Renascence: A Book of Verse — The House of Dreams

I SATE in my soul’s house one day The world-wide book before me lay And in mine eyes, as through a glass The colours of all things did pass, And thought and life, in mingled stream, Strange semblance showed as in a dream.

My soul’s still house lies hid in trees, And sitting in its porch one sees, Before the feet, a garden green, Amidst a wild and dark demesne, When sight may range by lea and lawn, From sunset to the gate of dawn, Till through the utmost wood may be Descried a dim and dreadful sea.

Five gates it hath, five porches fair, That know bright guests of light and air, And through the windows, clear and high, The winged thoughts come from earth and sky That show me things by shore and sea, And visions high of things to be.

Anigh the house a water clear, Born of some secret crystal mere Among the mountains of the land, And flowing to the dim sea-strand;

But still and silent in its pace, That in its smooth translucent face Bright image flashed of many a thing, And folk that passed in wandering, With colours fresh of tree and flower.

Here kept my soul a secret bower;

And in the garden all the year One plied his craft of gardener, Nor slept between the moon and sun, Nor ever was his labour done;

For this was Time who told my hours And gave, and took away, my flowers.

And one beside him fed a fire With listless hands, whose whole desire Was not therein, but far away She watched an ever dying day: She smiled sometimes, and oft she wept, But through her tears her watch she kept: Time brought her flowers; she cast the same To feed the hungering tongues of flame— Yea, all men know the dreamful dame, Pale Memory, ye rede her name.

In my soul’s house, alway to be, Dwelt spirits five for company, And fair they were in form and face, And well my soul’s white house did grace: For one the chambers garnished fit With boughs and flowers, and them she lit By night and day, for she was Sight And rulèd all my soul’s delight.

Her sister to my table bare Sweet pleasure of earth’s fruits and rare, As every season brought its meed Or ever as my soul had need.

Another made sweet incense rise From out a censer in such wise That mingled sweet of every kind, And let the slender smoke enwind The pillars of the roof, and send The pleasant mist from end to end.

The while another yet of these With music soft my soul would please;

To every thought in every mood She made her tuneful interlude: She touched the strings, she ruled the lute, And many a soft harmonious flute That mocked the birds in leafy quire;

But oft this spirit would aspire To lift the solemn organ’s voice, And this would be her dearest choice, Till, with its deeper soul embued, My soul forgot its solitude.

Yet one there was, both dumb and blind, Who yet was wise in every kind, And many a thing her hand could teach, In silent service serving each.

These watched the house and kept it fair As each its several part had care.

Thus sate my soul and talked with these In its white porch among the trees;

And each brought word what she had seen Of all that ranged that region green: For many folk passed to and fro, As flew the hours or footed slow.

One came in garment green and pale Across the hill, adown the dale, And blossoms in her hand she bore;

A swallow skimmed her path before;

It was a herald bright of spring, And this the song that she did sing: * * * * * There fell a day of sun and shower, Spring stirred within her leafless bower, She sent me from her wintry home— “Go forth and tell the world I come.

” Beneath the windows of the dawn I took my way, by lake and lawn, I saw of flowers the firstling born, I gathered of the flowering thorn: And from the dale and from the down I passed into the sleeping town, Along the stoney streets to spill My flowers, by door and window sill: But they were like the eyes of men, Sleep-locked, though some were open then: I saw within a darkened room An old man, lying in the gloom.

He saw my flowers, and then he sighed, And turned upon his bed and died.

I took my way with soundless feet, But none I met my steps to greet.

Save when a wakeful babe me spied, And stretched his dimpled arms and cried.

They hushed his voice, nor knew his will— I left the city sleeping still.

* * * * * She ceased her song, and there was hush, As after when the tuneful thrush Hath warbled clear the wood is still Ere yet again the quire sings shrill For very joy.

And then I heard, Among the grass, Time grind and gird Upon his blade: He stooped to slay, And soon before his feet there lay The fallen emblems of the hours— A harvest sheaf of spring’s first flowers— Which she beside him gathering flung Into the fire the while they sung, And thus I heard their voices chime: (THE SONG OF MEMORY AND TIME.

) TIME.

Spring-tide come and winter going;

Flower to seed, and seed to sowing;

Seed and harvest, reaping, mowing.

MEMORY.

Life beginning, and life ending;

Life his substance ever spending;

Time to life his little lending.

TIME.

Hark!

the wingèd winds are calling;

Clouds the young year’s path appalling;

Blooms of spring like snow are falling.

MEMORY.

Snows of spring green earth bestrewing!

Wasted hopes must I be rueing, Spring of life there’s no renewing.

And after these had ceased their song, A company there passed along, In divers weed, and changeful mien, And glad, or sad, athwart my green: Their fluttering robes of dark or pale, Like leaves adrift on Autumn gale;

And they like shadows o’er the grass Before my porch did singly pass, But through the house their voices rang, Tune-tongued like bells, as thus they sang:— (SONG OF THE HOURS.

) Between the gates of night and morn, With sleepless hands and sleepless eyes, We watch the sun and moon outworn, The silent stars that sink and rise.

In hidden chambers of the night, The thread of Fate we sit and spin, Through death and life, in dark and light, From life’s slim staff to wind and win.

With joinèd hands and parting feet, The work is wove, and still undone;

But still we tread Time’s measure fleet, As through the glass the sand is spun.

With linkèd hands and feet that wind Between the pillars of the day, Around the house the garland bind, For spring hath come, we cannot stay.

* * * * * They passed.

A change came o’er the sky.

I heard a shout—I heard a cry.

A horn’s far sound the woods awoke, And sudden from the thicket broke, In my soul’s sight, a thing of flame, And after, swift, a horseman came— A youth intent upon the chase;

But ever, as he urged his pace, One laid her hands upon his rein, And from that end would him restrain;

While did the stirring horn resound, And in the leash each panting hound Pressed hard to slip the tightened chain.

What would that eager hunter gain?

Some magic thing whose form and hue Still changed as he did close pursue— A flame, a bubble of the air?

A woman, marvellously fair?

Yea, every shape it hath in turn That makes man’s troubled soul to burn, And doth his baffled sight elude To leave the world a solitude.

Again the sounding horn did bray, The hounds were slipt and broke away, And swift throughout the close they sped, Still as the changeful quarry led;

Till far beyond the open green They flashed the forest stems between, And soon were lost in night of wood.

Again I heard Time’s interlude:— TIME

Whence the way and whither wending?

Seeks hot youth, till eld descending, Leaves unread the secret pending.

What is Life?

Truth answers never;

Darkly flows the secret river, But its springs are hid for ever.

What is Truth?

Man’s long endeavour Finds the web but not the weaver: Sleeps the riddle none may sever.

As it was in Time’s beginning, Then, as now, while Fate is spinning Man her clue would still be winning.

* * * * * My soul knew rest no more that day.

I heard Time’s voice sink far away, And long did muse till light was gone, Still sitting in my porch alone.

Strange thoughts like flashes went and came, And dreams of love, and hopes of fame, With dim desires that inly burned;

Dead hopes that rose again and yearned To follow still that unknown quest, And failing, fluttered back to rest.

Then had my soul a vision strange, As far in spirit did I range, And I beheld a far dim plain, Dyed in day’s last Tyrean stain, And through its dark and desert ground A gleaming vein of water wound, Where lonely piles of ruin old Loomed vast, with hollow chambers cold, Where horror dwelt with night and death, And filled they were with ghostly breath.

But there amid the gathering glooms, Among the temples and the tombs, One wandered in a pilgrim’s guise, Who fixed afar his wistful eyes;

His footsteps kept the river’s side, A glowing lamp his feet did guide, That shone upon that desert’s dearth, As like a star there fall’n to earth;

And moving through the twilight dim, By shattered arch and column slim, With staff and scrip he kept his way, Among those wrecks of ancient day.

* * * * * Far, far upon that desert land, Half buried in her grave of sand, The ancient head of Egypt rose;

And, still sublime in death’s repose, Great Memnon kept his awful throne Outwatching day and night alone: And where the Greek laid stone on stone The faces of his gods were shown, When to the world—a youth—there came Fair Wisdom, Power, and Beauty’s dame, Heré, not Pallas, had his choice But Aphrodité won his voice.

The crumbling strength of mighty Rome, Her grave, her cradle, and her home;

There stood the emblems of her reign— The Arch that would the world sustain, And still doth span in legioned range The gulf of time, the waves of change.

Long stood the Pilgrim here at gaze, As lost in thought of antique days, As far his searching eyes could scan Beneath the age-worn arches’ span.

He marked each age’s builded pile Loom dimly down the endless aisle, Where shone the winding waters’ thread, A wandering life among the dead, Until his sight no more could trace Its courses from their hidden place, Wrapt in the clinging mists that shroud The trackless mountains dim with cloud;

But still his spirit found no home Beneath the broad eternal dome.

At last the Pilgrim turned and sighed, Nor stayed he where a cross beside Marked how a greater power and pride Did conquer Rome, and still doth bide.

Full many a stone about that ground Made stumbling, but of flowers were found None save the sanguined poppy’s hue Between still sleep and death that grew.

The Pilgrim stayed for sleep nor rest, As bent upon some hidden quest;

Nor turned he from his painful way Where folk made feast and holiday Beneath fair vines and fruited trees, As pipe, and dance, and song them please.

He seemed the world of men to shun, And joyed when he a wood had won, Sweet cloistered green, and roofed above, Where soft he heard the wooing dove, And sound of wandering water near;

He drank its crystal cup and clear, And kept his path beside the stream Till he beheld white pillars gleam.

He passed from green to blossomed boughs That compassed fair a secret house;

Still music drew him to the door, Swift beat his heart, and trembling more, He entered, to a gold dim space Flame-lit before an altar daïs, Rose-garlanded, most fair and meet, And all the air was still and sweet, But over these in fairer case Shone the clear semblance of a face.

He knelt before that altar stone, The anthem soothed his heart’s faint tone, And seraph voices high and soft, In measured cadence quired aloft, Or sailed in tempest gusts of sound When passion’s music shook the ground.

Filled was the Pilgrim’s soul and bowed, Till in his stress he cried aloud: “O Love!

This is thy holy place, Give me, I pray, my lady’s grace!

” [Illustration]