Browning's Shorter Poems Part 16

UP AT A VILLA--DOWN IN THE CITY

_(As distinguished by an Italian person of quality.)_

Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare, The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city square; Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there!

Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least! 4 There, the whole day long, one's life is a perfect feast; While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more than a beast.

Well now, look at our villa! stuck like the horn of a bull Just on a mountain edge as bare as the creature's skull, Save a mere s.h.a.g of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull!

--I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair's turned wool. 10

But the city, oh the city--the square with the houses! Why?

They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's something to take the eye!

Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry; You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who hurries by; Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the sun gets high; And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted properly.

What of a villa? Tho' winter be over in March, by rights, 'Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well off the heights: You've the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen steam and wheeze, And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint gray olive trees. 20

Is it better in May, I ask you? You've summer all at once; In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns, 'Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce risen three fingers well, The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows out its great red bell Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick and sell.

Is it ever hot in the square? There's a fountain to spout and splas.h.!.+

In the shade it sings and springs; in the s.h.i.+ne such foam-bows flash On the horses with curling fish-tails, that prance and paddle and pash Round the lady atop in her conch--fifty gazers do not abash, Tho' all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash. 30

All the year long at the villa, nothing to see though you linger, Except yon cypress that points like death's lean lifted forefinger.

Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i' the corn and mingle, Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle.

Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill, And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill.

Enough of the seasons,--I spare you the months of the fever and chill.

Ere you open your eyes in the city, the blessed church-bells begin: No sooner the bells leave off than the diligence rattles in: You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a pin. 40 By and by there's the travelling doctor gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth; Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the market beneath. 42 At the post-office such a scene-picture--the new play, piping hot!

And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves were shot.

Above it, behold the Archbishop's most fatherly of rebukes, And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some little new law of the Duke's!

Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend Don So-and-so, Who is Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarca, St. Jerome and Cicero, 48 "And moreover" (the sonnet goes rhyming), "the skirts of St. Paul has reached, 49 Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctuous than ever he preached." 50 Noon strikes,--here sweeps the procession! our Lady borne smiling and smart.

51 With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords stuck in her heart! 52 _Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-te-tootle_ the fife; No keeping one's haunches still: it's the greatest pleasure in life.

But bless you, it's dear--it's dear! fowls, wine, at double the rate.

They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what oil pays pa.s.sing the gate It's a horror to think of. And so, the villa for me, not the city!

Beggars can scarcely be choosers: but still--ah, the pity, the pity!

Look, two and two go the priests, then the monks with cowls and sandals, And the penitents dressed in white s.h.i.+rts, a-holding the yellow candles; 60 One, he carries a flag up straight, and another a cross with handles, And the Duke's guard brings up the rear, for the better prevention of scandals: _Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-te-tootle_ the fife.

Oh, a day in the city square, there is no such pleasure in life!

A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI'S

Oh Galuppi, Balda.s.saro, this is very sad to find! 1 I can hardly misconceive you; it would prove me deaf and blind; But altho' I take your meaning, 'tis with such a heavy mind!

Here you come with your old music, and here's all the good it brings.

What, they lived once thus at Venice where the merchants were the kings, Where St. Mark's is, where the Doges used to wed the sea with rings? 6

Ay, because the sea's the street there; and 'tis arched by ... what you call ... Shylock's bridge with houses on it, where they kept the carnival: 8 I was never out of England--it's as if I saw it all.

Did young people take their pleasure when the sea was warm in May? 10 b.a.l.l.s and masks begun at midnight, burning ever to mid-day, When they make up fresh adventures for the morrow, do you say?

Was a lady such a lady, cheeks so round and lips so red,-- On her neck the small face buoyant, like a bell-flower on its bed, O'er the breast's superb abundance where a man might base his head?

Well, and it was graceful of them: they'd break talk off and afford --She, to bite her mask's black velvet--he, to finger on his sword, While you sat and played Toccatas, stately at the clavichord? 18

What? Those lesser thirds so plaintive, sixths diminished sigh on sigh, 19 Told them something? Those suspensions, those solutions--"Must we die?" 20 Those commiserating sevenths--"Life might last! we can but try!" 21

"Were you happy?"--"Yes."--"And are you still as happy?"--"Yes. And you?"

--"Then, more kisses !"--"Did _I_ stop them, when, a million seemed so few?"

Hark, the dominant's persistence till it must be answered to!

So, an octave struck the answer. Oh, they praised you, I dare say!

"Brave Galuppi! that was music! good alike at grave and gay!

I can always leave off talking when I hear a master play!"

Then they left you for their pleasure: till in due time, one by one, Some with lives that came to nothing, some with deeds as well undone, Death, stepped tacitly and took them where they never see the sun. 30

But when I sit down to reason, think to take my stand nor swerve, While I triumph o'er a secret wrung from nature's close reserve, In you come with your cold music till I creep thro' every nerve.

Yes, you, like a ghostly cricket, creaking where a house was burned: "Dust and ashes, dead and done with, Venice spent what Venice earned.

The soul, doubtless, is immortal--where a soul can be discerned.

"Yours, for instance: you know physics, something of geology, Mathematics are your pastime; souls shall rise in their degree; b.u.t.terflies may dread extinction,--you'll not die, it cannot be! 39

"As for Venice and her people, merely born to bloom and drop, 40 Here on earth they bore their fruitage, mirth and folly were the crop: What of soul was left, I wonder, when the kissing had to stop?

"Dust and ashes!" So you creak it, and I want the heart to scold.

Dear dead women, with such hair, too--what's become of all the gold Used to hang and brush their bosoms? I feel chilly and grown old.

ABT VOGLER

(AFTER HE HAS BEEN EXTEMPORIZING UPON THE MUSICAL INSTRUMENT OF HIS INVENTION)

Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build, Bidding my organ obey, calling its keys to their work, Claiming each slave of the sound, at a touch, as when Solomon willed 3 Armies of angels that soar, legions of demons that lurk, Man, brute, reptile, fly,--alien of end and of aim, Adverse, each from the other heaven-high, h.e.l.l-deep removed,-- Should rush into sight at once as he named the ineffable Name, And pile him a palace straight, to pleasure the princess he loved! 8

Would it might tarry like his, the beautiful building of mine, This which my keys in a crowd pressed and importuned to raise! 10 Ah, one and all, how they helped, would dispart now and now combine, Zealous to hasten the work, heighten their master his praise!

And one would bury his brow with a blind plunge down to h.e.l.l, Burrow awhile and build, broad on the roots of things, Then up again swim into sight, having based me my palace well, Founded it, fearless of flame, flat on the nether springs.

And another would mount and march, like the excellent minion he was, Ay, another and yet another, one crowd but with many a crest, Raising my rampired walls of gold as transparent as gla.s.s, 19 Eager to do and die, yield each his place to the rest: 20 For higher still and higher (as a runner tips with fire, When a great illumination surprises a festal night-- Outlining round and round Rome's dome from s.p.a.ce to spire) 23 Up, the pinnacled glory reached, and the pride of my soul was in sight.

In sight? Not half! for it seemed, it was certain, to match man's birth, Nature in turn conceived, obeying an impulse as I; And the emulous heaven yearned down, made effort to reach the earth.