Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series

by Robert Browning

  “By using — letting have effect so much

  “Of hate as hides me from that whole of hate

  “Would take my life which I want and must have —

  “Just as I take from your excess of love

  “Enough to save my life with, all I need.

  “The Archbishop said to murder me were sin:

  “My leaving Guido were a kind of death

  “With no sin, — more death, he must answer for.

  “Hear now what death to him and life to you

  “I wish to pay and owe. Take me to Rome!

  “You go to Rome, the servant makes me hear.

  “Take me as you would take a dog, I think,

  “Masterless left for strangers to maltreat:

  “Take me home like that — leave me in the house

  “Where the father and the mother are; and soon

  “They’ll come to know and call me by my name,

  “Their child once more, since child I am, for all

  “They now forget me, which is the worst o’ the dream —

  “And the way to end dreams is to break them, stand,

  “Walk, go: then help me to stand, walk and go!

  “The Governor said the strong should help the weak:

  “You know how weak the strongest women are.

  “How could I find my way there by myself?

  “I cannot even call out, make them hear —

  “Just as in dreams: I have tried and proved the fact.

  “I have told this story and more to good great men,

  “The Archbishop and the Governor: they smiled.

  “‘Stop your mouth, fair one!’ — presently they frowned,

  “‘Get you gone, disengage you from our feet!’

  “I went in my despair to an old priest,

  “Only a friar, no great man like these two,

  “But good, the Augustinian, people name

  “Romano, — he confessed me two months since:

  “He fears God, why then needs he fear the world?

  “And when he questioned how it came about

  “That I was found in danger of a sin —

  “Despair of any help from providence, —

  “‘Since, though your husband outrage you,’ said he,

  “‘That is a case too common, the wives die

  “‘Or live, but do not sin so deep as this’ —

  “Then I told — what I never will tell you —

  “How, worse than husband’s hate, I had to bear

  “The love, — soliciting to shame called love, —

  “Of his brother, — the young idle priest i’ the house

  “With only the devil to meet there. ‘This is grave —

  “‘Yes we must interfere: I counsel, — write

  “‘To those who used to be your parents once,

  “‘Of dangers here, bid them convey you hence!’

  “‘But,’ said I, ‘when I neither read nor write?’

  “Then he took pity and promised ‘I will write.’

  “If he did so, — why, they are dumb or dead:

  “Either they give no credit to the tale,

  “Or else, wrapped wholly up in their own joy

  “Of such escape, they care not who cries, still

  “I’ the clutches. Anyhow, no word arrives.

  “All such extravagance and dreadfulness

  “Seems incident to dreaming, cured one way, —

  “Wake me! The letter I received this morn,

  “Said — if the woman spoke your very sense —

  “‘You would die for me:’ I can believe it now:

  “For now the dream gets to involve yourself.

  “First of all, you seemed wicked and not good,

  “In writing me those letters: you came in

  “Like a thief upon me. I this morning said

  “In my extremity, entreat the thief!

  “Try if he have in him no honest touch!

  “A thief might save me from a murderer.

  “‘Twas a thief said the last kind word to Christ:

  “Christ took the kindness and forgave the theft:

  “And so did I prepare what I now say.

  “But now, that you stand and I see your face,

  “Though you have never uttered word yet, — well, I know,

  “Here too has been dream-work, delusion too,

  “And that at no time, you with the eyes here,

  “Ever intended to do wrong by me,

  “Nor wrote such letters therefore. It is false,

  “And you are true, have been true, will be true.

  “To Rome then, — when is it you take me there?

  “Each minute lost is mortal. When? — I ask.”

  I answered, “It shall be when it can be.

  “I will go hence and do your pleasure, find

  “The sure and speedy means of travel, then

  “Come back and take you to your friends in Rome.

  “There wants a carriage, money and the rest, —

  “A day’s work by to-morrow at this time.

  “How shall I see you and assure escape?”

  She replied, “Pass, to-morrow at this hour.

  “If I am at the open window, well:

  “If I am absent, drop a handkerchief

  “And walk by! I shall see from where I watch,

  “And know that all is done. Return next eve,

  “And next, and so till we can meet and speak!”

  “To-morrow at this hour I pass,” said I.

  She was withdrawn.

  Here is another point

  I bid you pause at. When I told thus far,

  Someone said, subtly, “Here at least was found

  “Your confidence in error, — you perceived

  “The spirit of the letters, in a sort,

  “Had been the lady’s, if the body should be

  “Supplied by Guido: say, he forged them all!

  “Here was the unforged fact — she sent for you,

  “Spontaneously elected you to help,

  “ — What men call, loved you: Guido read her mind,

  “Gave it expression to assure the world

  “The case was just as he foresaw: he wrote,

  “She spoke.”

  Sirs, that first simile serves still, —

  That falsehood of a scorpion hatched, I say,

  Nowhere i’ the world but in Madonna’s mouth.

  Go on! Suppose, that falsehood foiled, next eve

  Pictured Madonna raised her painted hand,

  Fixed the face Rafael bent above the Babe,

  On my face as I flung me at her feet:

  Such miracle vouchsafed and manifest,

  Would that prove the first lying tale was true?

  Pompilia spoke, and I at once received,

  Accepted my own fact, my miracle

  Self-authorised and self-explained, — she chose

  To summon me and signify her choice.

  Afterward, — oh! I gave a passing glance

  To a certain ugly cloud-shape, goblin-shred

  Of hell-smoke hurrying past the splendid moon

  Out now to tolerate no darkness more,

  And saw right through the thing that tried to pass

  For truth and solid, not an empty lie:

  “So, he not only forged the words for her

  “But word for me, made letters he called mine:

  “What I sent, he retained, gave these in place,

  “All by the mistress-messenger! As I

  “Recognised her, at potency of truth,

  “So she, by the crystalline soul, knew me,

  “Never mistook the signs. Enough of this —

  “Let the wraith go to nothingness again,

  “Here is the orb, have only thought for her!”

  “Thought?” nay, Sirs, what shall follow was not thought:

  I have thought sometimes, and thought long and hard
.

  I have stood before, gone round a serious thing,

  Tasked my whole mind to touch and clasp it close,

  As I stretch forth my arm to touch this bar.

  God and man, and what duty I owe both, —

  I dare to say I have confronted these

  In thought: but no such faculty helped here.

  I put forth no thought, — powerless, all that night

  I paced the city: it was the first Spring.

  By the invasion I lay passive to,

  In rushed new things, the old were rapt away;

  Alike abolished — the imprisonment

  Of the outside air, the inside weight o’ the world

  That pulled me down. Death meant, to spurn the ground,

  Soar to the sky, — die well and you do that.

  The very immolation made the bliss;

  Death was the heart of life, and all the harm

  My folly had crouched to avoid, now proved a veil

  Hiding all gain my wisdom strove to grasp:

  As if the intense centre of the flame

  Should turn a heaven to that devoted fly

  Which hitherto, sophist alike and sage,

  Saint Thomas with his sober grey goose-quill,

  And sinner Plato by Cephisian reed,

  Would fain, pretending just the insect’s good,

  Whisk off, drive back, consign to shade again.

  Into another state, under new rule

  I knew myself was passing swift and sure;

  Whereof the initiatory pang approached,

  Felicitous annoy, as bitter-sweet

  As when the virgin-band, the victors chaste,

  Feel at the end the earthly garments drop,

  And rise with something of a rosy shame

  Into immortal nakedness: so I

  Lay, and let come the proper throe would thrill

  Into the ecstacy and outthrob pain.

  I’ the grey of dawn it was I found myself

  Facing the pillared front o’ the Pieve — mine,

  My church: it seemed to say for the first time

  “But am not I the Bride, the mystic love

  “O’ the Lamb, who took thy plighted troth, my priest,

  “To fold thy warm heart on my heart of stone

  “And freeze thee nor unfasten any more?

  “This is a fleshly woman, — let the free

  “Bestow their life-blood, thou art pulseless now!”

  See! Day by day I had risen and left this church

  At the signal waved me by some foolish fan,

  With half a curse and half a pitying smile

  For the monk I stumbled over in my haste,

  Prostrate and corpse-like at the altar-foot

  Intent on his corona: then the church

  Was ready with her quip, if word conduced,

  To quicken my pace nor stop for prating — ”There!

  “Be thankful you are no such ninny, go

  “Rather to teach a black-eyed novice cards

  “Than gabble Latin and protrude that nose

  “Smoothed to a sheep’s through no brains and much faith!”

  That sort of incentive! Now the church changed tone —

  Now, when I found out first that life and death

  Are means to an end, that passion uses both,

  Indisputably mistress of the man

  Whose form of worship is self-sacrifice —

  Now, from the stone lungs sighed the scrannel voice

  “Leave that passion, come be dead with me!”

  As if, i’ the fabled garden, I had gone

  On great adventure, plucked in ignorance

  Hedge-fruit, and feasted to satiety,

  Laughing at such high fame for hips and haws,

  And scorned the achievement: then come all at once

  O’ the prize o’ the place, the thing of perfect gold,

  The apple’s self: and, scarce my eye on that,

  Was ‘ware as well o’ the seven-fold dragon’s watch.

  Sirs, I obeyed. Obedience was too strange, —

  This new thing that had been struck into me

  By the look o’ the lady, — to dare disobey

  The first authoritative word. ‘Twas God’s.

  I had been lifted to the level of her,

  Could take such sounds into my sense. I said

  “We two are cognisant o’ the Master now;

  “It is she bids me bow the head: how true,

  “I am a priest! I see the function here;

  “I thought the other way self-sacrifice:

  “This is the true, seals up the perfect sum.

  “I pay it, sit down, silently obey.”

  So, I went home. Dawn broke, noon broadened, I

  I sat stone-still, let time run over me.

  The sun slanted into my room, had reached

  The west. I opened book, — Aquinas blazed

  With one black name only on the white page.

  I looked up, saw the sunset: vespers rang:

  “She counts the minutes till I keep my word

  “And come say all is ready. I am a priest

  “Duty to God is duty to her: I think

  “God, who created her, will save her too

  “Some new way, by one miracle the more,

  “Without me. Then, prayer may avail perhaps.”

  I went to my own place i’ the Pieve, read

  The office: I was back at home again

  Sitting i’ the dark. “Could she but know — but know

  “That, were there good in this distinct from God’s,

  “Really good as it reached her, though procured

  “By a sin of mine, — I should sin: God forgives.

  “She knows it is no fear withholds me: fear?

  “Of what? Suspense here is the terrible thing.

  “If she should, as she counts the minutes, come

  “On the fantastic notion that I fear

  “The world now, fear the Archbishop, fear perhaps

  “Count Guido, he who, having forged the lies,

  “May wait the work, attend the effect, — I fear

  “The sword of Guido! Let God see to that —

  “Hating lies, let not her believe a lie!”

  Again the morning found me. “I will work,

  “Tie down my foolish thoughts. Thank God so far!

  “I have saved her from a scandal, stopped the tongues

  “Had broken else into a cackle and hiss

  “Around the noble name. Duty is still

  “Wisdom: I have been wise.” So the day wore.

  At evening — ”But, achieving victory,

  “I must not blink the priest’s peculiar part,

  “Nor shrink to counsel, comfort: priest and friend —

  “How do we discontinue to be friends?

  “I will go minister, advise her seek

  “Help at the source, — above all, not despair:

  “There may be other happier help at hand.

  “I hope it, — wherefore then neglect to say?”

  There she stood — leaned there, for the second time,

  Over the terrace, looked at me, then spoke:

  “Why is it you have suffered me to stay

  “Breaking my heart two days more than was need?

  “Why delay help, your own heart yearns to give?

  “You are again here, in the self-same mind,

  “I see here, steadfast in the face of you, —

  “You grudge to do no one thing that I ask.

  “Why then is nothing done? You know my need.

  “Still, through God’s pity on me, there is time

  “And one day more: shall I be saved or no?”

  I answered — ”Lady, waste no thought, no word

  “Even to forgive me! Care for what I care —

  “Only! Now follow me as I were fate!

  “Leave this house in the dark to-morrow night,
<
br />   “Just before daybreak: — there’s new moon this eve —

  “It sets, and then begins the solid black.

  “Descend, proceed to the Torrione, step

  “Over the low dilapidated wall,

  “Take San Clemente, there’s no other gate

  “Unguarded at the hour: some paces thence

  “An inn stands; cross to it; I shall be there.”

  She answered, “If I can but find the way.

  “But I shall find it. Go now!”

  I did go,

  Took rapidly the route myself prescribed,

  Stopped at Torrione, climbed the ruined place,

  Proved that the gate was practicable, reached

  The inn, no eye, despite the dark, could miss,

  Knocked there and entered, made the host secure:

  “With Caponsacchi it is ask and have;

  “I know my betters. Are you bound for Rome?

  “I get swift horse and trusty man,” said he.

  Then I retraced my steps, was found once more

  In my own house for the last time: there lay

  The broad pale opened Summa. “Shut his book,

  “There’s other showing! ‘Twas a Thomas too

  “Obtained, — more favoured than his namesake here, —

  “A gift, tied faith fast, foiled the tug of doubt, —

  “Our Lady’s girdle; down he saw it drop

  “As she ascended into heaven, they say:

  “He kept that safe and bade all doubt adieu.

  “I too have seen a lady and hold a grace.”

  I know not how the night passed: morning broke:

  Presently came my servant. “Sir, this eve —

  “Do you forget?” I started. — ”How forget?

  “What is it you know?” — ”With due submission, Sir,

  “This being last Monday in the month but one

  “And a vigil, since to-morrow is Saint George,

  “And feast day, and moreover day for copes,

  “And Canon Conti now away a month,

  “And Canon Crispi sour because, forsooth,

  “You let him sulk in stall and bear the brunt

  “Of the octave. . . . Well, Sir, ‘tis important!”

  ”True!”

  “Hearken, I have to start for Rome this night.

  “No word, lest Crispi overboil and burst!

  “Provide me with a laic dress! Throw dust

  “I’ the Canon’s eye, stop his tongue’s scandal so!

  “See there’s a sword in case of accident.”

  I knew the knave, the knave knew me.

  And thus

  Through each familiar hindrance of the day

  Did I make steadily for its hour and end, —

  Felt time’s old barrier-growth of right and fit

  Give way through all its twines and let me go;

  Use and wont recognised the excepted man,