Part 2

We are gods by our own reck'ning,- and may well shut up the temples,
And wield on, amid the incense-steam , the thunder of our cars.

'For we throw out acclamations of self-thanking, self-admiring,
With, at every mile run faster,--'O the wondrous, wondrous age,'
Little thinking if we work our SOULS as nobly as our iron,
Or if angels will command us, at the goal of the pilgrimage.

'Why, what is this patient entrance into nature's deep resources,
But the child's most gradual learning to walk straightly without bane?
When we drive out, from the cloud of steam , majestical white horses,
Are we greater than the first men, who led black ones by the mane?

'If we sided with the eagles, if we struck the stars in rising,
If we wrapped the globe intensely, with one hot electric breath
'Twere but power within our tether - no new spirit-power conferring-
And in life we were not greater men, nor bolder men in death.'

She was patient with my talking; and I loved her-loved her certes ,
As I loved all Heavenly objects, with uplifted eyes and hands!
As I loved pure inspirations-loved the graces, loved the virtues,-
In a Love content with writing his own name, on desert sands .

It was thus I reeled! I told you that her hand had many suitors —
But she rose above them, smiling down, as Venus down the waves—
And with such a gracious coldness, that they could not press their futures
On that present of her courtesy, which yieldingly enslaves.

And this morning, as I sate alone within the inner chamber
With the great saloon beyond it, lost in pleasant thought serene—
For I had been reading Camoëns — that poem you remember,
Which his lady’s eyes are praised in, as the sweetest ever seen.

And the book lay open, and my thought flew from it, taking from it
A vibration and impulsion to an end beyond its own,--
As the branch of a green osier , when a child would overcome it,
Springs up freely from his clasping, and goes swinging in the sun.

As I mused I heard a murmur,--it grew deep as it grew longer—

Speakers using earnest language--'Lady Geraldine,you would!'’
And I heard a voice that pleaded ever on, in accents stronger,
As a sense of reason gave it power to make its rhetoric good.

Well I knew that voice—it was an earl’s, of soul that matched his station—
Of a soul complete in lordship —might and right read on his brow;
Very finely courteous--far too proud to doubt his domination

Of the common people,--he atones for grandeur by a bow.

High straight forehead, nose of eagle, cold blue eyes, of less expression

Than resistance,--coldly casting off the looks of other men,

As steel,arrows,-- unelastic lips, which seem to taste possession,

And be cautious lest the common air should injure or distrain.

For the rest, accomplished, upright,--ay,and standing by his order

With a bearing not ungraceful; fond of arts, and letters too;

Just a good man, made a proud man, as the sandy rocks that border

A wild coast, by circumstances, in a regnant ebb and flow.

Thus, I knew that voice--I heard it--and I could not help the hearkening;

In the room I stood up blindly, and my burning heart within

Seemed to seethe and fuse my senses, till they ran on all sides, darkening,

And scorched , weighed, like melted metal, round my feet that stood therein.

And that voice, I heard it pleading, for love's sake--for wealth, position,...

For the sake of liberal uses, and great actions to be done--

And she answered, answered gently,--'Nay, my lord, the old tradition

Of your Normans, by some worthier hand than mine is, should be won.'

'Ah, that white hand!' he said quickly,--and in his he either drew it,

Or attempted--for which gravity and instance she replied--
‘Nay, indeed, my lord, this talk is vain, and we had best eschew it,
And pass on, like friends, to other points, less easy to decide.’

What he said again, I know not. It is likely that his trouble
Worked his pride up to the surface, for she answered in slow scorn
‘And your lordship judges rightly. Whom I marry, shall be noble,
Ay, and wealthy. I shall never blush to think how he was born.’

There I maddened! her words stung me!
Life swept through me into fever,
And my soul sprang up astonished; sprang, full-statured in an hour.
Know you what it is when anguish, with apocalyptic NEVER,
To a Pythian height dilates you,--
and despair sublimes to power?

From my brain, the soul-wings budded!—waved a flame about my body,
Whence conventions coiled to ashes. I felt self-drawn out, as man,
From amalgamate false natures; and I saw the skies grow ruddy
With the deepening feet of angels, and I knew what spirits can.
I was mad-inspired-say either! anguish worketh inspiration!
Was a man, or beast—perhaps so; for the tiger roars, when speared!
And I walked on, step by step, along the level of my passion
Oh my soul! and passed the doorway to her face, and never feared.

He had left her,--peradventure, when my footstep proved my coming
But for her—she half arose, then sate grew scarlet and grew pale;
Oh, she trembled!-'tis so always with a worldly man or woman,

In the presence of true spirits-what else can they do but quail?

Oh, she fluttered like a tame bird, in among its forest-brothers,
Far too strong for it! then drooping, bowed her face upon her hands-
And I spake out wildly, fiercely, brutal truths of her and others!
I, she planted in the desert, swathed her, windlike, with my sands.

I plucked up her social fictions, bloody-rooted, though leaf-verdant,--
Trod them down with words of shaming,--all the purples and the gold,
And the 'landed stakes' and Lordships-all that spirits pure and ardent
Are cast out of love and reverence, because chancing not to hold.

'For myself I do not argue,' said I, 'though I love you, Madam,
But for better souls, that nearer to the height of yours have trod-
And this age shows, to my thinking, still more infidels to Adam ,
Than directly, by profession, simple infidels to God .

'Yet, O god' (I said), 'O grave' (I said) , 'O mother's heart and bosom,
With whom first and last are equal, saint and corpse and little child!
We are fools to your deductions, in these figments of heart-closing!
We are traitors to your causes, in these sympathies defiled!
But for Adam's seed , MAN! Trust me, ‘tis a clay above your scorning,
With God’s image stamped upon it, and God’s kindling breath within.
‘What right have you, Madam, gazing in your shining mirror daily,
Getting so, by heart, your beauty, which all others must adore,--
While you draw the golden ringlets down your fingers, to vow gaily,...
You will wed no man that’s only good to God,--and nothing more?

‘Why, what right have you, made fair by that same God—the sweetest woman
Of all women He has fashioned—with your lovely spirit-face,
Which would seem too near to vanish, if its smile were not so human,--
And your voice of holy sweetness, turning common words to grace:

‘What right can you have, God’s other works, to scorn, despise, . . . revile them
In the gross, as mere men, broadly—not as noble men, forsooth ,--
But as Parias of the outer world, forbidden to assoil them,
In the hope of living,--dying,--near that sweetness of your mouth?

‘Have you any answer, Madam? If my spirits were less earthy—
If its instruments were gifted with more vibrant silver strings—
I would kneel down where I stand, and say—‘Behold me! I am worthy
Of thy loving, for I love thee! I am worthy as a king.’

‘As it is—your ermined pride, I swear, shall feel this stain upon her—
That I, poor, weak,tost with passion, scorned by me and you again,
Love you, Madam—dare to love you—to my grief and your dishonour—
To my endless desolation, and your impotent disdain!’

More mad words like these—mere madness! friend, I need not write them fuller;
And I hear my hot soul dropping on the lines in showers of tears—
Oh, a woman! friend, a woman! Why, a beast had scarce been duller,
Than roar bestial loud complaints against the shining of the spheres.

But at last there came a pause. I stood all vibrating with thunder,
Which my soul had used. The silence drew her face up like a call.
Could you guess what word she uttered? She looked up, as if in wonder,
With tears beaded on her lashes, and said ‘Bertram!’ It was all.

If she had cursed me—and she might have—or if even, with queenly bearing,
Which at need is used by women, she had risen up and said,
‘Sir, you are my guest, and therefore I have given you a full hearing—
Now, beseech you, choose a name exacting somewhat less, instead—‘

I had borne it!—but that ‘Bertram’—why it lies there on the paper
A mere word, without her accents,--and you cannot judge the weight
Of that calm that crushed my passion! I seemed swimming in a vapour,--
And her gentleness did shame me, whom her scorn made desolate.

So, struck backward, and exhausted with that inward flow of passion
Which had passed, in deadly rushing, into forms of abstract truth,--
With a logic agonizing through unfit denunciation,--
And with youth’s own anguish turning grimly grey the hairs of youth-
With a sense accursed and instant, that if even I spake wisely, I spake basely—using truth,--if what I spake, indeed was true—
To avenge wrong on a woman—her, who sate there weighing nicely
A poor manhood’s worth, found guilty of such deeds as I could do!—

With such wrong and woe exhausted—what I suffered and occasioned,--
As a wild horse, through a city, runs with lightning in his eyes,,
And then dashing at a church's cold and passive wall, impassioned,
Strikes the death into his burning brain, and blindly drops and dies.

So I fell, struck down before her! Do you blame me, friend for weakness?
‘Twas my strength of passion slew me!—fell before her like a stone;
Fast and dreadful world rolled from me, on its roaring wheels of blackness!
When the light came I was lying in this chamber—and alone.

Oh, of course, she charged her lacqueys to bear out the sickly burden,
And to cast it from her scornful sight—but not beyond the gate—
She is too kind to be cruel, and too haughty not to pardon
Such a man as I—‘twere something to be level to her hate.

But for me—you now are conscious why, my friend, I write this letter,--
How my life is read all backwards, and the charm of life read all backward , and the charm of life undone!!
I shall leave this house at dawn—I would to-night, if I were better—
And I charge my soul to hold my body strengthened for the sun.

When the sun has dyed the oriel , I depart with no last gazes,
No weak moanings—one word only, left in writing for her hands,--
Out of reach of her derisions, and some unavailing praises,
To make front against this anguish in the far and foreign lands.

Blame me not, I would not squander life in grief—I am abstemious ;
I but nurse my spirit's falcon,that its wings may soar again.
There’s no room for tears of weakness, in the blind eyes of a Phemius:
Into work the poet kneads them ,--and he does not die till then.

CONCLUSION

Bertram finished the last pages, while along the silence ever
Still in hot and heavy splashes, fell his tears on every leaf :
Having ended, he leans backward in his chair, with lips that quiver
From the deep unspoken, ay, and deep unwritten thoughts of grief.

Soh! How still the lady standeth! ‘tis a dream—a dream of mercies!
Twixt the purple-lattice curtains, how she standeth still and pale!
‘Tis a vision, sure, of mercies, to soften his self-curses--
Sent to sweep a patient quiet, o’er the tossing of his wail.
‘Eyes,’ he said, ‘now throbbing through me! are ye eyes that did undo me?
Shining eyes, like antique jewels set in Parian statue-stone!
Underneath that calm white forehead, are ye ever burning torrid,
O’er the desolate sand-desert of my heart and life undone?’

With a murmurous stir, uncertain, in the air, the purple curtain
Swelleth in and swelleth out around her motionless pale brows;
‘While the gliding of the river sends a rippling noise for ever,
through the open casement whitened by the moonlight’s slant repose.

Said he—‘Vision of a lady! stand there silent, stand there steady!
Now I see it plainly, plainly; now I cannot hope or doubt—
There, the cheeks of calm expression—there, the lips of silent passion,
Curvéd like an archer’s bow, to send the bitter arrows out.’

Ever, evermore the while in a slow silence she kept smiling,--
And approached him slowly, slowly, in a gliding measured pace;
With her two white hands extended, as if praying one offended,
And a look of supplication, gazing earnest in his face.<br

This Page was last update: Monday, April 22, 2002 at 3:06:01 PM
This page was originally posted: 4/22/2002; 2:56:33 PM.
Copyright 2009 Lady Geraldine's Courtship

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