by Oscar Wilde
Magdalen College, Oxford
TRISTITIAE
1
O well for him who lives at ease
With garnered gold in wide domain,
Nor heeds the splashing of the rain,
The crashing down of forest trees.
O well for him who ne’er hath known
The travail of the hungry years,
A father grey with grief and tears,
A mother weeping all alone.
But well for him whose foot hath trod
The weary road of toil and strife,
Yet from the sorrows of his life
Builds ladders to be nearer God.
THE TRUE KNOWLEDGE
1
Thou knowest all; I seek in vain
What lands to till or sow with seed –
The land is black with briar and weed,
Nor cares for falling tears or rain.
Thou knowest all; I sit and wait
With blinded eyes and hands that fail,
Till the last lifting of the veil
And the first opening of the gate.
Thou knowest all; I cannot see.
I trust I shall not live in vain,
I know that we shall meet again
In some divine eternity.
HEART’S YEARNINGS
2
Surely to me the world is all too drear,
To shape my sorrow to a tuneful strain,
It is enough for wearied ears to hear
The Passion-Music of a fevered brain,
Or low complainings of a heart’s pain.
My saddened soul is out of tune with time,
Nor have I care to set the crooked straight,
Or win green laurels for some pleasant rhyme,
Only with tired eyes I sit and wait,
Until the opening of the Future’s Mystic Gate.
I am so tired of all the busy throng
That chirp and chatter in the noisy street,
That I would sit alone and sing no song
But listen for the coming of Love’s feet.
Love is a pleasant messenger to greet.
O Love come close before the hateful day,
And tarry not until the night is dead,
O Love come quickly, for although one pray,
What has God ever given in thy stead
But dust and ashes for the head?
Strain, strain O longing eyes till Love is near;
O Heart be ready for his entering thee,
O Breaking Heart be free from doubt and fear,
For when Love comes he cometh gloriously,
And entering love is very fair to see.
Peace, Peace O breaking heart, Love comes apace,
And surely great delight and gladness brings,
Now look at last upon his shining face,
And listen to the flying of his wings
And the sweet voice of Love that sings.
O pale moon shining fair and clear
Between the apple-blossoms white,
That cluster round my window here,
Why does Love tarry in his flight
And not come near for my heart’s delight –
I only hear the sighing of the breeze
That makes complaint in a sweet undertune,
I only see the blossom-laden trees
Splintering the arrows of the golden moon,
That turns black night into the burnished noon.
Magdalen College, Oxford
THE LITTLE SHIP
Have your forgotten the ship love
I made as a childish toy,
When you were a little girl love,
And I was a little boy?
Ah! never in all the fleet love
Such a beautiful ship was seen,
For the sides were painted blue love
And the deck was yellow and green.
I carved a wonderful mast love
From my Father’s Sunday stick,
You cut up your one good dress love
That the sail should be of silk.
And I launched it on the pond love
And I called it after you,
And for the want of the bottle of wine love
We christened it with the dew.
And we put your doll on board love
With a cargo of chocolate cream,
But the little ship struck on a cork love
And the doll went down with a scream!
It is forty years since then love
And your hair is silver grey,
And we sit in our old armchairs love
And we watch our children play.
And I have a wooden leg love
And the title of K. C. B.
For bringing Her Majesty’s Fleet love
Over the stormy sea.
But I’ve never forgotten the ship love
I made as a childish toy
When you were a little girl love
And I was a sailor boy.
ΘPHNΩIΔIA1
Song sung by the captive women of Troy on the beach at Aulis, while the Achaeans were there storm-bound through the wrath of dishonoured Achilles, and waiting for a fair wind to bring them home.2
ΣTPOΦH3
O fair wind blowing from the sea!
Who through the dark and mist dost guide
The ships that on the billows ride,
Unto what land, ah, misery!
Shall I be borne, across what stormy wave,
Or to whose house a purchased slave?
O sea-wind blowing fair and fast
Is it unto the Dorian strand,
Or to those far and fabled shore,
Where great Apidanus outpours
His streams upon the fertile land,
Or shall I tread the Phthian sand,
Borne by the swift breath of the blast?
ANTIΣTPOΦH1
O blowing wind! You bring my sorrow near,
For surely borne with splashing of the oar,
And hidden in some galley-prison drear
I shall be led unto that distant shore
Where the tall palm-tree first took root, and made,
With clustering laurel leaves, a pleasant shade
For Leto when with travail great she bore
A god and goddess in Love’s bitter fight
Her body’s anguish, and her soul’s delight.
It may be in Delos,
Encircled of seas,
I shall sing with some maids
From the Cyclades,
Or Artemis goddess
And queen and maiden,
Sing of the gold
In her hair heavy-laden.
Sing of her hunting,
Her arrows and bow,
And in singing find solace
From weeping and woe.
ΣTPOΦH B
Or it may be my bitter doom
To stand a handmaid at the loom,
In distant Athens of supreme renown;
And weave some wondrous tapestry,
Or work in bright embroidery,
Upon the crocus flowered robe and saffron-coloured gown,
The flying horses wrought in gold,
The silver chariot onward rolled
That bears Athena through the Town;
Or the warring giants that strove to climb
From earth to heaven to reign as kings,
And Zeus the conquering son of Time
Borne on the hurricane’s eagle wings;
And the lightning flame and the bolts that fell
From the risen cloud at the god’s behest,
And hurled the rebels to darkness of hell,
To a sleep without slumber or waking or rest.
ANTIΣTPOΦH B
Alas! Our children’s sorrow, and their pain In slavery.
Alas! Our warrior sires nobly slain For liberty.
Alas! Our country’s glory, and the name Of Troy’s fair town;
By the
lances and the fighting and the flame Tall Troy is down.
I shall pass with my soul over-laden,
To a land far away and unseen,
For Asia is slave and handmaiden,
Europa is Mistress and Queen.
Without love, or love’s holiest treasure,
I shall pass into Hades abhorred,
To the grave as my chamber of pleasure,
To death as my Lover and Lord.
LOTUS LAND
The sultry noon is amorous for rain;
The golden bee, the lily’s paramour,
Sleeps in the lily-bell, which doth allure
And bind its lovers with a honied chain;
How still it is! no passionate note of pain
Comes from the tawny songstress of the brake,
And in the polished mirror of the lake
My purple mountains see themselves again.
O sad, and sweet, and silent! surely here
A man might dwell apart from troublous fear,
Watching the bounteous seasons as they go
From lusty spring to winter; – Yet you say
That there is War in Europe on this day?
Red War and Ravenous? Can this be so!
Illaunroe
DÉSESPOIR
The seasons send their ruin as they go,
For in the spring the narciss shows its head
Nor withers till the rose has flamed to red,
And in the autumn purple violets blow,
And the slim crocus stirs the winter snow;
Wherefore yon leafless trees will bloom again
And this grey land grow green with summer rain
And send up cowslips for some boy to mow.
But what of life whose bitter hungry sea
Flows at our heels, and gloom of sunless night
Covers the days which never more return?
Ambition, love and all the thoughts that burn
We lose too soon, and only find delight
In withered husks of some dead memory.
LOTUS LEAVES
1
There is no peace beneath the noon.
Ah! In those meadows is there peace
Where, girdled with a silver fleece,
As a bright shepherd, strays the moon?
Queen of the gardens of the sky,
Where stars like lilies, white and fair,
Shine through the mists of frosty air,
Oh, tarry, for the dawn is nigh!
Oh, tarry, for the envious day
Stretches long hands to catch thy feet,
Alas! But thou art over-fleet,
Alas! I know thou wilt not stay.
Up sprang the sun to run his race,
The breeze blew fair on meadow and lea;
But in the west I seemed to see
The likeness of a human face.
A linnet on the hawthorn spray
Sang of the glories of the spring,
And made the flow’ring copses ring
With gladness for the new-born day.
A lark from out the grass I trod
Flew wildly, and was lost to view
In the great seamless veil of blue
That hangs before the face of God.
The willow whispered overhead
That death is but a newer life,
And that with idle words of strife
We bring dishonour on the dead.
I took a branch from off the tree,
And hawthorn-blossoms drenched with dew,
I bound them with a sprig of yew,
And made a garland fair to see.
I laid the flowers where He lies,
(Warm leaves and flowers on the stone);
What joy I had to sit alone
Till evening broke on tired eyes:
Till all the shifting clouds had spun
A robe of gold for God to wear,
And into seas of purple air
Sank the bright galley of the sun.
Shall I be gladdened for the day,
And let my inner heart be stirred
By murmuring tree or song of bird,
And sorrow at the wild wind’s play?
Not so: such idle dreams belong
To souls of lesser depth than mine;
I feel that I am half divine;
I know that I am great and strong.
I know that every forest tree
By labour rises from the root;
I know that none shall gather fruit
By sailing on the barren sea.
UNTITLED
1
O loved one lying far away
Beyond the reach of human moan,
Can coffin board and heavy stone
Turn godlike man to senseless clay?
Or hast thou eyes to see the light
And feeling quick with joy and pain?
Alas! I think a lesser gain
Is mine, if thou can’st see me right.
Alas! how mean we must appear
When looked on by the holy dead!
I trust the glory round thy head
Hast kept thine eyes from seeing clear.
2
For in my heart these fancies rise
That I the singer of this song
Am weak where thou didst think me strong
And foolish where you feigned me wise.
Now that I lack thy helping hand
I shift with every changing creed,
No better than a broken reed
Less stable than the shifting sand.
Less stable than the changing sea,
At every setting of the sun
I cry in vain, ‘What have I done
This day for immortality?’
A FRAGMENT FROM THE AGAMEMNON OF AESCHYLOS
(Lines 1140-1173)
The scene is the court-yard of the Palace at Argos. Agamemnon has already entered the House of Doom, and Clytemnestra has followed close on his heels. Cassandra is left alone upon the stage. The conscious terror of death and the burden of prophecy lie heavy upon her; terrible signs and visions greet her approach. She sees blood upon the lintel, and the smell of blood scares her, as some bird, from the door. The ghosts of the murdered children come to mourn with her. Her second sight pierces the Palace walls; she sees the fatal bath, the tramelling net, and the axe sharpened for her own ruin and her lord’s.
But not even in the hour of her last anguish is Apollo merciful; her warnings are unheeded, her prophetic utterances made mock of.
The orchestra is filled with a chorus of old men weak, foolish, irresolute. They do not believe the weird woman of mystery till the hour for help is past, and the cry of Agamemnon echoes from the house, ‘Oh me! I am stricken with a stroke of death.’
Chorus
Thy prophecies are but a lying tale,
For cruel gods have brought thee to this state,
And of thyself and thine own wretched fate
Sing you this song and these unhallowed lays,
Like the brown bird of grief insatiate
Crying for sorrow of its dreary days;
Crying for Itys, Itys, in the vale –
The nightingale! The nightingale!
Cassandra
Yet I would that to me they had given
The fate of that singer so clear,
Fleet wings to fly up unto heaven,
Away from all mourning and fear;
For ruin and slaughter await me – the cleaving with sword and the spear.
Chorus
Whence come these crowding fancies on thy brain,
Sent by some god it may be, yet for naught?
Why dost thou sing with evil-tongued refrain,
Moulding thy terrors to this hideous strain
With shrill, sad cries, as if by death distraught?
Why dost thou tread that path of prophecy,
Where, upon either hand,
Landmarks for ever stand
With horrid legend f
or all men to see?
Cassandra
O bitter bridegroom who didst bear
Ruin to those that loved thee true!
O holy stream Scamander, where
With gentle nurturement I grew
In the first days, when life and love were new.
And now – and now – it seems that I must lie
In the dark land that never sees the sun;
Sing my sad songs of fruitless prophecy
By the black stream Cokytos that doth run
Through long, low hills of dreary Acheron.
Chorus
Ah, but thy word is clear!
Even a child among men,
Even a child might see
What is lying hidden here.
Ah! I am smitten deep
To the heart with a deadly blow
At the evil fate of the maid,
At the cry of her song of woe!
Sorrows for her to bear!
Wonders for me to hear!
