Alfred, Lord Tennyson - Delphi Poets Series

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Alfred, Lord Tennyson - Delphi Poets Series Page 14

by Lord Tennyson Alfred


  And answers to his mother’s calls

  From the flower’d furrow. In a time,

  Of which he wots not, run short pains

  Through his warm heart; and then, from whence

  He knows not, on his light there falls

  A shadow; and his native slope,

  Where he was wont to leap and climb,

  Floats from his sick and filmed eyes,

  And something in the darkness draws

  His forehead earthward, and he dies.

  Shall man live thus, in joy and hope

  As a young lamb, who cannot dream,

  Living, but that he shall live on?

  Shall we not look into the laws

  Of life and death, and things that seem,

  And things that be, and analyse

  Our double nature, and compare

  All creeds till we have found the one,

  If one there be?” Ay me! I fear

  All may not doubt, but everywhere

  Some must clasp Idols. Yet, my God,

  Whom call I Idol? Let thy dove

  Shadow me over, and my sins

  Be unremembered, and thy love

  Enlighten me. Oh teach me yet

  Somewhat before the heavy clod

  Weighs on me, and the busy fret

  Of that sharpheaded worm begins

  In the gross blackness underneath.

  O weary life! O weary death!

  O spirit and heart made desolate!

  O damnéd vacillating state!

  The Burial of Love

  His eyes in eclipse,

  Pale cold his lips,

  The light of his hopes unfed,

  Mute his tongue,

  His bow unstrung

  With the tears he hath shed,

  Backward drooping his graceful head.

  Love is dead;

  His last arrow sped;

  He hath not another dart;

  Go — carry him to his dark deathbed;

  Bury him in the cold, cold heart —

  Love is dead.

  Oh, truest love! art thou forlorn,

  And unrevenged? Thy pleasant wiles

  Forgotten, and thine innocent joy?

  Shall hollow-hearted apathy,

  The cruellest form of perfect scorn,

  With langour of most hateful smiles,

  For ever write

  In the weathered light

  Of the tearless eye

  An epitaph that all may spy?

  No! sooner she herself shall die.

  For her the showers shall not fall,

  Nor the round sun that shineth to all;

  Her light shall into darkness change;

  For her the green grass shall not spring,

  Nor the rivers flow, nor the sweet birds sing,

  Till Love have his full revenge.

  To ——

  Sainted Juliet! dearest name!

  If to love be life alone,

  Divinest Juliet,

  I love thee, and live; and yet

  Love unreturned is like the fragrant flame

  Folding the slaughter of the sacrifice

  Offered to Gods upon an altarthrone;

  My heart is lighted at thine eyes,

  Changed into fire, and blown about with sighs.

  Song The Owl

  First printed in 1830.

  I

  When cats run home and light is come,

  And dew is cold upon the ground,

  And the far-off stream is dumb,

  And the whirring sail goes round,

  And the whirring sail goes round;

  Alone and warming his five wits,

  The white owl in the belfry sits.

  II

  When merry milkmaids click the latch,

  And rarely smells the new-mown hay,

  And the cock hath sung beneath the thatch

  Twice or thrice his roundelay,

  Twice or thrice his roundelay;

  Alone and warming his five wits,

  The white owl in the belfry sits.

  Second Song To the Same

  First printed in 1830.

  I

  Thy tuwhits are lull’d I wot,

  Thy tuwhoos of yesternight,

  Which upon the dark afloat,

  So took echo with delight,

  So took echo with delight,

  That her voice untuneful grown,

  Wears all day a fainter tone.

  II

  I would mock thy chaunt anew;

  But I cannot mimick it;

  Not a whit of thy tuwhoo,

  Thee to woo to thy tuwhit,

  Thee to woo to thy tuwhit,

  With a lengthen’d loud halloo,

  Tuwhoo, tuwhit, tuwhit, tuwhoo-o-o.

  Recollections of the Arabian Nights

  First printed in 1830.

  With this poem should be compared the description of Harun al Rashid’s Garden of Gladness in the story of Nur-al-din Ali and the damsel Anis al Talis in the Thirty-Sixth Night. The style appears to have been modelled on Coleridge’s Kubla Khan and Lewti, and the influence of Coleridge is very perceptible throughout the poem.

  When the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free

  In the silken sail of infancy,

  The tide of time flow’d back with me,

  The forward-flowing tide of time;

  And many a sheeny summer-morn,

  Adown the Tigris I was borne,

  By Bagdat’s shrines of fretted gold,

  High-walled gardens green and old;

  True Mussulman was I and sworn,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Anight my shallop, rustling thro’

  The low and bloomed foliage, drove

  The fragrant, glistening deeps, and clove

  The citron-shadows in the blue:

  By garden porches on the brim,

  The costly doors flung open wide,

  Gold glittering thro’ lamplight dim,

  And broider’d sofas on each side:

  In sooth it was a goodly time,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Often, where clear-stemm’d platans guard

  The outlet, did I turn away

  The boat-head down a broad canal

  From the main river sluiced, where all

  The sloping of the moon-lit sward

  Was damask-work, and deep inlay

  Of braided blooms unmown, which crept

  Adown to where the waters slept.

  A goodly place, a goodly time,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  A motion from the river won

  Ridged the smooth level, bearing on

  My shallop thro’ the star-strown calm,

  Until another night in night

  I enter’d, from the clearer light,

  Imbower’d vaults of pillar’d palm,

  Imprisoning sweets, which, as they clomb

  Heavenward, were stay’d beneath the dome

  Of hollow boughs. A goodly time,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Still onward; and the clear canal

  Is rounded to as clear a lake.

  From the green rivage many a fall

  Of diamond rillets musical,

  Thro’ little crystal arches low

  Down from the central fountain’s flow

  Fall’n silver-chiming, seem’d to shake

  The sparkling flints beneath the prow.

  A goodly place, a goodly time,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Above thro’ many a bowery turn

  A walk with vary-colour’d shells

  Wander’d engrain’d. On either side

  All round about the fragrant marge

  From fluted vase, and br
azen urn

  In order, eastern flowers large,

  Some dropping low their crimson bells

  Half-closed, and others studded wide

  With disks and tiars, fed the time

  With odour in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Far off, and where the lemon-grove

  In closest coverture upsprung,

  The living airs of middle night

  Died round the bulbul as he sung;

  Not he: but something which possess’d

  The darkness of the world, delight,

  Life, anguish, death, immortal love,

  Ceasing not, mingled, unrepress’d.

  Apart from place, withholding time,

  But flattering the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Black the garden-bowers and grots

  Slumber’d: the solemn palms were ranged

  Above, unwoo’d of summer wind:

  A sudden splendour from behind

  Flush’d all the leaves with rich gold-green,

  And, flowing rapidly between

  Their interspaces, counterchanged

  The level lake with diamond-plots

  Of dark and bright. A lovely time,

  For it was in the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Dark-blue the deep sphere overhead,

  Distinct with vivid stars inlaid,

  Grew darker from that under-flame:

  So, leaping lightly from the boat,

  With silver anchor left afloat,

  In marvel whence that glory came

  Upon me, as in sleep I sank

  In cool soft turf upon the bank,

  Entranced with that place and time,

  So worthy of the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Thence thro’ the garden I was drawn

  A realm of pleasance, many a mound,

  And many a shadow-chequer’d lawn

  Full of the city’s stilly sound,

  And deep myrrh-thickets blowing round

  The stately cedar, tamarisks,

  Thick rosaries of scented thorn,

  Tall orient shrubs, and obelisks

  Graven with emblems of the time,

  In honour of the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  With dazed vision unawares

  From the long alley’s latticed shade

  Emerged, I came upon the great

  Pavilion of the Caliphat.

  Right to the carven cedarn doors,

  Flung inward over spangled floors,

  Broad-based flights of marble stairs

  Ran up with golden balustrade,

  After the fashion of the time,

  And humour of the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  The fourscore windows all alight

  As with the quintessence of flame,

  A million tapers flaring bright

  From twisted silvers look’d to shame

  The hollow-vaulted dark, and stream’d

  Upon the mooned domes aloof

  In inmost Bagdat, till there seem’d

  Hundreds of crescents on the roof

  Of night new-risen, that marvellous time,

  To celebrate the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Then stole I up, and trancedly

  Gazed on the Persian girl alone,

  Serene with argent-lidded eyes

  Amorous, and lashes like to rays

  Of darkness, and a brow of pearl

  Tressed with redolent ebony,

  In many a dark delicious curl,

  Flowing beneath her rose-hued zone;

  The sweetest lady of the time,

  Well worthy of the golden prime

  Of good Haroun Alraschid.

  Six columns, three on either side,

  Pure silver, underpropt a rich

  Throne of the massive ore, from which

  Down-droop’d, in many a floating fold,

  Engarlanded and diaper’d

  With inwrought flowers, a cloth of gold.

  Thereon, his deep eye laughter-stirr’d

  With merriment of kingly pride,

  Sole star of all that place and time,

  I saw him in his golden prime,

  THE GOOD HAROUN ALRASCHID!

  Ode to Memory

  First printed in 1830.

  After the title in 1830 ed. is “Written very early in life”. The influence most perceptible in this poem is plainly Coleridge, on whose Songs of the Pixies it seems to have been modelled. Tennyson considered it, and no wonder, as one of the very best of “his early and peculiarly concentrated Nature-poems”. See Life, i., 27. It is full of vivid and accurate pictures of his Lincolnshire home and haunts. See Life, i., 25-48, passim.

  I

  Thou who stealest fire,

  From the fountains of the past,

  To glorify the present; oh, haste,

  Visit my low desire!

  Strengthen me, enlighten me!

  I faint in this obscurity,

  Thou dewy dawn of memory.

  II

  Come not as thou camest of late,

  Flinging the gloom of yesternight

  On the white day; but robed in soften’d light

  Of orient state.

  Whilome thou camest with the morning mist,

  Even as a maid, whose stately brow

  The dew-impearled winds of dawn have kiss’d,

  When she, as thou,

  Stays on her floating locks the lovely freight

  Of overflowing blooms, and earliest shoots

  Of orient green, giving safe pledge of fruits,

  Which in wintertide shall star

  The black earth with brilliance rare.

  III

  Whilome thou camest with the morning mist.

  And with the evening cloud,

  Showering thy gleaned wealth into my open breast,

  (Those peerless flowers which in the rudest wind

  Never grow sere,

  When rooted in the garden of the mind,

  Because they are the earliest of the year).

  Nor was the night thy shroud.

  In sweet dreams softer than unbroken rest

  Thou leddest by the hand thine infant Hope.

  The eddying of her garments caught from thee

  The light of thy great presence; and the cope

  Of the half-attain’d futurity,

  Though deep not fathomless,

  Was cloven with the million stars which tremble

  O’er the deep mind of dauntless infancy.

  Small thought was there of life’s distress;

  For sure she deem’d no mist of earth could dull

  Those spirit-thrilling eyes so keen and beautiful:

  Sure she was nigher to heaven’s spheres,

  Listening the lordly music flowing from

  The illimitable years.

  O strengthen me, enlighten me!

  I faint in this obscurity,

  Thou dewy dawn of memory.

  IV

  Come forth I charge thee, arise,

  Thou of the many tongues, the myriad eyes!

  Thou comest not with shows of flaunting vines

  Unto mine inner eye,

  Divinest Memory!

  Thou wert not nursed by the waterfall

  Which ever sounds and shines

  A pillar of white light upon the wall

  Of purple cliffs, aloof descried:

  Come from the woods that belt the grey hill-side,

  The seven elms, the poplars four

  That stand beside my father’s door,

  And chiefly from the brook that loves

  To purl o’er matted cress and ribbed sand,

  Or dimple in the dark of rushy coves,

  Drawing into his narrow earthen urn,

  In every elbow and turn,

  The filte
r’d tribute of the rough woodland.

  O! hither lead thy feet!

  Pour round mine ears the livelong bleat

  Of the thick-fleeced sheep from wattled folds,

  Upon the ridged wolds,

  When the first matin-song hath waken’d loud

  Over the dark dewy earth forlorn,

  What time the amber morn

  Forth gushes from beneath a low-hung cloud.

  V

  Large dowries doth the raptured eye

  To the young spirit present

  When first she is wed;

  And like a bride of old

  In triumph led,

  With music and sweet showers

  Of festal flowers,

  Unto the dwelling she must sway.

  Well hast thou done, great artist Memory,

  In setting round thy first experiment

  With royal frame-work of wrought gold;

  Needs must thou dearly love thy first essay,

  And foremost in thy various gallery

  Place it, where sweetest sunlight falls

  Upon the storied walls;

  For the discovery

  And newness of thine art so pleased thee,

  That all which thou hast drawn of fairest

  Or boldest since, but lightly weighs

  With thee unto the love thou bearest

  The first-born of thy genius.

  Artist-like,

  Ever retiring thou dost gaze

  On the prime labour of thine early days:

  No matter what the sketch might be;

  Whether the high field on the bushless Pike,

  Or even a sand-built ridge

  Of heaped hills that mound the sea,

  Overblown with murmurs harsh,

  Or even a lowly cottage whence we see

  Stretch’d wide and wild the waste enormous marsh,

  Where from the frequent bridge,

  Like emblems of infinity,

  The trenched waters run from sky to sky;

  Or a garden bower’d close

  With plaited alleys of the trailing rose,

  Long alleys falling down to twilight grots,

  Or opening upon level plots

  Of crowned lilies, standing near

  Purple-spiked lavender:

  Whither in after life retired

  From brawling storms,

  From weary wind,

  With youthful fancy reinspired,

  We may hold converse with all forms

  Of the many-sided mind,

  And those whom passion hath not blinded,

  Subtle-thoughted, myriad-minded.

  My friend, with you to live alone,

  Were how much better than to own

  A crown, a sceptre, and a throne!

  O strengthen, enlighten me!

  I faint in this obscurity,

  Thou dewy dawn of memory.

  Song “I’the glooming light...”

  I

  I’ the glooming light

  Of middle night

  So cold and white,

  Worn Sorrow sits by the moaning wave;

 

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