Selected Poems of Francis Thompson Part 6

We, therefore, with a sure instinctive mind, An equal s.p.a.ciousness of bondage find In confines far or near, of air or our own kind.

Our looks and longings, which affront the stars, Most richly bruised against their golden bars, Delighted captives of their flaming spears, Find a restraint restrainless which appears As that is, and so simply natural, In you;--the fair detention freedom call, And overscroll with fancies the loved prison-wall.

Such sweet captivity, and only such, In you, as in those golden bars, we touch!

Our gazes for sufficing limits know The firmament above, your face below; Our longings are contented with the skies, Contented with the heaven, and your eyes.

My restless wings, that beat the whole world through, Flag on the confines of the sun and you; And find the human pale remoter of the two.

AFTER HER GOING

The after-even! Ah, did I walk, Indeed, in her or even?

For nothing of me or around But absent She did leaven, Felt in my body as its soul, And in my soul its heaven.

"Ah me! my very flesh turns soul, Essenced," I sighed, "with bliss!"

And the blackbird held his lutany, All fragrant-through with bliss; And all things stilled were as a maid Sweet with a single kiss.

For grief of perfect fairness, eve Could nothing do but smile; The time was far too perfect fair, Being but for a while; And ah, in me, too happy grief Blinded herself with smile!

The sunset at its radiant heart Had somewhat unconfest: The bird was loath of speech, its song Half-refluent on its breast, And made melodious toyings with A note or two at best.

And she was gone, my sole, my Fair, Ah, sole my Fair, was gone!

Methinks, throughout the world 'twere right I had been sad alone; And yet, such sweet in all things' heart, And such sweet in my own!

Miscellaneous Poems

A FALLEN YEW

It seemed corrival of the world's great prime, Made to un-edge the scythe of Time, And last with stateliest rhyme.

No tender Dryad ever did indue That rigid chiton of rough yew, To fret her white flesh through:

But some G.o.d, like to those grim Asgard lords Who walk the fables of the hordes From Scandinavian fjords,

Upheaved its stubborn girth, and raised unriven, Against the whirl-blast and the levin, Defiant arms to Heaven.

When doom puffed out the stars, we might have said, It would decline its heavy head, And see the world to bed.

For this firm yew did from the va.s.sal leas, And rain and air, its tributaries, Its revenues increase,

And levy impost on the golden sun, Take the blind years as they might run, And no fate seek or shun.

But now our yew is strook, is fallen--yea Hacked like dull wood of every day To this and that, men say.

Never!--To Hades' shadowy s.h.i.+pyards gone, Dim barge of Dis, down Acheron It drops, or Lethe wan.

Stirred by its fall--poor destined bark of Dis!-- Along my soul a bruit there is Of echoing images,

Reverberations of mortality: Spelt backward from its death, to me Its life reads saddenedly.

Its breast was hollowed as the tooth of eld; And boys, there creeping unbeheld, A laughing moment dwelled.

Yet they, within its very heart so crept, Reached not the heart that courage kept With winds and years beswept.

And in its boughs did close and kindly nest The birds, as they within its breast, By all its leaves caressed.

But bird nor child might touch by any art Each other's or the tree's hid heart, A whole G.o.d's breadth apart;

The breadth of G.o.d, the breadth of death and life!

Even so, even so, in undreamed strife With pulseless Law, the wife,--

The sweetest wife on sweetest marriage-day,-- Their soul at grapple in mid-way, Sweet to her sweet may say:

"I take you to my inmost heart, my true!"

Ah, fool! but there is one heart you Shall never take him to!

The hold that falls not when the town is got, The heart's heart, whose immured plot Hath keys yourself keep not!

Its ports you cannot burst--you are withstood-- For him that to your listening blood Sends precepts as he would.

Its gates are deaf to Love, high summoner; Yea, Love's great warrant runs not there: You are your prisoner.

Yourself are with yourself the sole consortress In that unleaguerable fortress; It knows you not for portress.

Its keys are at the cincture hung of G.o.d; Its gates are trepidant to His nod; By Him its floors are trod.

And if His feet shall rock those floors in wrath, Or blest aspersion sleek His path, Is only choice it hath.

Yea, in that ultimate heart's occult abode To lie as in an oubliette of G.o.d; Or in a bower untrod,

Built by a secret Lover for His Spouse;-- Sole choice is this your life allows, Sad tree, whose peris.h.i.+ng boughs So few birds house!

THE HOUND OF HEAVEN

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days; I fled Him down the arches of the years; I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears I hid from Him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes I sped; And shot, precipitated, Adown t.i.tanic glooms of chasmed fears, From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.

But with unhurrying chase, And unperturbed pace, Deliberate speed, majestic instancy, They beat--and a Voice beat More instant than the Feet-- "All things betray thee, who betrayest Me."

I pleaded, outlaw-wise, By many a hearted cas.e.m.e.nt, curtained red, Trellised with intertwining charities; (For, though I knew His love Who followed, Yet was I sore adread Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside); But, if one little cas.e.m.e.nt parted wide, The gust of His approach would clash it to.

Fear wist not to evade, as Love wist to pursue.

Across the margent of the world I fled, And troubled the gold gateways of the stars, Smiting for shelter on their clanged bars; Fretted to dulcet jars And silvern chatter the pale ports o' the moon.

I said to dawn, Be sudden; to eve, Be soon; With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over From this tremendous Lover!

Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!