Ruined ‘midst ruin, ruining, bereft

  Of name and honour? O love, piteous

  That but for this were all the hard things cleft

  That lay ‘twixt us and love; till nought was left

  ‘Twixt thy lips and my lips! O hard that we

  Were once so full of all felicity!

  “O love, O Paris, know’st thou this of me

  That in these hills e’en such a name I have

  As being akin to a divinity;

  And lightly may I slay and lightly save;

  Nor know I surely if the peaceful grave

  Shall ever hide my body dead — behold,

  Have ten long years of misery made me old?”

  Sadly she laughed; and rising wearily

  Stood by him in the fresh and sunny morn;

  The image of his youth and faith gone by

  She seemed to be, for one short minute born

  To make his shamed lost life seem more forlorn;

  He shut his eyes and moaned, but once again

  She knelt beside him, and the weary pain

  Deepened upon her face. “Hearken!” she said,

  “Death is anear thee; is then death so ill

  With me anigh thee — since Troy is as dead,

  Ere many tides the Xanthus’ mouth shall fill,

  And thou art reft of her that harmed me still,

  Whatso may change — shall I heal thee for this,

  That thou may’st die more mad for her last kiss?”

  She gazed at him with straining eyes; and he —

  Despite himself love touched his dying heart,

  And from his eyes desire flashed suddenly,

  And o’er his wan face the last blood did start

  As with soft love his close-shut lips ‘gan part.

  She laughed out bitterly, and said, “Why then

  Must I needs call thee falsest of all men,

  “Seeing thou liest not to save thy life? —

  Yee listen once again — fair is this place

  That knew not the beginning of the strife

  And recks not of its end — and this my face,

  This body thou wouldst day-long once embrace

  And deem thyself right happy — thine it is,

  Thine only, Paris, shouldst thou deem it bliss.”

  He looked into her eyes, and deemed he saw

  A strange and awful look a-gathering there,

  And sick scorn at her quivering fine lip draw;

  Yet trembling he stretched out his hand to her,

  Although self-loathing and strange hate did tear

  His heart that Death made cold, e’en as he said,

  “Whatso thou wilt shall be remembered;

  “Whatso thou wilt, O love, shall be forgot, —

  It may be I shall love thee as of old.”

  As thunder laughs she laughed— “Nay, touch me not!

  Touch me not, fool!” she cried, “Thou grow’st a-cold,

  And I am Death, Death, Death! — the tale is told

  Of all thy days! of all those joyous days

  When thinking nought of me thou garneredst praise.

  “Turn back again, and think no more of me!

  I am thy Death! woe for thy happy days!

  For I must slay thee; ah, my misery!

  Woe for the God-like wisdom thou wouldst praise!

  Else I my love to life again might raise

  A minute, ah, a minute! and be glad

  While on my lips thy blessing lips I had!

  “Would God that it were yesterday again;

  Would God the red sun had died yester-eve,

  And I were no more hapless now than then!

  Would God that I could say, and not believe,

  As yesterday, that years past hope did leave

  My cold heart — that I lived a death in life —

  Ah! then within my heart was yet a strife!

  “But now, but now, is all come to an end —

  Nay, speak not; think not of me! think of her

  Who made me this; and back unto her wend,

  Lest her lot, too, should be yet heavier!

  I will depart for fear thou diest here,

  Lest I should see thy woeful ghost forlorn

  Here wandering ever ‘twixt the night and morn.

  “ — O heart grown wise, wilt thou not let me go?

  Will ye be never satisfied, O eyes,

  With gazing on my misery and my woe?

  O foolish, quivering heart, now grown so wise,

  What folly is it that from out thee cries

  To be all close to him once more, once more

  Ere yet the dark stream cleaveth shore from shore?”

  Her voice was a wail now, with quivering hand

  At her white raiment did she clutch and tear

  Unwitting, as she rose up and did stand

  Bent over his wide eyes and pale face, where

  No torturing hope was left, no pain, or fear;

  For Death’s cold rest was gathering fast on him,

  And toward his heart crept over foot and limb.

  A little while she stood, and spake no word,

  But hung above him, with white heaving breast,

  And moaning still as moans the grey-winged bird

  In autumn-tide o’er his forgotten nest;

  And then her hands about her throat she pressed,

  As though to keep a cry back, then stooped down

  And set her face to his, while spake her moan:

  “O love, O cherished more than I can tell,

  Through years of woe, O love, my life and bane,

  My joy and grief, farewell, farewell, farewell!

  Forgetfulness of grief I yet may gain;

  In some wise may come ending to my pain;

  It may be yet the Gods will have me glad!

  Yet, love, I would that thee and pain I had!

  “Alas! it may not be, it may not be,

  The falling blossom of the late spring-tide

  Shall hang a golden globe upon the tree

  When through the vale the mists of autumn glide:

  Yet would, O Love, with thee I might abide.

  Now, now that restful death is drawing nigh —

  Farewell, farewell, how good it is to die!”

  O strange, O strange, when on his lips once more

  Her lips were laid! O strange that he must die

  Now, when so clear a vision had come o’er

  His failing heart, and keenest memory

  Had shown him all his changing life passed by;

  And what he was, and what he might have been,

  Yea, and should be, perchance, so clear were seen!

  Yea, then were all things laid within the scale,

  Pleasure and lust, love and desire of fame,

  Kindness, and hope, and folly — all the tale

  Told in a moment, as across him came

  That sudden flash, bright as the lightning-flame,

  Showing the wanderer on the waste how he

  Has gone astray ‘mid dark and misery.

  Ah, and her face upon his dying face

  That the sun warmed no more! that agony

  Of dying love, wild with the tale of days

  Long past, and strange with hope that might not be —

  All was gone now, and what least part had he

  In Love at all, and why was life all gone?

  Why must he meet the eyes of death alone?

  Alone, for she and ruth had left him there;

  Alone, because the ending of the strife

  He knew, well taught by death, drew surely near;

  Alone, for all those years with pleasure rife

  Should be a tale ‘mid Helen’s coming life,

  And she and all the world should go its ways,

  ‘Midst other troubles, other happy days.

  And yet how was it with him? As if death

  Strove yet with struggling life and love in vain,

  With eyes grown deadly bright and rattling breathy

  He raised himself; while wide his blood did stain

  The linen fair, and seized the horn again,

  And blew thereon a wild and shattering blast

  Ere from his hand afar the thing he cast.

  Then, as a man who in a failing fight

  For a last onset gathers suddenly

  All soul and strength, he faced the summer light,

  And from his lips broke forth a mighty cry

  Of “Helen, Helen, Helen!” — yet the sky

  Changed not above his cast-back golden head,

  And merry was the world though he was dead.

  BUT now when every echo was as still

  As were the lips of Paris, once more came

  The litter-bearers down the beech-clad hill

  And stood about him crying out his name,

  Lamenting for his beauty and his fame,

  His love, his kindness, and his merry heart,

  That still would thrust ill days and thoughts apart.

  Homeward they bore him through the dark woods’ gloom

  With heavy hearts presaging nothing good;

  And when they entered Troy again, a tomb

  For them and theirs it seemed. — Long has it stood,

  But now indeed the labour and the blood,

  The love, the patience, and good-heart are vain —

  The Greeks may have what yet is left to gain.

  I CANNOT tell what crop may clothe the hills,

  The merry hills Troy whitened long ago —

  Belike the sheaves, wherewith the reaper fills

  His yellow wain, no whit the weaker grow

  For that past harvest-tide of wrong and woe;

  Belike the tale, wept over otherwhere,

  Of those old days is clean forgotten there.

  ALAS too short seemed to those ancient men

  The little span of threescore years and ten,

  Too hard, too bitter, the dull years of life

  Beset at best with many a care and strife

  To bear withal Love’s torment, and the toils

  Wherewith the days of youth and joy he spoils;

  Since e’en so God makes equal Eld and Youth

  Tormenting Youth with lies and Eld with truth;

  Well-nigh they blamed the singer too, that he

  Must needs draw pleasure from men’s misery;

  Nathless a little even they must feel

  How time and tale a long-past woe will heal,

  And make a melody of grief, and give

  Joy to the world that whoso dies shall live.

  Moreover, good it was for them to note

  The slim hand set unto the changing throat,

  The lids down drooped to hide the passionate eyes

  Whereto the sweet thoughts all unbid would rise;

  The bright-cheeked shame, the conscious mouth as love

  Within the half-hid gentle breast ‘gan move,

  Like a swift-opening flower beneath the sun;

  The sigh and half frown as the tale was done,

  And thoughts uncertain, hard to grasp, did flit

  ‘Twixt the beginning and the end of it —

  And to their ancient eyes it well might seem.

  Lay tale in tale, as dream within a dream,

  Untold now the beginning, and the end

  Not to be heard by those whose feet should wend

  Long ere that tide through the dim ways of death.

  But now the sun grew dull, the south wind’s breath

  Ruffled the stream, and spake within the trees

  Of rain beyond the hills; the images

  The tale wrought changed with the changed deadening day,

  Till dim they grew and vanished quite away.

  NOW when September drew unto its end,

  Unto the self-same place those men did wend

  Where last they feasted; and the autumn day

  Was so alike to that one passed away,

  That, but for silence of the close stripped bare,

  And absence of the merry folk and fair,

  Whose feet the deep grass, making haste to grow

  Before the winter, minded nothing now

  But for the thinned and straightened boughs, well freed

  Of golden fruit; the vine-stocks that did need

  No pruning more, ere eager man and maid

  Brown fingers on the dusty bunches laid —

  But for these matters, they might even deem

  That they had slept awhile and dreamed a dream,

  And woke up weary in the self-same place.

  And now as each man saw his fellow’s face

  They ‘gan to smile, beholding this same thought

  Each in the other’s eyes:

  “Or all is nought

  Whereof I think,” at last a wanderer said,

  “Or of my tale shall ye be well apaid;

  Meet is it for this silent company

  Sitting here musing, well content to see

  The shadows changing, as the sun goes by:

  A dream it is, friends, and no history

  Of men who ever lived; so blame me nought

  If wondrous things together there are brought,

  Strange to our waking world — yet as in dreams

  Of known things still we dream, whatever gleams

  Of unknown light may make them strange, so here

  Our dreamland story holdeth such things dear

  And such things loathed, as we do; else, indeed,

  Were all its marvels nought to help our need.

  THE LAND EAST OF THE SUN AND WEST OF THE MOON.

  ARGUMENT.

  THIS tale, which is set forth as a dream, tells of a churl’s son who won a fair Queen to his love, and afterwards lost her, and yet in the end was not deprived of her.

  IN Norway, in King Magnus’ days,

  A man there dwelt, my story says,

  Who Gregory had got to name;

  Folk said from outland parts he came,

  Though none knew whence; he served withal

  The Marshal Biorn in field and hall,

  And little, yet was deft of hand

  And stout of heart, when men did stand

  Spear against spear; and his black eyes

  Folk deemed were somewhat overwise.

  For of the stars full well he knew,

  And whither lives of men they drew.

  So Gregory the Star gazer

  Men called him, and somewhat in fear

  They held him, though his daily mood

  Was ever mild enow and good.

  It chanced upon a summer day,

  When in the south King Magnus lay,

  With all his men, the Marshal sent

  A well-manned cutter, with intent

  To get him fish for house-keeping,

  And Gregory, skilful in this thing,

  The skipper over them to be;

  So merrily they put to sea,

  And of a little island lay,

  Amidst the firth, and fished all day,

  But when night fell, ashore they went

  Upon the isle, and pitched their tent,

  And ate and drank, and slept at last.

  But while sleep held the others fast

  Did Gregory waken, turning oft

  Upon his rough bed nothing soft,

  Till stealthily at last he rose

  And crept from the tent thronged and close

  Into the fresh and cloudless night,

  And ‘neath the high-set moon’s cold light

  Went softly down unto the sea;

  And sleep, that erst had seemed to be

  A thing his life must hope in vain,

  Now ‘gan to fall on him again,

  E’en as he reached the sandy bay

  Where on the beach their cutter lay.

  Calm was the sea ‘twixt wall and wall

  Of the green bight; the surf did fall

  With little noise upon the sand,

  Where ‘neath the moon the smooth curved strand

  Shone white ‘twixt dark sea, rocks, and turf.

  There, hearkening to the lazy surf,

  Musing he scarcely knew of what,

  Upon a grey rock Gregory sat,

  Till sleep had all its will of him,

  And now at last, with slackened limb

  And nodding head, he fell to dream;

  And far away now did he seem,

  Waked up within the great hall, where

  King Magnus held right merry cheer

  In honour of the Christmas-tide,

  At Ladir; and on every side

  His courtmen and good bonders sat.

  There as folk talked of this and that,

  And drank, and all were blithe enow,

  Amid the drifting of the snow

  And howling of the wind without,

  Within the porch folk heard a shout,

  And opening of the outer door;

  Then one came in, who to the floor

  Cast down the weight of snow, and stood

  Undoing of his fur-lined hood,

  And muttering in his beard the while.

  The King gazed on him with a smile,

  Then said at last— “What is it then?

  Art thou called one of my good men,

  And art thou of the country-side,

  Or hast thou mayhap wandered wide?

  Come sit thee down and eat and drink —

  — And yet hast thou some news, I think?”

  The man said, “News from over sea

  Of Mary and the Trinity,

  And goodman Joseph, do I bring;

  Nowell, Nowell, Nowell, O King!”

  Inward he stalked on, therewithal,

  But stopped amidmost of the hall,

  And cast to earth his cloak and hood,

  And there in glittering raiment stood,

  While the maids went about the board

  And deftly the cup’s river poured,

  And ‘mid great clank of ewer and horn

  Men drank the day when Christ was born.

  Then by the King the gold-clad man

  Sat, Gregory dreamed, and soon began

  Great marvels of far lands to tell,

  And said at last:

  “Ye serve me well,

  And strange things therefore will I show,

  Wonders that none save ye may know;

 

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