 10).

  679.14 quaking Lima’s crosses rock] In one of the Peruvian earthquakes.

  680.19–20 sensitive needle . . . disturbed] The Spanish armor stowed below changes the needle of the flagship compass. In his journal at Thessalonica on December 7, 1856, Melville wrote: “Captain told a story about the heap of arms affecting the compass.”

  683.28 Oreads] Mountain nymphs, who normally help travelers.

  688.22 Gorgonian head] In Greek myth the Gorgon sisters had snakes for hair. In Mardi (ch. 18) the shark’s “Medusa locks” consist of remoras attached to its back.

  TIMOLEON ETC.

  699.1 Timoleon] Recalled by the Corinthians after exile for his participation in killing his brother, Timoleon (411–337 B.C.E.) in Sicily fought off forces from Carthage and ruled the island benevolently.

  699.29–700.7 Argos and Cleone . . . his shield] In his Lives, Plutarch describes the battle between the Corinthians and the troops of Argos and Cleone, and how Timoleon saved his older brother Timophanes by covering him with his shield.

  701.29–31 lictors . . . Furies’ rods.] The bodyguards carried fasces, bundles of rods.

  701.33 Ate] Goddess of mischief, who causes ruinous decisions and actions.

  703.6 Phocion] An honorable Athenaeum politician.

  706.1–2 ’Tis Vesta . . . delirious leap] Vesta is the Roman goddess of domesticity; Sappho, the poet of female homosexuality, was claimed (by men wishing to make her heterosexual) to have leaped from a cliff for love of a young ferryman.

  708.21 Albani’s porch] Villa Albani, grand mid-eighteenth-century villa near Rome pillaged during Napoleon’s invasion (visited by Melville).

  708.24 Thomas a’Kempis] German-Dutch monk and theologian (1380–1471), author of the Imitation of Christ.

  709.1 arm’d Virgin] Athena, goddess who burst from Zeus’s head already helmeted and with a sphere.

  716.16–17 “Though He . . . trust in Him.”] Job 13:15.

  717.3 burning boats in Caesar’s rear] Plutarch says that Caesar was forced to burn his ships at Alexandria to keep them from the enemy.

  718.4 C——’s Lament] In a draft of the poem, Melville used the name of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834).

  718.25 Shelley’s Vision] In “Foot-prints on the Sea-shore” Hawthorne pelts his shadow in the sea with pebbles, a sign of self-contempt (the opposite of “Self-reverence”). See Clarel 432.34–35.

  720.3 The Age of Antonines] Roman emperors, especially Antoninus Pius (reigned 138–161 C.E.) and Marcus Aurelius (reigned 161–180 C.E.).

  720.13 Solstice of Man] Period of becalmed seas, a week before and after the winter solstice when, it was believed, kingfishers laid their eggs on floating nests.

  721.27 Truce of God] In the eleventh and twelfth centuries the Catholic Church declared various truces during which warfare would be suspended.

  721.28 Calumet] Peace pipe.

  722.2 Raleigh’s find] Sir Walter Raleigh (1554?–1618), a promoter of Virginia settlement, did much to popularize tobacco in England.

  722.4 Gilead’s] “Is there no balm in Gilead?” (Jeremiah 8:22).

  722.15 Saint Martin’s summer] Indian summer.

  723.21 Jael the wiled one] See note 78.14.

  730.1–3 Spinoza . . . and you!] Spinoza (who never went to Greece) deludedly imagines a unity of the beauteous prostitute and the temple.

  730.5 The Frieze] The Parthenon frieze (“Elgin marbles”), probably seen by Melville.

  730.20 Ictinus] A designer of the Parthenon.

  731.6 Off Cape Colonna] Cape Colonna in Greece, so named for the one remaining column of the temple to Juno. The site of William Falconer’s 1762 poem The Shipwreck.

  733.21 Anacreon] Greek lyric poet of drinking songs.

  733.34 Phrygian cap] See note 338.23.

  733.37 Proserpine’s] Proserpina, vegetative goddess: abducted by Pluto to be Queen of the Underworld, she was allowed to return to earth in spring and summer.

  734.13 Hermes] A remarkable statue of a young man holding the infant Dionysus, discovered in May 1877, in the ruins of a Greek temple, to great international excitement.

  735.14 Theban flamens] Priests of Thebes, in Egypt, where Luxor is now.

  736.6 Grampians] Mountain range in Scotland.

  736.21 You—turn the cheek] Jesus’s advice (Matthew 5:39).

  738.8 Kaf] See note 53.8.

  738.9 Araxes] River running from Turkey into Iran.

  WEEDS AND WILDINGS CHIEFLY: WITH A ROSE OR TWO

  744.29 “melting mood”] In Othello’s last speech his eyes drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees drop their medicinable gum.

  746.14 dibbling] Poking a hole in soil with a pointed tool with a curved handle.

  747.19 mouse, and mole] In John Webster’s The White Devil (1612) the “ant, the field mouse and the mole” (V.iv.109) are to rear hillocks to keep a dead body warm.

  750.7 spars] Bright crystalline mineral, easily cleaved into facets.

  753.30 Oberon’s clan] Oberon, the king of the fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

  757.4 Keats, stabbed by the Muses] In his vision the poet hears the goddess reject the common accusation that the critics killed Keats.

  759.8–9 American Aloe on Exhibition] Melville’s Van Rensselaer cousins put their “Great American Aloe” on exhibition “in its centennial bloom” in September 1842, while Melville was in the Pacific. “All Albany” was “going to see it,” and New York City papers suggested that “people of floral taste” might go up to Albany to see it with its flower stem “22 feet high” containing “at least 2,000 flowers.” All the proceeds went to “that laudable charity, the Orphan Asylum.”

  764.22 betrayed purpose] An echo of “purposes betrayed” in Wordsworth’s “Malham Cove” (1819), a meditation on conceiving a complete work of art versus completing it and versus having it utterly decay after completion.

  767.25–27 Benjamin West . . . was Death.’] The American-born painter (1738–1820) took this subject from Revelation 6:8, in 1796 and again in 1817.

  769.10 Jefferson] Joseph Jefferson (1829–1905) played the young and the old Rip Van Winkle successfully for four decades, living to be filmed in the role.

  769.32 Boniface] Term for an innkeeper, from the character in George Farquhar’s The Beaux’ Stratagem (1707).

  771.4 bossom’s lawn] A cloth.

  774.3–4 Four words for text . . . The Rose of Sharon] Song of Solomon 2:1. “I am the
rose of Sharon.”

  774.10 metheglin] Mead, from a mix of fermented honey and water.

  775.24 Clement Drouon] Presumably a fictional invention by Melville.

  776.28 Shushan] Ancient city in Persia. See Clarel 623.22–624.4.

  778.3 Coming through the rye] Title of a 1782 poem (“Comin’ Thro’ the Rye”) by Robert Burns.

  778.30–31 Dives . . . Lazarus’] Luke 16:19–31.

  779.11–12 laved by streams . . . Pharpar . . . Abana] 2 Kings 5:12. See also note 619.9–24.

  782.17 Eve’s fair daughters] Genesis 6:2, 4.

  PARTHENOPE

  798.30–34 “The ladies . . . to please.”] W. D. Howells: “Our men read the newspapers, but our women read the books.”

  802.3 Almanac de Gotha] The dictionary of European nobility and royalty published in Germany from 1763 to 1944.

  803.9 Asaph the Singer] One of David’s singers before the Ark (1 Chronicles 15:17 and 16:5).

  804.2 Bomba] So called from his brutal bombardment of Messina in 1848, Ferdinand II (1810–1859), King of the Two Sicilies.

  804.28 King Fanny, Bomba’s heir] Bomba’s son, Francis II (reigned 1859–61).

  804.31 Bullock] So called from his exile on the Pampas of Uruguay, Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807–1882), the general who brought about the unification of Italy.

  806.29 Cade] Leader of an English rebellion in 1450 who in Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II, IV.ii, agrees with the follower who wants to “kill all the lawyers.”

  807.22 Arethusa] See note 339.30.

  822.6 Cid Campeadór] Eleventh-century Castilian warrior Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, a folk hero for his battles mainly against Moors.

  826.34 Ducit amor patriæ!] “Patriotism Leads Me.”

  826.35 General Worth’s monument] The monument to William Worth (1794–1849), Mexican-American War hero, is at 5th Avenue, Broadway, and 25th Street, near Melville’s house.

  827.17 Charles Fenno Hoffman] New York literary man (1806–1884), institutionalized as insane during the last three decades of his life.

  838.28 Thirty Thousand Virgins of Cologne] An inflated allusion to a medieval cult involving a possibly imaginary St. Ursula and virgins violated by the Huns; relics were shown in a church Melville apparently did not visit in Cologne.

  839.17 Peri] Fairy in Persian mythology, familiar from Thomas Moore’s Lalla Rookh.

  841.19 Silvio] Silvio Pellico (1789–1854), Italian dramatist and patriot, imprisoned for a decade by Austrian rulers, wrote My Prisons (1836), which helped the cause of unification in Italy.

  843.33 Rome’s . . . laureat] Virgil.

  843.34 England’s now] England’s laureate from 1850 to 1892, Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

  847.27 Queen Joanna] Queen Joanna of Naples (1326–1382), who had her husband, Andrew of Hungary, murdered.

  850.13 Carmagnole] Brutally exultant song popular during the French Revolution, accompanied by a dance.

  853.1 Metheglin] See note 774.10.

  UNCOLLECTED POETRY AND PROSE-AND-VERSE

  870.9 Osiris] Egyptian god of the afterlife and rebirth.

  870.12 Thotmes] Thothmes III, Pharaoh who was a great military leader in the fifteenth century B.C.E.

  870.24–27 Here . . . Fat Jack was one] In Henry IV, Part I, II.iv, Falstaff plays Hal’s father, then they switch roles; as the king, Hal promises to banish “plump jack.”

  873.8–10 Falernian fellows . . . Hafiz . . . Horace . . . Beranger] Falernian wine was renowned in ancient Rome. All three poets celebrated alcohol.

  874.20 Take a reef] Reduce the size of a sail.

  875.3 genius, turned to sordid ends] Compare Clarel 247.5–247.9.

  875.16 Gold was none for Danæ’s shower] The transcription of the manuscript here is correct but no one has explained Danæ without a shower of gold.

  876.10 mattock heavier than the hoe] For grave-digging.

  879.6 All smiles at last] Echo of Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” (1842).

  879.13 even] Level.

  879.17 life-thong] Sort of rope that strangles life.

  880.23–26 Pish! . . . spotless humans, we!] In the Charles Cotton translation, Montaigne (in “Apology of Raymond Sebond”) asks, “When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime to her more than she is to me?”

  881.7 free robe and vest] That is, free of robe and vest.

  881.10 Ancient of Days] In the prophet Daniel’s “dream and visions” four gigantic, diversely shaped, prehistoric beasts come up from the sea and establish their power, only to have their thrones “cast down” as God (“the Ancient of days”) sits, his garment “white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire” (Daniel 7:9).

  881.11 Man of the Cave of Engihoul] In 1831, a paleontologist found in a cave in Belgium human bones along with bones from now-extinct animals. In The Geological Evidences of the Antiquity of Man (1863), Sir Charles Lyell discussed whether the bones of man and animals could have been deposited at different epochs. The Appleton editions of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species came out in February 1860 and The Descent of Man in April 1871.

  881.17 Not older Cuvier’s mastodon] That is, one hypothesis is that Cuvier’s mastodon was contemporaneous with or younger than the man in the cave.

  881.21–23 Thule’s king . . . Wetterhorn] The man of the cave claims to remember when the king of the ultimate northern regions travelled by sleigh (drawn by a possibly extinct breed of reindeer—such as paleontologists were finding?) from the Pole to the top of the lofty Wetterhorn in Switzerland over waters still frozen in May—a flooded continent. The tale of St. Nicholas’s Christmas journey dates only from the popularity of Clement Moore’s poem (commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas”), after the late 1830s.

  881.29 do-do tracks] Footmarks of the recently extinct dodo of the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius: the man of Engihoul broods on extinctions dating long before the time of the Greek Chronos (the personification of Time).

  882.6 From Moses knocks under the stool.] That is, knocks the stool from under Moses—wiping aside the Hebrew myths and history.

  882.7 In bas relief . . . cracked decree!] The man of bone has shown prehistoric creatures in bas relief (as they were being excavated from cave floors), but the greater Barnum show was re-created in the mid-1850s in a Victorian Jurassic Park in Crystal Palace Park, the Megalosaurus and other prehistoric creatures standing or part submerged, full size (to the best of current scientific estimation).

  882.19 quiz] Tease, mock.

  882.31 Buss me] Kiss me (line spoken by the man of bone).

  882.33–34 Joe Smith . . . Joves Three . . . Jos . . . great Mahone] Joseph Smith, Jr. (1805–1844), the founder of Mormonism; the three Joves, Roman deities (as a Victorian translation of Cicero’s The Nature of the Gods says, “Your theologians . . . and authors on unknown antiquity, say that in the universe there are three Joves”); Jos (or Joss), Chinese god worshipped in the form of an idol; Mahone: a slurring way of referring to Mohammet.

  883.1 Ducalion’s day] Deucalion, the Greek parallel to Noah.

  883.2 Pliocene] The most recent geological epoch of three that Lyell introduces at the outset of his Antiquities.

  883.3 Ens] Latin for “entity,” “being,” as in Emerson’s Nature: “Every such truth is the absolute Ens seen from one side. But it has innumerable sides.”

  883.10 the Grand Pan-Jam] The Grand Panjandrum, invented in the 1700s in a passage to test an actor’s memory, by Melville’s time applied to spectacular public displays. Here, the whole kit and caboodle of religion, from homegrown American Mormonism to Joss in Ch
ina and Mohammedanism.

  886.27 Artemis] Greek equivalent of Diana, goddess of the hunt.

  887.28–30 Sesostris’s . . . Isis . . . Watts] The Pharaoh Sesostris (known in the form of a ruined colossal statue); Isis, Egyptian goddess, believed to help the dead enter the afterlife; James Watt (1736–1819), Scottish inventor whose 1769 steam engine was crucial to the Industrial Revolution.

  Index of Titles and First Lines

  A note about the index: The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the hardcover edition. For the locations of an entry, use your reading system’s search function.

  About the Shark, phlegmatical one, 688

  Abreast through town by Nile they go, 870

  Abrupt the supernatural Cross, 734

  A circumambient spell it is, 729

  A crescent bow—a quiver thrown, 886

  Adieu, 904

  Admiral of the White, The, 865

  Adore the Roses; nor delay, 775

  Adown the Dolorosa Lane, 289

  A dreadful glory lights an earnest end, 876

  Æolian Harp At the Surf Inn, The, 684

  Afar they fell. It was the zone, 96

  After long wars when comes release, 721

  Afternoon in Naples in the Time of Bomba, An, 833

  After the Pleasure Party, 705

  Age of the Antonines, The, 720

  Ah, wherefore, lonely, to and fro, 895

  A hill there is that laves its feet, 726

  A kindling impulse seized the host, 54

  All dripping in tangles green, 688

  All feeling hearts must feel for him, 83

  Aloft he guards the starry folds, 72

  Aloof they crown the foreland lone, 731

  Always with us! 752

  Ambuscade, The, 771

  America, 93

  American Aloe on Exhibition, The, 759

  A moonless night—a friendly one, 46

  Amoroso, 771

  Amulets gemmed, to Miriam dear, 712

  Apathy and Enthusiasm, 13

  Apparition, The [from BATTLE-PIECES], 90