HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 MAURICE HEWLETT 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 '913 
 
COPYRIGHT 
 
DEDICATION 
 
 LOVE owes tribute unto Death, 
 Being but a flower of breath, 
 Ev'n as thy fair body is 
 Moment's figure of the bliss 
 Dwelling in the mind of God 
 When He called thee from the sod, 
 Like a crocus up to start, 
 Gray-eyed with a golden heart, 
 Out of earth, and point our sight 
 To thy eternal home of light. 
 
 Here on earth is all we know : 
 To let our love as steadfast blow, 
 Open-hearted to the sun, 
 Folded down when our day's done, 
 As thy flower that bids it be 
 Flower of thy charity. 
 'Tis not ours to boast or pray 
 Breath from us shall outlive clay 5 
 'Tis not thine, thou Pitiful, 
 Set me task beyond my rule. 
 
 Yet as young men carve on trees 
 
 Lovely names, and find in these 
 
 Solace in the after time, 
 
 So to have hid thee in my rhyme 
 
 Shall be comfort when I take 
 
 The lonely road. Then, for my sake, 
 
 Keep thou this my graven sigh, 
 
 And, that I may not all die, 
 
 Open it, and hear it tell, 
 
 Here was one who loved thee well. 
 
 October 6, 1912. 
 
 259878 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 HELEN REDEEMED ...... i 
 
 HYPSIPYLE . . . . . . .123 
 
 OREITHYIA 149 
 
 CLYTIE" . 155 
 
 LAI OF GOBERTZ ... 159 
 
 THE SAINTS' MAYING . . . . . 169 
 THE ARGIVE WOMEN . . . . .173 
 
 GNATHO 187 
 
 To THE GODS OF THE COUNTRY . . 193 
 
 FOURTEEN SONNETS 
 
 ALMA SDEGNOSA . . . . .197 
 THE WINDS' POSSESSION . . . .198 
 ASPETTO REALE . . . .199 
 
 KIN CONFESSED ..... 200 
 
 <J)UEL GIORNO PIl) .... . . . 2O I 
 
 ABSENCE ....... 202 
 
 PRESENCE 203 
 
 DREAM ANGUISH ..... 204 
 
 HYMNIA-BEATRIX 206 
 
 Lux E TENEBRIS ..... 207 
 
 DUTY 208 
 
 vii 
 
viii CONTENTS 
 
 PACK 
 
 WAGES 209 
 
 EYE-SERVICE . . . . . .210 
 
 CLOISTER THOUGHTS . . . .211 
 
 THE CHAMBER IDYLL . . . . .213 
 
 EPIGRAMMATA 
 
 THE OLD HOUSE 217 
 
 BLUE IRIS . . . . . .217 
 
 THE ROSEBUD 218 
 
 SPRING ON THE DOWN . . . .218 
 
 SNOWY NIGHT 219 
 
 EVENING MOOD 219 
 
 THE PARTING 220 
 
 DEDICATION OF A BOOK . . 221 
 
NOTE 
 
 THREE of the Poems here published have 
 appeared in book form already, in the 
 Volume called Songs and Meditations, 
 long out of print. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 
 PROEM 
 
 SING of the end of Troy, and of that flood 
 
 Of passion by the blood 
 
 Of heroes consecrate, by poet's craft 
 
 Hallowed, if that thin waft 
 
 Of godhead blown upon thee stretch thy song 
 
 To span such store of strong 
 
 And splendid vision of immortal themes 
 
 Late harvested in dreams, 
 
 Albeit long years laid up in tilth. Most 
 
 meet 
 
 Thou sing that slim and sweet 
 Fair woman for whose bosom and delight 
 Paris, as well he might, 
 
 Wrought all the woe, and held her to his cost 
 And Troy's, and won and lost 
 Perforce ; for who could look on her or feel 
 Her near and not dare steal 
 One hour of her, or hope to hold in bars 
 Such wonder of the stars 
 Undimmed ? As soon expect to cage the rose 
 
 I B 
 
2 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Of dawn which comes and goes 
 
 Fitful, or leash the shadows of the hills, 
 
 Or music of upland rills 
 
 As Helen's beauty and not tarnish it 
 
 With thy poor market wit, 
 
 Adept to hue the wanton in the wild, 
 
 Defile the undefiled ! 
 
 Yet by the oath thou swearedst, standing high 
 
 Where piled rocks testify 
 
 The holy dust, and from Therapnai's hold 
 
 Over the rippling wold 
 
 Didst look upon Amyklai's, where sunrise 
 
 First dawned in Helen's eyes, 
 
 Take up thy tale, good poet, strain thine art 
 
 To sing her rendered heart, 
 
 Given last to him who loved her first, nor 
 
 swerved 
 
 From loving, but was nerved 
 To see through years of robbery and shame 
 Her spirit, a clear flame, 
 Eloquent of her birthright. Tell his peace, 
 And hers who at last found ease 
 In white-arm'd Here, holy husbander 
 Of purer fire than e'er 
 To wife gave Kypris. Helen, and Thee I 
 
 sing 
 
 In whom her beauties ring, 
 Fair body of fair mind fair acolyte, 
 Star of my day and night ! 
 
 i%th September 1912. 
 
FIRST STAVE 
 
 THE DEATH OF ACHILLES 
 
 WHERE Simoeis and Xanthos, holy streams, 
 Flow brimming on the level, and chance 
 
 gleams 
 
 Betray far Ida through a rended cloud 
 And hint the awful home of Zeus, whose 
 
 shroud 
 
 The thunder is 'twixt Ida and the main 
 Behold gray Ilios, Priam's fee, the plain 
 About her like a carpet ; from whose height 
 The watchman, ten years watching, every 
 
 night 
 
 Counteth the beacon fires and sees no less 
 Their number as the years wax and duress 
 Of hunger thins the townsmen day by day 
 More than the Greeks kill plague and famine 
 
 slay. 
 Here in their wind-swept city, ten long 
 
 years 
 
 Beset and in this tenth in blood and tears 
 And havocry to fall, old Priam's sons 
 
4 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Guard still their gods, their wives and little 
 
 ones, 
 
 Guard Helen still, for whose fair womanhood 
 The sin was done, woe wrought, and all the 
 
 blood 
 
 Of Danaan and Dardan in their pride 
 Shed ; nor yet so the end, for Here cried 
 Shrill on the heights more vengeance on 
 
 wrong done, 
 
 And Greek or Trojan paid it. Late or soon 
 By sword or bitter arrow they went hence, 
 Each with their goodliest paying one man's 
 
 offence. 
 
 Goodliest in Troy fell Hector ; back to Greek 
 Then swung the doomstroke, and to Dis the 
 
 bleak 
 Must pass great Hector's slayer. Zeus on 
 
 high, 
 Hidden from men, held up the scales ; the 
 
 sky 
 
 Told Thetis that her son must go the way 
 He sent Queen Hecuba's himself must pay, 
 Himself though young, splendid Achilles' self, 
 The price of manslaying, with blood for pelf. 
 A grief immortal took her, and she grieved 
 Deep in sea-cave, whereover restless heaved 
 The wine-dark ocean silently, not moving, 
 Tearless, a god. O Gods, however loving, 
 That is a lonely grief that must go dry 
 About the graves where the beloved lie, 
 And knows too much to doubt if death ends all 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 5 
 
 Pleasure in strength of limb, joy musical, 
 Mother-love, maiden-love, which never more 
 Must the dead look for on the further shore 
 Of Acheron, and past the willow-wood 
 Of Proserpine ! 
 
 But when he understood, 
 Achilles, that his end was near at hand, 
 Darkling he heard the news, and on the strand 
 Beyond the ships he stood awhile, then cried 
 The Sea-God that high-hearted and clear-eyed 
 He might go down ; and this for utmost 
 
 grace 
 
 He asked, that not by battle might his face 
 Be marred, nor fighting might some Dardan 
 
 best 
 
 Him who had conquered ever. For the rest, 
 Fate, which had given, might take, as fate 
 
 should be. 
 
 So prayed he, and Poseidon out of the sea, 
 There where the deep blue into sand doth 
 
 fade 
 
 And the long wave rolls in, a bar of jade, 
 Sent him a portent in that sea-blue bird 
 Swifter than light, the halcyon ; and men 
 
 heard 
 
 The trumpet of his praise : " Shaker of Earth, 
 Hail to thee ! Now I fare to death in mirth, 
 As to a banquet ! " 
 
 So when day was come 
 Lightly arose the prince to meet his doom, 
 And kissed Brise'fs where she lay abed 
 
6 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And never more by hers might rest his head : 
 " Farewell, my dear, farewell, my joy," said 
 
 he; 
 
 " Farewell to all delights 'twixt thee and me ! 
 For now I take a road whose harsh alarms 
 Forbid so sweet a burden to my arms." 
 Then his clean limbs his weeping squires 
 
 bedight 
 
 In all the mail Hephaistos served his might 
 Withal, of breastplate shining like the sun 
 Upon flood-water, three-topped helm whereon 
 Gleamed the gold basilisk, and goodly greaves. 
 These bore he without word ; but when from 
 
 sheaves 
 
 Of spears they picked the great ash Pelian 
 Poseidon gave to Peleus, God to a man, 
 For no man's manege else than all men's 
 
 fear : 
 " Dry and cold fighting for thee this day, my 
 
 spear," 
 Quoth he. And so when one the golden 
 
 shield 
 
 Immortal, daedal, for no one else to wield, 
 Cast o'er his head, he frowned : " On thy 
 
 bright face 
 
 Let me see who shall dare a dint," he says, 
 And stood in thought full-armed ; thereafter 
 
 poured 
 
 Libation at the tent-door to the Lord 
 Of earth and sky, and prayed, saying : " O 
 
 Thou 
 
HELEN REDEEiMED 7 
 
 That hauntest dark Dodona, hear me now, 
 Since that the shadowing arm of Time is 
 
 flung 
 
 Far over me, but cloudeth me full young. 
 Scatheless I vow them. Let one Trojan cast 
 His spear and loose my spirit. Rage is past 
 Though I go forth my most provocative 
 Adventure : 'tis not I that seek. Receive 
 My prayer Thou as I have earned it lo, 
 Dying I stand, and hail Thee as I go 
 Lord of the ^Egis, wonderful, most great ! " 
 Which done, he took his stand, and bid 
 
 his mate 
 
 Urge on the steeds ; and all the Achaian host 
 Followed him, not with outcry or loud boast 
 Of deeds to do or done, but silent, grim 
 As to a shambles so they followed him, 
 Eyeing that nodding crest and swaying spear 
 Shake with the chariot. Solemn thus they 
 
 near 
 
 The Trojan walls, slow-moving, as by a Fate 
 Driven ; and thus before the Skaian Gate 
 Stands he in pomp of dreadful calm, to die, 
 As once in dreadful haste to slay. 
 
 Thereby 
 The walls were thick with men, and in the 
 
 towers 
 Women stood gazing, clustered close as 
 
 flowers 
 That blur the rocks in some high mountain 
 
 pass 
 
8 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 With delicate hues ; but like the gray hill- 
 grass 
 Which the wind sweepeth, till in waves of 
 
 . light 
 
 It tideth backwards so all gray or white 
 Showed they, as sudden surges moved them 
 
 cloak 
 Their heads, or bare their faces. And none 
 
 spoke 
 Among them, for there stood not woman 
 
 there 
 But mourned her dead, or sensed not in the 
 
 air 
 Her pendent doom of death, or worse than 
 
 death. 
 
 Frail as flowers were their faces, and all breath 
 Came short and quick, as on this dreadful 
 
 show 
 
 Staring, they pondered it done far below 
 As on a stage where the thin players seem 
 Unkith to them who watch, the stuff of dream. 
 Nor else about the plain showed living thing 
 Save high in the blue where sailed on out- 
 spread wing 
 
 A vulture bird intent, with mighty span 
 Of pinion. 
 
 In the hush spake the dead man, 
 Hollow-voiced, terrible : " Ye tribes of Troy, 
 Here stand I out for death, and ye for joy 
 Of killing as ye will, by cast of spear, 
 By bowshot or with sword. If any peer 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 9 
 
 Of Hector or Sarpedon care the bout 
 Which they both tried aforetime let him out 
 With speed, and bring his many against one, 
 Fearing no treachery, for there shall be none 
 To aid me, God nor man ; nor yet will I 
 Stir finger in the business, but will die 
 By murder sooner than in battle fall 
 Under some Trojan hand." 
 
 Breathless stood all, 
 
 Not moving out ; but Paris on the roof 
 Of his high house, where snug he sat aloof, 
 Drew taut the bowstring home, and notched 
 
 a shaft, 
 
 Soft whistling to himself, what time with craft 
 Of peering eyes and narrow twisted face 
 He sought an aim. 
 
 Swift from her hiding-place 
 Came burning Helen then, in her blue eyes 
 A fire unquenchable, but cold as ice 
 That scorcheth ere it strike a mortal chill 
 Upon the heart. " Darest thou . . . ? " 
 
 Smiling still, 
 
 He heeded not her warning, nor he read 
 The terror of her eyes, but drew and sped 
 A screaming arrow, deadly, swerving not 
 Then stood to watch the ruin he had wrought. 
 He heard the sob of breath o'er all the host 
 Of hushing men ; he marked, but then he 
 
 lost, 
 The blood-spurt at the shaft-head ; for the 
 
 crest 
 
io HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Upheaved, the shoulders stiffen'd, ere to the 
 
 breast 
 Bent down the head, as though the glazing 
 
 ^ sight 
 Curious would mark the death-spot. Still 
 
 upright 
 
 Stood he ; but as a tree that on the side 
 Of Ida yields to axe her soaring pride 
 And lightlier waves her leafy crown, and 
 
 swings 
 
 From side to side so on his crest the wings 
 Erect seemed shaking upwards, and to sag 
 The spear's point, and the burden'd head to 
 
 wag 
 
 Before the stricken body felt the stroke, 
 Or the strong knees grew lax, or the heart 
 
 broke. 
 Breathless they waited ; then the failing 
 
 man 
 
 Stiffened anew his neck, and changed and wan 
 Looked for the last time in the face of day, 
 And seemed to dare the Gods such might to 
 
 slay 
 
 As this, the sanguine splendid thing he was, 
 Withal now gray of face and pinched. Alas, 
 For pride of life ! Now he had heard his 
 
 knell. 
 
 His spirit passed, and crashing down he fell, 
 Mighty Achilles, and struck the earth, and 
 
 lay 
 A huddled mass, a bulk of bronze and clay 
 
HELEN REDEEMED n 
 
 Bestuck with gilt and glitter, like a toy. 
 There dropt a forest hush on watching Troy, 
 Upon the plain and watching ranks of men ; 
 And from a tower some woman keened him 
 
 then 
 
 With long thin cry that wavered in the air 
 As once before one wailed her Hector there. 
 
SECOND STAVE 
 
 MENELAUS' DREAM : HELEN ON THE WALL 
 
 So he who wore his honour like a wreath 
 About his brows went the dark way of death ; 
 Which being done, that deed of ruth and 
 
 doom 
 Gave breath to Troy ; but on the Achaians 
 
 gloom 
 
 Settled like pall of cloud upon a land 
 That swoons beneath it. Desperate they 
 
 scanned 
 Each other, saying : " Now we are left by 
 
 God," 
 
 And in the huts behind the wall abode, 
 Heeding not Diomede, Idomeneus, 
 Nor keen Odysseus, nor that friend of Zeus 
 Mykenai's king, nor that robbed Menelaus, 
 Nor bowman Teukros, Nestor wise, nor 
 
 Aias 
 
 Huge Aias, cursed in death ! Peleides bare 
 Himself with pride, but he went raving there. 
 For in the high assembly Thetis made 
 
 12 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 13 
 
 In honour of her son, to waft his shade 
 In peace to Hades' house, after the fire 
 Twice a man's height for him who did suspire 
 Twice a man's heart and render it to Heaven 
 Who gave it, after offerings paid and given, 
 And games of men and horses, she brought 
 
 forth 
 
 His regal arms for hero of most worth 
 In the broad Danaan host, who was adjudged 
 Odysseus by all voices. Aias grudged 
 The vote and wandered brooding, drawn 
 
 apart 
 
 From his room-fellows, seeding in his heart 
 Envy, which biting inwards did corrode 
 His mettle, and his ill blood plied the goad 
 Upon his brain, until the wretch made mad 
 Went muttering his wrongs, ill-trimmed, ill- 
 clad, 
 
 Sightless and careless, with slack mouth awry, 
 And working tongue, and danger in the eye ; 
 And oft would stare at Heaven and laugh 
 
 his scorn : 
 " O fools, think not to trick me ! " then 
 
 forlorn 
 
 Would gaze about green earth or out to sea : 
 " This is the end of man in his degree " 
 Thus would he moralise in those bare lands 
 With hopeless brows and tossing up of 
 
 hands 
 
 " To sow in sweat and see another reap ! " 
 Then, pitying himself, he'd fall to weep 
 
i 4 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 His desolation, scorned by Gods, by men 
 Slighted ; but in a flash he'd rage again 
 And shake his naked sword at unseen foes, 
 And dare them bring Odysseus to his blows : 
 Or let the man but flaunt himself in arms . . . ! 
 So threatening God knows what of savage 
 
 harms, 
 
 On him the oxen patient in the marsh, 
 Knee-deep in rushes, gazed to hear his harsh 
 Outcry ; and them his madness taught for 
 
 Greeks, 
 
 So on their dumb immensity he wreaks 
 His vengeance, driving in the press with 
 
 shout 
 
 Of " Aias ! Aias ! " hurtling, carving out 
 A way with mighty swordstroke, cut and 
 
 thrust, 
 
 And makes a shambles in his witless lust ; 
 And in the midst, bloodshot, with blank wild 
 
 eyes 
 
 Stands frothing at the lips, and after lies 
 All reeking in his madman's battlefield, 
 And sleeps nightlong. But with the dawn's 
 
 revealed 
 
 The pity of his folly ; then he sees 
 Himself at his fool's work. With shaking 
 
 knees 
 
 He stands amid his slaughter, and his own 
 Adds to the wreck, plunging without a groan 
 Upon his planted sword. So Aisa died 
 Lonely ; and he who, never from his side 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 15 
 
 Removed, had shared his fame, the Lokrian, 
 Abode the fate foreordered in the plan 
 Which the Blind Women ignorantly weave. 
 
 But think not on the dead, who die and 
 
 leave 
 
 A memory more fragrant than their deeds, 
 But to the remnant rather and their needs 
 Give thought with me. What comfort in 
 
 their swords 
 Have they, robbed of the might of two such 
 
 lords 
 
 As Peleus' son and Telamon's ? What art 
 Can drive the blood back to the stricken heart ? 
 Like huddled sheep cowed obstinate, as dull 
 As oxen impotent the wain to pull 
 Out of a rut, which, failing at first lunge, 
 Answer not voice nor goad, but sideways 
 
 plunge 
 Or backward urge with lowered heads, or 
 
 stand 
 
 Dumb monuments of sufferance so un- 
 manned 
 The Achaians brooded, nor their chiefs had 
 
 care 
 To drive them forth, since they too knew 
 
 despair, 
 
 And neither saw in battle nor retreat 
 A way of honour. 
 
 And the plain grew sweet 
 Again with living green ; the spring o' the year 
 
1 6 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Came in with flush of flower and bird-call 
 
 clear ; 
 And Nature, for whom nothing wrought is 
 
 vain, 
 Out of shed blood caused grass to spring 
 
 amain, 
 
 And seemed with tender irony to flout 
 Man's folly and pain when twixt dead spears 
 
 sprang out 
 The crocus-point and pied the plain with 
 
 fires 
 More gracious than his beacons ; and from 
 
 pyres 
 
 Of burnt dead men the asphodel uprose 
 Like fleecy clouds flushed with the morning 
 
 rose, 
 A holy pall to hide his folly and pain. 
 
 Thus upon earth hope fell like a new rain, 
 And by and by the pent folk within walls 
 Took heart and ploughed the glebe and from 
 
 the stalls 
 Led out their kine to pasture. Goats and 
 
 sheep 
 Cropt at their ease, and herd-boys now did 
 
 keep 
 
 Watch, where before stood armed sentinels ; 
 And battle-grounds were musical with bells 
 Of feeding beasts. Afar, high-beacht, the 
 
 ships 
 Loomed through the tender mist, their prows 
 
 like lips 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 17 
 
 Of thirsty birds which, lacking water, cry 
 Salvation out of Heaven flung on high : 
 Which marking, Ilios deemed her worst of 
 
 road 
 
 Was travelled, and held Paris for a God 
 Who winged the shaft that brought them all 
 
 this peace. 
 
 He in their love went sunning, took his 
 
 ease 
 
 In house and hall, at council or at feast, 
 Careless of what was greatest or what least 
 Of all his deeds, so only by his side 
 She lay, the blush-rose Helen, stolen bride, 
 The lovely harbour of his arms. But she, 
 A thrall, now her own thralldom plain could 
 
 see, 
 And sick of dalliance, loathed herself, and 
 
 him 
 Who had beguiled her. Now through eyes 
 
 made dim 
 
 With tears she looked towards the salt sea- 
 beach 
 Where stood the ships, and sought for sign 
 
 in each 
 
 If it might be her people's, and so hers, 
 Poor alien ! Argive now herself she avers 
 And proudly slave of Paris and no wife : 
 Minion she calls herself ; and when to strife 
 Of love he claims her, secret her heart surges 
 Back to her lord ; and when to kiss he urges, 
 
1 8 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And when to play he woos her with soft 
 
 words, 
 
 Secret her fond heart calleth, like a bird's, 
 Towards that honoured mate who honoured 
 
 her, 
 
 Making her wife indeed, not paramour, 
 Mother, and sharer of his hearth and all 
 His gear. Thus every night : and on the 
 
 wall 
 She watches every dawn for what dawn 
 
 brings. 
 And the strong spirit of her took new 
 
 wings 
 
 And left her lovely body in the arms 
 Of him who doted, conning o'er her charms, 
 And witless held a shell ; but forth as light 
 As the first sigh of dawn her spirit took 
 
 flight 
 Across the dusky plain to where fires 
 
 gleamed 
 And muffled guards stood sentry ; and it 
 
 streamed 
 
 Within the hut, and hovered like a wraith, 
 A presence felt, not seen, as when gray Death 
 Seems to the dying man a bedside guest, 
 But to the watchers cannot be exprest. 
 So hovered Helen in a dream, and yearned 
 Over the sleeper as he moaned and turned, 
 Renewing his day's torment in his sleep ; 
 Who presently starts up and sighing deep, 
 Searches the entry, if haply in the skies 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 19 
 
 The day begin to stir. Lo there, her eyes 
 Like waning stars ! Lo there, her pale sad 
 
 face 
 Becurtained in loose hair ! Now he can 
 
 trace 
 Athwart that gleaming moon her mouth's 
 
 droopt bow 
 
 To tell all truth about her, and her woe 
 And dreadful store of knowledge. As one 
 
 shockt 
 To worse than death lookt she, with horror 
 
 lockt 
 
 Behind her tremulous tragic-moving lips : 
 " O love, O love," saith he, and saying, slips 
 Out of the bed : " Who hath dared do thee 
 
 wrong ? " 
 
 No answer hath she, but she looks him long 
 And deep, and looking, fades. He sleeps 
 
 no more, 
 
 But up and down he pads the beaten floor, 
 And all that day his heart's wild crying 
 
 hears, 
 And can thank God for gracious dew of 
 
 tears 
 And tender thoughts of her, not thoughts of 
 
 shame. 
 So came the next night, and with night she 
 
 came, 
 
 Dream-Helen ; and he knew then he must go 
 Whence she had come. His need would 
 
 have it so 
 
20 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And her need. Never must she call in vain. 
 
 Now takes he way alone over the plain 
 Where dark yet hovers like a catafalque 
 And all life swoons, and only dead things 
 
 walk, 
 
 Uneasy sprites denied a resting space, 
 That shudder as they flit from place to place, 
 Like bats of flaggy wing that make night 
 
 blink 
 With endless quest : so do those dead, men 
 
 think, 
 
 Who fall and are unserved by funeral rite. 
 These passes he, and nears the walls of might 
 Which Godhead built for proud Laomedon, 
 And knows the house of Paris built thereon, 
 Terraced and set with gadding vines and trees 
 And ever falling water, for the ease 
 Of that sweet indweller he held in store. 
 Thither he turns him quaking, but before 
 Him dares not look, lest he should see her 
 
 there 
 
 Aglimmer through the dusk and, unaware, 
 Discover her fill some mere homely part 
 Intolerably familiar to his heart, 
 And deeply there enshrined and glorified, 
 Laid up with bygone bliss. Yet on he hied, 
 Being called, and ever closer on he came 
 As if no wrong nor misery nor shame 
 Could harder be than not to see her Nay, 
 Even if within that smooth thief's arms she 
 lay 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 21 
 
 Besmothered in his kisses rather so 
 
 Had he stood stabbed to see, than on to 
 
 g 
 His round of lonely exile ! 
 
 Now he stands 
 Beneath her house, and on his spear his 
 
 hands 
 Rest, and upon his hands he grounds his 
 
 chin, 
 
 And motionless abides till day come in ; 
 Pure of his vice, that he might ease her woe, 
 Not brand her with his own. Not yet the 
 
 glow 
 Of false dawn throbbed, nor yet the silent 
 
 town 
 Stood washt in light, clear - printed to the 
 
 crown 
 In the cold upper air. Dark loomed the 
 
 walls, 
 Ghostly the trees, and still shuddered the 
 
 calls 
 
 Of owl to owl from unseen towers. Afar 
 A dog barked. High and hidden in the 
 
 haar 
 
 Which blew in from the sea a heron cried 
 Honk ! and he heard his wings, but not 
 
 espied 
 The heavy flight. Slow, slow the orb was 
 
 filled 
 With light, and with the light his heart was 
 
 thrilled 
 
22 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 With opening music, faint, expectant, sharp 
 As the first chords one picks out from the 
 
 harp 
 
 To prelude paean. Venturing all, he lift 
 His eyes, and there encurtained in a drift 
 Of sea-blue mantle close-drawn, he espies 
 Helen above him watching, her grave eyes 
 Upon him fixt, blue homes of mystery 
 Unfathomable, eternal as the sea, 
 And as unresting. 
 
 So in that still place, 
 In that still hour stood those two face to 
 
 face. 
 
THIRD STAVE 
 
 MENELAUS SPEAKS WITH HELEN 
 
 BUT when he had her there, sharp root 
 
 of ill 
 
 To him and his, safeguarded from him still, 
 Too sweet to be forgotten, too much marred 
 By usage to be what she seemed, bescarred, 
 Behandled, too much lost and too much won, 
 Mock image making horrible the sun 
 That once had shown her pure for his 
 
 demesne, 
 
 And still revealed her lovely, and unclean 
 Despair turned into stone what had been kind, 
 And bitter surged his griefs, to flood his 
 
 mind. 
 
 " O ruinous face," said he, " O evilhead, 
 Art thou so early from the wicked bed ? 
 So prompt to slough the snugness of thy 
 
 vice ? 
 
 Or is it that in luxury thou art nice 
 Become, and dalliest ? " Low her head she 
 
 hung 
 
 2 3 
 
24 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And moved her lips. As when the night is 
 
 young 
 
 The hollow wind presages storm, his moan 
 Came wailing at her. " Ten years here, 
 
 alone, 
 And in that time to have seen thee thrice ! " 
 
 But she : 
 
 " Often and often have I chanced to see 
 My lord pass." 
 
 His heart leapt, as leaps the child 
 Enwombed : " Hast thou ? " 
 
 Faintly her quick eyes smiled : 
 "'At this time my house sleepeth, but I 
 
 wake ; 
 
 So have time to myself when I can take 
 New air, and old thought." 
 
 As a man who skills 
 To read high hope out of dark oracles, 
 So gleamed his eyes ; so fierce and quick 
 
 said he : 
 
 " Lady, O God ! Now would that I could be 
 Beside thee there, breathing thy breath, thy 
 
 thought 
 
 Gathering ! " Silent stood she, memory- 
 fraught, 
 Nor looked his way. But he must know 
 
 her soul, 
 
 So harpt upon her heart. " Is this the whole 
 That thou wouldst have me think, that thou 
 
 com'st here 
 Alone to be ? " 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 25 
 
 She blushed and dared to peer 
 Downward. " Is it so wonderful," she said, 
 " If I desire it ? " He : " Nay, by my head, 
 Not so ; but wonderful I think it is 
 In any man to suffer it." The hiss 
 Of passion stript all vesture from his tones 
 And showed the King man naked to the 
 
 bones, 
 Man naked to the body's utterance. 
 
 She turned her head, but felt his burning 
 
 glance 
 Scorch, and his words leap up. " Dost thou 
 
 desire 
 I leave thee then ? Answer me that." 
 
 " Nay, sire, 
 Not so." And he : " Bid me to stay while 
 
 sleeps 
 Thy house," he said, " so stay I." Her eyes' 
 
 deeps 
 
 Flooded his soul and drowned him in despair, 
 Despair and rage. " Behold now, ten years' 
 
 wear 
 
 Between us and our love ! Now if I cast 
 My spear and rove the snow-mound of thy 
 
 breast, 
 Were that a marvel ? " 
 
 Long she lookt and grave, 
 Pondering his face and searching. " Not so 
 
 brave 
 My lord as that would prove him. Nay, 
 
 and I know 
 
26 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 He would not do it." And the truth was 
 
 so ; 
 And well he knew the reason : better she. 
 
 Yet for a little in that vacancy 
 Of silence and unshadowing light they stood, 
 Those long-divided, speechless. His first 
 
 mood 
 With bitter grudge was choked, but hers was 
 
 mild, 
 
 As fearing his. At last she named the child, 
 Asking, Was all well ? Short he told her, 
 
 Yes, 
 
 The child was well. She fingered in her dress 
 And watched her hand at play there. 
 
 " Here," she said, 
 "There is no child," and sighed. Into his 
 
 dead 
 And wasted heart there leaped a flame and 
 
 caught 
 His hollow eyes. " Remembcrest thou 
 
 naught, 
 
 Nothing regrettest, nothing holdst in grief 
 Of all our joy together ere that thief 
 Came rifling in ? " For all her answer she 
 Lookt long upon him, long and earnestly ; 
 And misty grew her eyes, and slowly filled. 
 Slowly the great tears brimmed, and slowly 
 
 rilled 
 
 Adown her cheeks. So presently she hid 
 Those wells of grief, and hung her lovely 
 
 head ; 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 27 
 
 And he had no more words, but only a cry 
 At heart too deep for utterance, and too high 
 For tears. 
 
 And now came Paris from the house 
 Into the sun, rosy and amorous, 
 As when the sun himself from the sea-rim 
 Lifteth, and gloweth on the earth grown dim 
 With waiting ; and he piped a low clear call 
 As mellow as the thrush's at the fall 
 Of day from some near thicket. At whose 
 
 sound 
 Rose up caught Helen and blushing turned 
 
 her round 
 
 To face him ; but in going, ere she met 
 The prince, her hand along the parapet 
 She trailed, palm out, for sign to who below 
 Rent at himself, nor had the wit to know 
 In that dumb signal eloquence, and hope 
 Therein beyond his sick heart's utmost scope. 
 Throbbing he stood as when a quick-blown 
 
 peat, 
 Now white, now red, burns inly O wild 
 
 heat, 
 
 O ravenous race of men, who'd barter Space 
 And Time for one short snatch of instant 
 
 grace ! 
 Withal, next day, drawn by his dear 
 
 desire, 
 When as the young green burned like 
 
 emerald fire 
 
28 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 In the cold light, back to the tryst he came ; 
 But she was sooner there, and called his 
 
 name 
 
 Softly as cooing dove her bosom's mate ; 
 And showed her eyes to him, which half 
 
 sedate 
 
 To be so sought revealed her, half in doubt 
 Lest he should deem her bold to meet the 
 
 bout 
 With too much readiness. But high he 
 
 flaunted 
 
 Her name towards the sky. " Thou God- 
 enchanted, 
 Thou miracle of dawn, thou Heart of the 
 
 Rose, 
 
 Hail thou ! " On his own eloquence he grows 
 The lover he proclaims. " O love," he 
 
 saith, 
 " I would not leave thee for a moment's 
 
 breath, 
 Nor once these ten long years had left thy 
 
 side 
 Had it been possible to stay ! " 
 
 She sighed, 
 She wondered o'er his face, she looked her 
 
 fill, 
 
 Museful, still doubting, smiling half, athrill, 
 All virgin to his praise. " O wonderful," 
 She said, " Such store of love for one so foul 
 As I am now ! " 
 
 O fatal hot-and-cold, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 29 
 
 O love, whose iris wings not long can hold 
 The upper air ! Sudden her thought smote 
 
 hot 
 On him. " Thou sayest ! True it is, God 
 
 wot ! 
 Warm from his bed, and tears for thy 
 
 unworth ; 
 Warm from his bed, and tears to meet my 
 
 mirth ; 
 Then back to his bed ere yet thy tears be 
 
 dry!" 
 
 She heard not, but she knew his agony 
 Of burning vision, and kept back her tears 
 Until his pity moved in tune with hers 
 Towards herself. But he from thunderous 
 
 brows 
 Frowned on. " No more I see thee by this 
 
 house, 
 
 Except to slay thee when the hour decree 
 An end to this vile nest of cuckoldry 
 And holy vows made hateful, save thou speak 
 To each my question sooth. Keep dry thy 
 
 cheek 
 From tears, hide up thy beauty with thy 
 
 grief 
 
 Or let him have his joy of them, thy thief, 
 What time he may. Answer me thou, or 
 
 vain 
 
 Till thine hour strike to look for me again." 
 With hanging head and quiet hanging 
 
 hands, 
 
30 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 With lip atremble, as caught in fault she 
 
 stands, 
 
 Scarce might he hear her whispered message : 
 
 " Ask, 
 Lord, and I answer thee." 
 
 Strung to his task : 
 "Tell me now all," he said, "from that far 
 
 day 
 
 Whenas embracing thee, I stood to pray, 
 And poured forth wine unto the thirsty earth 
 To Zeus and to Poseidon, in whose girth 
 Lie sea and land ; to Gaia next, their spouse, 
 And next to Here, mistress of my house, 
 Traitress, and thine, for grace upon my 
 
 faring : 
 For thou wert by to hear me, false arm 
 
 bearing 
 
 Upon my shoulder, glowing, lying cheek 
 Next unto mine. Ay, and thou prayedst, 
 
 with meek 
 
 Fair seeming, prosperous send-off and return. 
 Tell me what then, tell all, and let me learn 
 With what pretence that dog-souled slaked 
 
 his thirst 
 In thy sweet liquor. Tell me that the 
 
 first." 
 Then Helen lifted up her head, and 
 
 beamed 
 Clear light upon him from her eyes, which 
 
 seemed 
 That blue which, lying on the white sea-bed 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 31 
 
 And gazing up, the sunbeam overhead 
 Would show, with green entinctured, and the 
 
 warp 
 
 Inwoven of golden shafts, blended yet sharp ; 
 So that a glory mild and radiant 
 Transfigured them. Upon him fell aslant 
 That lovely light, while in her cheeks the hue 
 Of throbbing dawn came sudden. So he 
 
 knew 
 Her best before she spoke ; for when she 
 
 spoke 
 
 It was as if the nightingale should croak 
 In April midst the first young leaves, so 
 
 bleak, 
 So harsh she schooled her throat, that it 
 
 should speak 
 
 Dry matter and hard logic as if she 
 Were careful lest self-pity urged a plea 
 Which was not hers to make ; or as one faint 
 And desperate lays down all his argument 
 Like bricks upon a field, let who will make 
 A house of them ; so drily Helen spake 
 With a flat voice. " Thou hadst been nine 
 
 days gone, 
 
 Came my lord Alexandros, Priam's son, 
 And hailed me in the hall whereas I sat, 
 And claimed his guest -right, which not 
 
 wondering at 
 
 I gave as fitting was. Then came the day 
 I was beguiled. What more is there to say ? " 
 Fixt on her fingers playing on the wall 
 
 
32 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Her eyes were. But the King said : "Tell 
 
 me all. 
 
 Thou wert beguiled : by his desire beguiled, 
 Or by thine own ? " She shook her head and 
 
 smiled 
 
 Most sadly, pitying herself. " Who knoweth 
 The ways of Love, whence cometh, whither 
 
 goeth 
 The heart's low whimper ? This I know, 
 
 he loved 
 
 Me then, and pleasured only where I moved 
 About the house. And I had pleasure too 
 To know of me he had it. Then we knew 
 The day at hand when he must take the 
 
 road 
 
 And leave me ; and its eve we close abode 
 Within the house, and spake not. But I 
 
 wept." 
 She stayed, and whispering down her next 
 
 word crept : 
 " I was beguiled, beguiled." And then her 
 
 HP 
 
 She bit, and rueful showed her partnership 
 In sinful dealing. 
 
 But he, in his esteem 
 Bleeding and raw, urged on. " To Kranai's 
 
 deme 
 He took thee then ? " 
 
 Speechless she bent her head 
 Towards her tender breasts whereon, soft 
 shed 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 33 
 
 As upon low quiet hills, the dawn light 
 
 played, 
 And limned their gentle curves or sank in 
 
 shade. 
 
 So gazing, stood she silent, but the King 
 Urged on. " From thence to Ilios, thou 
 
 willing, 
 Hetookthee?" 
 
 Then, u I was beguiled," again 
 She said ; and he, who felt a worthier strain 
 Stir in his gall compassion, and uplift 
 Him out of knowledge, saw a blessed rift 
 Upon his dark horizon, as tow'rds night 
 The low clouds break and shafted shows the 
 
 ^ light. 
 " Ten years beguiled ! " he said, " but now it 
 
 seems 
 Thou art " She shook her head. " Nay, 
 
 now come dreams ; 
 Nay, now I think, remember, now I see." 
 "What callest thou to mind?" "Her- 
 
 mione," 
 She said, " our child, and Sparta my own 
 
 land, 
 
 And all the honour that lay to my hand 
 Had I but chosen it, as now I would " 
 And sudden hid her face up in her hood, 
 Her courage ebbed in grief, all hardness 
 
 drowned 
 In bitter weeping. 
 
 Noble pity crowned 
 D 
 
34 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 The greater man in him ; so for a space 
 They wept together, she for loss ; for grace 
 Of gain wept he. " No more," he said, " my 
 
 sweet, 
 Tell me no more." 
 
 " Ah, hear the whole of it 
 Before my hour is gone," she cried. But he 
 Groaning, " I dare not stay here lest I see 
 Him take thee again." 
 
 Both hands to fold her breast, 
 She shook her head ; like as the sun through 
 
 mist 
 Shone triumph in her eyes. " Have no more 
 
 fear 
 
 Of him or any " Then, hearing a stir 
 
 Within the house, her finger toucht her lip, 
 And one fixt look she gave of fellowship 
 Assured then turned and quickly went her 
 
 way ; 
 And his light vanisht with her for that day 
 
FOURTH STAVE 
 
 THE APOLOGY OF HELEN 
 
 O SINGING heart, O twice-undaunted lover! 
 O ever to be blest, twice blest moreover ! 
 Twice over win the world in one girl's eyes, 
 Twice over lift her name up to the skies ; 
 Twice to hope all things, so to be twice 
 
 born 
 
 For he lives not who cannot front the morn 
 Saying, " This day I live as never yet 
 Lived striving man on earth ! " What if the 
 
 fret 
 
 Of loss and ten years' agonizing snow 
 Thy hairs or leave their tracery on thy brow, 
 Each line beslotted by the demon hounds 
 Hunting thee down o' nights ? Laugh at 
 
 thy wounds, 
 Laugh at thy eld, strong lover, whose blood 
 
 flows 
 
 Clear from the fountain, singing as it goes, 
 " She loves, and so I live and shall not die ! 
 Love on, love her : 'tis immortality. 
 35 
 
36 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Once more before the sun he greeted her : 
 She glowed her joy ; her mood was calm and 
 
 clear 
 
 As mellow evening's whenas, like a priest, 
 Rain has absolved the world, and golden mist 
 Hangs over all like benediction. 
 In her proud eyes sat triumph on a throne, 
 To know herself beloved, her lover by, 
 So near the consummation. Womanly 
 She dallied with the moment when, all wife, 
 Upon his breast she'd lie and cast her life, 
 Cast body, soul and spirit in one gest 
 Supreme of giving. Glorying in his quest 
 Of her, now let her hide what he must glean, 
 But not know yet. Ah, sweet to feel his 
 
 keen 
 Long eye -search, like the touch of eager 
 
 fingers, 
 And sweet to thrill beneath such hot blush- 
 
 bringers ; 
 
 To fence with such a swordsman hazardous 
 And sweet. " Belov'd, thou art glad of me ! " 
 
 Then thus 
 Antiphonal to him she breathes, "Thou 
 
 sayest ! " 
 " I see thy light and hail it ! " 
 
 " Thou begayest 
 My poor light." 
 
 " Knowest thou not that thou art loved ? " 
 " And am I loved then ? " 
 
 " If thou'ldst have it proved, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 37 
 
 Look in my eyes. Would thine were open 
 
 book!" ' 
 " Palimpsest I," she said, and would not 
 
 look. 
 But he was grappling now with truth, 
 
 would have it, 
 What though it cost him all his gain. She 
 
 gave it, 
 
 Looking him along. " O lady mine," he said, 
 " Now are my clouds dispersed every shred ; 
 For thou art mine ; I think thou lovest me. 
 Speak, is that true ?" 
 
 She could not, or may be 
 She would not hold her gaze, but let it fall, 
 And watched her fingers idling on the wall, 
 And so remained ; but urged to it by the 
 
 spell 
 
 He cast, she whispered down, " I cannot tell 
 Thee here, and thus apart " which when he 
 
 had 
 
 In its full import drove him well-nigh mad 
 With longing. " Call me and I come ! " 
 
 But fear 
 Flamed in her eyes : " No, no, 'tis death ! 
 
 He's here 
 At hand. 'Tis death for thee, and worse 
 
 than death " 
 She ended so " for both of us." 
 
 And breath 
 Failed him, for well he knew now what she 
 
 meant, 
 
38 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And sighed his thanks to Gods beneficent. 
 
 Thereafter in sweet use of lovers' talk, 
 In boon spring weather, whenas lovers walk 
 Handfasted through the meadows pied, and 
 
 wet 
 With dew from flower and leaf, these lovers 
 
 met 
 
 Two bodies separate, one wild heart between, 
 Day after day, these two long-severed been ; 
 And of this mating of the eye and tongue 
 There grew desire passionate and strong 
 For body's mating and its testimony, 
 Hearts' intimacy, perfect, full and free. 
 
 And Helen for her heart's ease did deny 
 Her girdled Goddess of the beamy eye, 
 Saying, " Come you down, Mistress of sleek 
 
 loves 
 And panting nights : your service of bought 
 
 doves 
 
 And honey-hearted wine may cost too dear. 
 What hast thou done for me since first my 
 
 ear 
 
 With thy sly music thou didst sign and seal 
 Apprentice to thy mystery, teach me feel 
 Thy fierce divinity in the trembling touch 
 Of open lips ? Served I not thee too much 
 In Kranai and in Sparta my demesne, 
 Too much in widc-wayed Ilios, Eastern 
 
 Queen ? 
 
 Yes, but it was too much a thousandfold, 
 For what was I but leman bought and sold ? 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 39 
 
 " For woman craved what mercy hath man 
 
 brought, 
 
 What face a woman for a woman sought ? 
 What mercy or what face ? And what saith 
 
 she, 
 The hunted, scorned wretch ? Boast that 
 
 she be 
 
 Coveted, hankered, spat on ? One to gloat, 
 The rest to snarl without ! If man play goat, 
 What must she play ? Her glory is it to 
 
 draw 
 
 On greedy eye, sting greedy lip and paw, 
 And find the crown of her desire therein ? 
 Hath she no rarer bliss than all this sin, 
 Is she for dandling, kissing, hidden up 
 For hungry hands to stroke or lips to sup ? 
 Hath she then nothing of her own, no mirth 
 In honesty, nor eyes to worship worth, 
 Nor pride except in that which makes men 
 
 dogs, 
 
 Nor loathing for the vice wherein, like logs 
 That float beneath the sun, lie fair women 
 Submiss, inert receptacles for sin ? 
 Is this her all ? Hath she no heart, nor care 
 Therefor? No womb, nor hope therein to 
 
 bear 
 
 Fruit of her heart's insurgence ? Is her face, 
 Are these her breasts for fondling, not to 
 
 grace 
 
 Her heart's high honour, swell to nurture it, 
 That it too grow ? Hath she no mother- wit, 
 
40 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Nor sense for living things and innocent, 
 Nor leap of joy for this good world's content 
 Of sun and wind, of flower and leaf, and song 
 Of bird, or shout of children as they throng 
 The world of mated men and women ? Nay, 
 Persuade me not, O Kypris ; but I say 
 Evil hath been the lore which thou hast 
 
 taught 
 For many have loved my face, and many 
 
 sought 
 
 My breast, and thought it joy supping thereat 
 Sweetness and dear delight ; but out of that 
 What hath there come to them, to me and all 
 Mine but hot shame ? Not milk, but bitter 
 
 gall." 
 
 So in her high passion she rent herself 
 And rocked, or hid her face upon the shelf 
 Of the grim wall, lest he should see the whole 
 Inexpiable sorrow of her soul. 
 But he by pity pure made bountiful 
 Lent her excuse, by every means to lull 
 Her agony. Said he, " Of mortals who 
 Can e'er withstand the way she wills them to, 
 Kypris the forceful Goddess ? Nay, dear child, 
 Thou wert constrained." 
 
 She said, " I was beguiled 
 And clung to him until the day-dawn broke 
 When I could read as in the roll of a book 
 His open heart. And then my own heart 
 reeled 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 41 
 
 To know him craven, dog, not man, revealed 
 A panting drudge of lust, who held me here 
 Caged vessel. Nay, come close. I loved 
 
 him dear, 
 
 Too dear, I know ; but never till he came 
 Had known the leap of joy, the fire of flame 
 Upon the heart he gave me, Paris the bright, 
 Whose memory was music and his sight 
 Fragrance, whose nearness made my footfall 
 
 dance, 
 Whose touch was fever, and his burning 
 
 glance 
 Faintness and blindness ; in whose light my 
 
 life 
 
 Centred ; who was the sun, and I, false wife, 
 The foolish flower that turns whereso he 
 
 wheels 
 
 Over the broad earth's canopy, and steals 
 Colour from his strong beam, but at the last 
 Whenas the night comes and the day is past 
 Droops, burnt at the heart. So loved I him, 
 
 and so 
 Waxed bold to dare the deed that brought 
 
 this woe." 
 And there she changed, and bitter was her 
 
 cry : 
 
 " Ah, lord, far better had it been to die 
 Ere I had cast this pain on thee, and shame 
 On me, and wrought such outrage on our 
 
 name. 
 Natheless I live " 
 
42 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 " Ay, and give life ! " he said ; 
 "Yet this thing more I'd have thee tell 
 
 what led 
 Thy thought to me? From him, what 
 
 turned thy troth 
 Such troth as there could be ? " 
 
 She cried, " The oath ! 
 The oath ye sware before the Lords of 
 
 Heaven, 
 
 The sacrifice, the pledges taken and given 
 When thou and Paris met upon the plain, 
 And all the host sat down to watch you twain 
 Do battle, which should have me. For my 
 
 part, 
 
 They took me forth to watch ; as in the mart 
 A heifer feels the giver of the feast 
 Pinch in her flank, and hears the chaffer twist 
 This way and that for so much fat or lean 
 Even so was I, a queen, child of a queen." 
 
 She bit her lip until the blood ran free, 
 And in her eyes he markt deep injury 
 Scald as the salt tears welled ; but " Listen 
 
 yet," 
 
 She said : " Ye fought, and Paris fell beset 
 Under thy spurning heel, yet felt no whit 
 The bitterness as I must come to it ; 
 For she, his Goddess, hid him up in mists 
 And brought him beat and broken from the 
 
 lists 
 Here to his chamber. But I stood and 
 
 burned, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 43 
 
 Shameful to be by one lost, by one earned, 
 A prize for games, a slave, a bandied thing 
 Since as the oath was made so must I swing 
 From bed to bed. But while I stood and 
 
 wept, 
 
 Melted in fruitless sorrow, up she crept 
 For me, his Goddess, gliding like a snake, 
 Who wreathed her arms and whispering me 
 
 go make 
 The nuptial couch, < What oath binds love ? ' 
 
 did say. 
 
 Loathing him, I must go. He had his way, 
 As well he might who paid that goodly price, 
 Honour, truth, courage, all, to have his vice : 
 The which forsook him when those fair 
 
 things fled ; 
 
 For though my body hath lain in his bed, 
 My heart abhors it. And now in truth I wis 
 My lord's true heart is where my own heart 
 
 is, 
 
 The two together welded and made whole ; 
 And I will go to him and give my soul 
 And shamed and faded body to his nod, 
 To spurn or take; and he shall be my God." 
 
 Whereat made virgin, as all women are 
 By love's white purging fire which leaves no 
 
 scar 
 Where all was soiled and seamed before the 
 
 torch 
 Of Eros toucht the heart, and the keen 
 
 scorch 
 
 
44 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Lickt up the foul misuse of vase so fair 
 As woman's body, Helen flusht and fair 
 Leaned from the wall a fire-hued seraph's 
 
 face 
 And in one rapt long look gave and took 
 
 Grace. 
 
 Deep in her eyes he saw the light divine, 
 Quick in him ran fierce joy of it like wine : 
 Light unto light made answer, as a flag 
 Answers when men tell tidings from one crag 
 Unto another, and from peak to peak 
 The good news flashes. Scarcely could he 
 
 speak 
 Measurable words, so high his wild thought 
 
 whirled : 
 " Bride, Goddess, Helen, O Wonder of the 
 
 World, 
 Shall I come for thee ? " 
 
 Her tender words came soft 
 As dropping rose petals on garden croft 
 Down from the wall's sheer height " Come 
 
 soon, come soon." 
 And homing to the lines those drummed his 
 
 tune. 
 
FIFTH STAVE 
 
 A COUNCIL OF THE ACHAIANS : 
 THE EMBASSY OF ODYSSEUS 
 
 Now calleth he assembly of the chiefs, 
 Princes and kings and captains, them whose 
 
 griefs 
 
 To ease his own like treasure had been lent ; 
 Who came and sat at board within the tent 
 Of him they hailed host-father and their lord 
 For this adventure, in aught else abhorred 
 Of all true men. He sits above the rest, 
 The fox-red Agamemnon, round his crest 
 The circlet of his kingship over kings, 
 And at his thigh the sword gold-hiked swings 
 Which Zeus gave Atreus once ; and in his 
 
 heart 
 That gnawing doubt which twice had checkt 
 
 his start 
 
 For high emprise, having twice egged him to it, 
 As stout Odysseus knew who had to rue it. 
 
 Beside him Nestor sat, Nestor the old, 
 White as the winter moon, with logic cold 
 
 45 
 
46 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Instilled, as if the blood in him had fled 
 And in his veins clear spirit ran instead, 
 Which made men reasons and not fired their 
 
 sprites. 
 
 And next Idomeneus of countless fights, 
 Shrewd leader of the Cretans ; by his side 
 Keen-flashing Diomedes in his pride, 
 The young, the wild in onset, whose war- 
 shrill, 
 
 Next after Peleus' son's, held all Troy still, 
 And stayed the gray crows at their ravelling 
 Of dead men's bones. Into debate full fling 
 Went he, adone with tapping of the foot 
 And drumming on the board. Had but his 
 
 suit 
 
 Been granted so he said the war were done 
 And Troy a name ere full three years had 
 
 gone: 
 
 For as for Helen and her daintiness, 
 Troy held a mort of women who no less 
 Than she could pleasure night when work 
 
 was over 
 
 And men came home ready to play the lover ; 
 And in housework would better her. Let 
 
 Helen 
 
 Be laid by Paris, villain, and dead villain 
 Dead long ago if he had taken the field 
 Instead of Menelaus. Then no shield 
 Had Kypris' golden body been, acquist 
 With his sword-arm already, near the wrist ! 
 So Diomedes. Next him sat a man 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 47 
 
 With all his woe to come, the Lokrian 
 
 Aias, son of O'fleus, bearded swart, 
 
 Pale, with his little eyes, and legs too short 
 
 And arms too long, a giant when he sat, 
 
 Dwarf else, and in the fight a tiger-cat. 
 
 But mark his neighbour, mark him well : to 
 
 him 
 
 Falleth the lot to lay a charge more grim 
 On woman fair than even Althaia felt 
 Like lead upon her heartstrings, when she 
 
 knelt 
 And blew to flame the brand that held the 
 
 life 
 
 Of her own son ; or Procne with the knife, 
 Who slew and dressed her child to be a meal 
 To his own father. But this man's thews 
 
 were steel, 
 
 And steely were the nerves about his heart, 
 As they had need. Mark him, and mark 
 
 the part 
 
 He plays hereafter. Odysseus is his name, 
 The wily Ithacan, deathless in his fame 
 And in his substance deathless, since he 
 
 goes 
 
 Immortal forth and back wherever blows 
 The thunder of thy rhythm, O blind King, 
 First of the tribe of them with songs to sing, 
 Fountain of storied music and its end 
 For who the poet since who doth not tend 
 To essay thy leaping measure, or call down 
 Thy nodded approbation for his crown 
 
48 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And all his wages ? 
 
 Other chiefs sat there 
 In order due : as Pyrrhos, very fair 
 And young, with high bright colour, and the 
 
 hue 
 
 Of evening in his eyes of violet-blue 
 Son of Achilles he, and new to war. 
 Then Antiklos and Teukros, best by far 
 Of all the bowmen in the host. And last 
 Menestheus the Athenian dikast, 
 Who led the folk from Pallas's fair home. 
 
 To them spake Menelaus, being come 
 Into assembly last, and taken in hand 
 The spokesman's staff : "Ye princes of our 
 
 land, 
 
 Adventurous Achaians, stout of heart, 
 Good news I bring, that now we may depart 
 Each to his home and kindred, each to his 
 
 hearth 
 And wife and children dear and well-tilled 
 
 garth, 
 
 Contented with the honour he has brought 
 To me and mine, since I have what we've 
 
 sought 
 
 With bitter pain and loss. Yea, even now 
 Hath Here crowned your strife and earned 
 
 my vow 
 Made these ten years come harvest, having 
 
 drawn 
 The veil from off those eyes than which not 
 
 dawn 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 49 
 
 Holds sweeter light nor holier, once they see. 
 Yea, chieftains, Helen's heart comes back to 
 
 me ; 
 
 And fast she watches now hard by the wall 
 Of the wicked house, and ere the cock shall 
 
 call 
 
 Another morn I have her in my arms 
 Redeemed for Sparta, pure of Trojan harms, 
 Whole-hearted and clean-hearted as she came 
 First, before Paris and his deed of shame 
 Threatened my house with wreck, and on his 
 
 own 
 Have brought no joy. This night, disguised, 
 
 alone, 
 
 I stand within the city, waiting day ; 
 Then when men sleep, all in the shadowless 
 
 Robbing the robber, I drop down with her 
 Over the wall and lo ! the end of the war ! " 
 Thus great of heart and high of heart he 
 
 spake, 
 And trembling ceased. Awhile none cared 
 
 to break 
 
 The silence, like unto that breathless hush 
 That holds a forest ere the great winds rush 
 Up from the sea-gulf, bringing furious rain 
 Like mist to drown all nature, blot the plain 
 In one great sheet of water without form. 
 So held the chiefs. Then Diomede brake in 
 
 storm. 
 
 Ever the first he was to fling his spear 
 
 E 
 
50 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Into the press of battle ; dread his cheer, 
 Like the long howling of a wolf at eve 
 Or clamour of the sea-birds when they grieve 
 And hanker the out-scouring of the net 
 Hidden behind the darkness and the wet 
 Of tempest -ridden nights. " Princes,' 1 he 
 
 cried, 
 
 " What say ye to this wooer of his bride, 
 For whom it seems ten nations and their best 
 Have fought ten years to bring her back to 
 
 nest ? 
 Is this your meed of honour ? Was it for 
 
 this 
 
 You flung forth fortune to ensure him his ? 
 And he made snug at home, we seek our 
 
 lands 
 
 Barer than we left them, with emptier hands, 
 And some with fewer members, shed that he 
 Might fare as soft and trim as formerly ! 
 Not so went I adventuring, good friend ; 
 Not so look I this business to have end : 
 Nay, but I fight to live, not live to fight, 
 And so will live by day as thou by night, 
 Sating my eyes with havoc on this race 
 Of robbers of the hearth ; see their strong 
 
 place 
 
 Brought level with the herbage and the weed, 
 That where they revelled once shrew-mice 
 
 may feed, 
 And moles make palaces, and bats keep 
 
 house. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 51 
 
 And if thou art of spleen so slow to rouse 
 As quit thy score by thieving from a thief 
 And leave him scatheless else, thou art no 
 
 chief 
 
 For Tydeus' son, who sees no end of strife 
 But in his own or in his foeman's life." 
 
 So he. Then Pyrrhos spake : " By that 
 
 great shade 
 
 Wherein I stand, which thy false Paris made 
 Who slew my father, think not so to have 
 
 done 
 
 With Troy and Priam ; for Peleides' son 
 Must slake the sword that cries, and still the 
 
 ghost 
 
 Of him that haunts the ingles of this coast, 
 Murdered and unacquit while that man's 
 
 father 
 Liveth." 
 
 Then leapt up two, and both together 
 Cried, " Give us Troy to sack, give us our 
 
 fill 
 Of gold and bronze ; give us to burn and 
 
 kill ! " 
 
 And Aias said, " Are there no women then 
 In Troy, but only her ? And are we men 
 Or virgins of Athen6 ? " And the dream 
 Of her who served that dauntless One made 
 
 gleam 
 
 His shifting eyes, and stretcht his fleshy lips 
 Behind his beard. 
 
 Then stood that prince of ships 
 
52 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And shipmen, great Odysseus ; with one hand 
 He held the staff, with one he took command ; 
 And thus in measured tones, with word intent 
 Upon the deed, fierce but not vehement, 
 Drave in his dreadful message. At his sight 
 Clamour died down, even as the wind at night 
 Falls and is husht at rising of the moon. 
 " Ye chieftains of Achaia, not so soon 
 Is strife of ten years rounded to a close, 
 Neither so are men seated, friends or foes. 
 For say thus lightly we renounced the meed 
 Of our long travail, gave so little heed 
 To our great dead as find in one man's joy 
 Full recompense for all we've sunk in Troy 
 Wives desolate, children fatherless, lands, 
 
 gear, 
 
 Stock without master, wasting year by year ; 
 Youth past, age creeping on, friends, brothers, 
 
 sons 
 
 Lost in the void, gone where no respite runs 
 For sorrow, but the darkness covers all 
 What name should we bequeath our sons but 
 
 thrall, 
 
 Or what beside a name, who let go by 
 Ilios the rich for others' usury ? 
 And have the blessed Gods no say in this ? 
 Think you they be won over by a kiss 
 Here the Queen, she, the unwearied aid 
 Of all our striving, Pallas the war-maid ? 
 Have they not vowed, and will ye scant their 
 
 hate, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 53 
 
 Havoc on Ilios from gate to gate, 
 And for her towers abasement to the dust ? 
 Behold, O King, lust shall be paid with lust, 
 And treachery with treachery, and for blood 
 Blood shall be shed. Therefore let loose the 
 
 flood 
 
 Of our pent passion ; break her gates in, raze 
 The walls of her, cumber her pleasant ways 
 With dead men ; set on havoc, sate with spoil 
 Men ravening ; get corn and wine and oil, 
 Women to clasp in love, gold, silken things, 
 Harness of flashing bronze, swords, meed of 
 
 kings, 
 
 Chariots and horses swifter than the wind 
 Which, coursing Ida, leaves ruin behind 
 Of snapt tall trees : not faster shall they fall 
 Than Trojan spears once we are on the wall. 
 So only shall ye close this agelong strife, 
 Nor by redemption of a too fair wife, 
 Now smiling, now averse, now hot, now cold, 
 O Menelaus, may the tale be told ! 
 Nay, but by slaying of Achilles' slayer, 
 By the betrayal of the bed-betrayer, 
 By not withholding from the spoils of war 
 Men freeborn, nor from them that beaten are 
 Their rueful wages. Ilios must fall." 
 
 He said, and sat, and heard the acclaim of 
 
 all, 
 
 Save of the sons of Atreus, who sat glum, 
 One flusht, one white as parchment, and both 
 
 dumb ; 
 
54 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 One raging to be contraried, one torn 
 
 By those two passions wherewith he was 
 
 born, 
 The lust for body's ease and lust of gain. 
 
 Then slow he rose, Mykenai's king of men, 
 Gentle his voice to hear. " Laertes' son," 
 He said, but 'twas Nestor he looked upon, 
 The wise old man who sat beside his chair, 
 Mild now who once, a lion, kept his lair 
 Untoucht of any, or if e'er he left it, 
 Left it for prey, and held that when he reft it 
 From foe, or over friend made stronger 
 
 claim : 
 " Laertes' son," the king said, " all men's 
 
 fame 
 
 Reports thee just and fertile in device ; 
 And as the friend of God great is thy price 
 To us of Argos ; for without the Gods 
 How should we look to trace the limitless 
 
 roads 
 That weave a criss-cross 'twixt us and our 
 
 home ? 
 
 Go to now, some will stay and other some 
 Take to the sea-ways, hasty to depart, 
 Not warfaring as men fare to the mart, 
 To best a neighbour in some chaffering bout ; 
 But honour is the prize wherefor they go out, 
 And having that, dishonoured are content 
 To leave the foe that is best punishment. 
 Natheless since men there be, Argives ot 
 
 worth, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 55 
 
 Who needs must shed more blood ere they 
 
 go forth 
 
 As if of blood enough had not been spilt ! 
 Devise thou with my brother if thou wilt, 
 Noble Odysseus, seeking how compose 
 His honour with thy judgment. Well he 
 
 knows 
 
 Thy singleness of heart, deep ponderer, 
 Lover of a fair wife, and sure of her. 
 Come, let this be the sum of our debate." 
 a Content you," Menelaus said, " I wait 
 Upon thy word, thou fosterling of Zeus." 
 
 Then said Odysseus, " Be it as you choose, 
 Ye sons of Atreus. Then, advised, I say 
 Let me win into Troy as best I may, 
 Seek out the lovely lady of our land 
 And learn of her the watchwords, see how 
 
 stand 
 
 The sentries, how the warders of the gates ; 
 The strength, how much it is ; what prize 
 
 awaits 
 To crown our long endeavour. These things 
 
 learned, 
 
 Back to the ships I come ere yet are burned 
 The watch-fires of the night, before the sun 
 Hath urged his steeds the course they are to 
 
 run 
 
 Out of the golden gateways of the East." 
 Which all agreed, and Helen's lord not 
 least. 
 
SIXTH STAVE 
 
 HELEN AND PARIS J ODYSSEUS AND HELEN 
 
 LIKE as the sweet free air, when maids the 
 
 doors 
 
 And windows open wide, wanders the floors 
 And all the passage ways about the house, 
 Keen marshal of the sun, or serious 
 The cool gray light of morning 'gins to peer 
 Ere yet the household stirs, or chanticlere 
 Calls hinds to labour but hints not the glee 
 Nor full-flood glory of the day to be 
 When round about the hill the sun shall 
 
 swim 
 
 And burn a sea-path so demure and slim 
 Went Helen on her business with swift feet 
 And light, yet recollected, and her sweet 
 Secret held hid, that she was loved where 
 
 need 
 Called her to mate, and that she loved 
 
 indeed 
 
 Ah, sacred calm of wedlock, passion white 
 Of lovers knit in Herd's holy light ! 
 56 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 57 
 
 But while in early morn she wonned alone 
 And Paris slept, shrill rose her singing tone, 
 And brave the light on kindled cheeks and 
 
 eyes : 
 
 Brave as her hope is, brave the flag she flies. 
 Then, as the hour drew on when the sun's 
 
 rim 
 
 Should burn a sheet of gold to herald him 
 On Ida's snowy crest, lithe as a pard 
 For some lord's pleasuring encaged and 
 
 barred 
 
 She paced the hall soft-footed up and down, 
 Lightly and feverishly with quick frown 
 Peered shrewdly this way, that way, like a 
 
 bird 
 
 That on the winter grass is aye deterred 
 His food - searching by hint of unknown 
 
 snare 
 
 In thicket, holt or bush, or lawn too bare ; 
 Anon stopped, lip to finger, while the tide 
 Beat from her heart against her shielded side 
 Now closely girdled went she like a maid 
 And then slipt to the window, where she 
 
 stayed 
 
 But minutes three or four ; for soon she past 
 Out to the terrace, there to be at last 
 Downgazing on her glory, which her king 
 Reflected up in every motioning 
 And flux of his high passion. Only here 
 She triumphed, nor cared she to ask how 
 
 near 
 
58 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 The end of Troy, nor hazarded a guess 
 What deeds must do ere that could come to 
 
 pass. 
 
 To her the instant homage held all joy 
 And what to her was Sparta, or what Troy 
 Beside the bliss of that ? 
 
 Or Paris, what 
 
 Was he, who daily, nightly plained his lot 
 To have risked all the world and ten years 
 
 loved 
 
 This woman, now to find her nothing moved 
 By what he had done with her, what desired 
 To do ? And more she chilled the less he 
 
 tired, 
 
 And more he ventured less she cared recall 
 What was to her of nothing worth, or all : 
 All if the King required it of her, nought 
 If he who now could take it. It was bought, 
 And his by bargain : let him have it then ; 
 But let it be for giving once again, 
 And all the rubies in the world's deep heart 
 Could fetch no price beside it. 
 
 Yet apart 
 She brooded on the man who held her 
 
 chained, 
 
 Minister to his pleasure, and disdained 
 Him more the more herself she must dis- 
 parage, 
 
 Reflecting on him all her hateful carriage, 
 So old, incredible, so flat, so stale, 
 No more to be recalled than old wife's tale : 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 59 
 
 And scorned him, saw him neither high nor 
 
 low, 
 
 Not villain and not hero, who would go 
 Midway 'twixt baseness and nobility, 
 And not be fierce, if fierceness hurt a flea 
 Before his eyes. The man loved one thing 
 
 more 
 Than all the world, and made his mind a 
 
 whore 
 
 To minister his heart's need, for a price. 
 All which she loathed, yet chose not to be 
 
 nice 
 With the snug-revelling wretch, her master 
 
 yet, 
 
 Whose leaguer, though she scorned it, was no 
 
 fret ; 
 
 But lift on wings of her exalted mood, 
 She let him touch and finger what he would, 
 Unconscious of his being as he saw, 
 And with a groan, whipt sharp upon the raw 
 Of his esteem, " Ah, cruel art thou turned," 
 Would cry, "Ah, frosty fire, where I am 
 
 burned, 
 
 Yet dying bless the flame that is my bane ! " 
 With which to clasp her closer was he fain, 
 To touch in love, and feast his eyes to see 
 Her quiver at his touch, and laugh to be 
 The plucker of such chords of such a rote ; 
 And laughing stoop and kiss her milky throat, 
 Then see her shut eyes hide what he had done. 
 " Nay, shut them not upon me, nay, nor shun 
 
60 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 My worship ! " So he said ; but she, " They 
 
 fade, 
 
 But are not yet so old as thou hast made 
 The soul thou pinnest here beneath my 
 
 breasts 
 Which you have loved too well." His hand 
 
 he rests 
 
 Over one fair white bosom like a cup, 
 And leaning, of her lips his own must sup ; 
 But she will not, but gently doth refuse it, 
 Without a reason, save she doth not choose it. 
 
 Then when he flung away, she sat alone 
 And nursed her hope and sorrow, both in 
 
 one 
 
 Perturbed bosom ; and her fingers wove 
 White webs as far afield her wits did rove 
 Perpending and perpending. So frail, so fair, 
 So faint she seemed, a wraith you had said 
 
 there, 
 
 A woman dead, and not in lovely flesh. 
 But all the while she writhed within the mesh 
 Of circumstance, and fiercely flamed her rage : 
 " O slave, O minion, thing kept in a cage 
 For this sleek master's handling ! " So she 
 
 fumed 
 What time her wide eyes sought all ways, or 
 
 loomed 
 
 Like winter lakes dark in a field of snow, 
 And still ; nor lifted they their pall of woe 
 Responsive to her heart, nor flashed the 
 
 thrill 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 61 
 
 That knew, which said, " A true man loveth 
 me still." 
 
 That same night, as she used, fair Helen 
 
 went 
 
 Among the suppliants in the hall, and lent 
 To each who craved the bounty of her grace, 
 Her gentle touch on wounds, her pitiful face 
 To beaten eyes' dumb eloquence, that art 
 She above all could use, to stroke the heart 
 And plead compassion in bestowing it. 
 So with her handmaids busy did she flit 
 From man to man, 'mid outlaws, broken 
 
 blades, 
 Robbed husbandmen, their robbers, phantoms, 
 
 shades 
 
 Of what were men till hunger made them less 
 Than man can be and still know uprightness ; 
 And whom she spake with kindly words and 
 
 cheer 
 
 In him the light of hope began to peer 
 And. glimmer in his eyes ; and him she fed 
 And nourisht, then sent homeward comforted 
 A little, to endure a little more. 
 
 Now among these, hard by the outer door, 
 She marked a man unbent whose sturdy look 
 Never left hers for long, whose shepherd's hook 
 Seemed not a staff to prop him, whose bright 
 
 eyes 
 
 Burned steadily, as fire when the wind dies. 
 Great in the girth was he, but not so tall 
 
62 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 By a full hand as many whom the wall 
 Showed like gaunt channel-posts by an ebb 
 
 tide 
 
 Left stranded in a world of ooze. Beside 
 His knees she kneeled, and to his wounded 
 
 feet 
 Applied her balms ; but he, from his low 
 
 seat 
 
 Against the wall, leaned out and in her ear 
 Whispered, but so that no one else could 
 
 hear, 
 " Other than my wounds are there for thy 
 
 pains, 
 
 Lady, and deeper. One, a grievous, drains 
 The great heart of a king, and one is fresh, 
 Though ten years old, in the sweet innocent 
 
 flesh 
 Of a young child." 
 
 Nothing said she, but stoopt 
 The closer to her task. He thought she 
 
 droopt 
 Her head, he knew she trembled, that her 
 
 shoulder 
 Twitcht as she wrought her task ; so he grew 
 
 bolder, 
 
 Saying, " But thou art pitiful ! I know 
 That thou wilt wash their wounds." 
 
 She whispered " Oh, 
 Be sure of me ! " 
 
 Then he, " Let us have speech 
 Secret together out of range or reach 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 63 
 
 Of prying ears, if such a chance may be." 
 Then she said, " Towards morning look 
 
 for me 
 Here, when the city sleeps, before the sun." 
 
 So till the glimmer of dawn this hardy one 
 Keepeth the watch in Paris' house. All 
 
 night 
 
 With hard unwinking eyes he sat upright, 
 While all about the sleepers lay, like stones 
 Littered upon a hill-top, save that moans, 
 Sighings and " Gods, have pity !" showed that 
 
 they 
 
 By night rehearsed the miseries of day, 
 And by bread lived not but by hope deferred. 
 
 Grimly he suffered till such time he heard 
 Helen's light foot and faint and gray in 
 
 the mist 
 Descried her slim veiled outline, saw her 
 
 twist 
 
 And slip between the sleepers on the ground, 
 Atiptoe coming, swift, with scarce a sound, 
 Not faltering in fear. No fear she had. 
 From head to foot a sea-blue mantle clad 
 Her lovely shape, from which her pale keen 
 
 face 
 
 Shone like the moon in frosty sky. No case 
 Was his to waver, for her eyes spake true 
 As Heaven upon the world. Him then she 
 
 drew 
 
 To follow her, out of the house, to where 
 The ilex trees stood darkly, and the air 
 
64 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Struck sharp and chill before the dawn's first 
 
 breath. 
 
 There stood a little altar underneath 
 An image : Artemis the quick deerslayer, 
 High- girdled and barekneed ; to Whom in 
 
 prayer 
 First bowed, then stood erect with lifted 
 
 hands, 
 
 Palms upward, Helen. " Lady of open lands 
 And lakes and windy heights," prayed she, 
 
 " so do 
 
 To me as to Amphion's wife when blew 
 The wind of thy high anger, and she stared 
 On sudden death that not one dear life spared 
 Of all she had so do to me if false 
 I prove unto this Argive ! " 
 
 Then the walls 
 
 And gates of Ilios she traced in the sand, 
 And told him of the watch-towers, and how 
 
 manned 
 The gates at night ; and where the treasure 
 
 was, 
 
 And where the houses of the chiefs. But as 
 She faltered in the tale, " Show now/' said he, 
 " Where Priam's golden palace is." 
 
 But she 
 Said, " Nay, not that ; for since the day of 
 
 shame 
 That brought me in, no word or look of 
 
 blame 
 Hath he cast on me. Nay, when Hector died 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 65 
 
 And all the city turned on me and cried 
 My name, as to an outcast dog men fling 
 Howling and scorn, not one word said the 
 
 King. 
 And when they hissed me in the shrines of 
 
 the Gods, 
 And women egged their children on with 
 
 nods 
 
 To foul the house-wall, or in passing spat 
 Towards it, he, the old King, came and sat 
 Daily with me, and often on my hair 
 Would lay a gentle hand. Him thou shalt 
 
 spare 
 For my sake who betray him." 
 
 Odysseus said, 
 " Well, thou shalt speak no more of him. 
 
 His bed 
 
 Is not of thy making, nor mine, but his 
 Who hath thee here a cageling, thy Paris. 
 Him he begat as well as Hector. Now 
 Let Priam look to reap what he did sow." 
 But when glad light brimmed o'er the cup 
 
 of earth 
 And shrill birds called forth men to grief or 
 
 mirth 
 
 As might afford their labour under the sun, 
 Helen advised how best to get him gone, 
 And fetched a roll of cord, the which made 
 
 fast 
 
 About a stanchion, about him next she cast, 
 About and about until the whole was round 
 
66 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 His body, and the end to his arm she bound ; 
 Then showed him in the wall where best 
 
 foothold 
 Might be, and watcht him down as fold by 
 
 fold 
 
 He paid the cable out ; and as he paid 
 So did she twist it, till the coil was made 
 As it had been at first. Then watcht she him 
 Stride o'er the plain until he twinkled dim 
 And sank into the mist. 
 
 That day came not 
 King Menelaus to the trysting spot ; 
 But ere Odysseus left her she had ta'en 
 A crocus flower which on her breast had lain, 
 And toucht it with her lips. " Give this," 
 
 said she, 
 " To my good lord who hath seen the flower 
 
 in me." 
 
SEVENTH STAVE 
 
 THEY BUILD THE HORSE AND ENTER IN 
 
 WHAT weariness of wind and wave and 
 
 foam 
 
 Was to be for Odysseus ere his home 
 Of scrub and crag and scanty pasturage 
 He saw again ! What stress of pilgrimage 
 Through roaring waterways and cities of 
 
 men, 
 
 What sojourn among folk beyond the ken 
 Of mortal seafarers in homelier seas, 
 More trodden lands ! Sure, none had earned 
 
 his ease 
 
 As he, that windless morning when he drew 
 Near silent Ithaca, gray in misty blue, 
 And wondered on the old familiar scene, 
 Which was to him as it had never been 
 Aforetime. Say, had he but had inkling 
 That in this hour all that long wandering 
 Of his was self-ensured, had he been bold 
 To plan and carry what must now be told 
 Of this too hardy champion ? Solve it you 
 67 
 
68 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Whose chronicling is over. Mine's to do. 
 
 All day until the setting of the sun, 
 Devising how to use what he had won 
 Odysseus stood ; for nothing within walls 
 Was hid, he knew the very trumpet-calls 
 Wherewith they turned the guard out, and 
 
 the cries 
 
 The sentries used to hearten or advise 
 The city in the watches of the night. 
 Once in, no hope for Ilios ; but his plight 
 No better stood for that, since no way in 
 Could he conceive, nor entry hope to win 
 For any force enough to seize the gate 
 And open for the host. 
 
 But then some Fate, 
 
 Or, some men say, Athene the gray-eyed, 
 Ever his friend, never far from his side, 
 Prompted him look about him. Then he 
 
 heeds 
 
 A stork set motionless in the dry reeds 
 That lift their withered arms, a skeleton host, 
 Long after winter and her aching frost 
 Are gone, and rattle in the spring's soft 
 
 breeze 
 
 Dry bones, as if to daunt the budding trees 
 And warn them of the summer's wrath to 
 
 come. 
 
 Still sat the bird, as fast asleep or numb 
 With cold, her head half-buried in her breast, 
 With close -shut eyes : a dead bird on the 
 
 nest, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 69 
 
 Arrow-shot for behold ! a wound she bore 
 Mid-breast, which stooping to, to see the 
 
 more, 
 
 Lo, forth from it came busy, one by one, 
 Light-moving ants ! So she to her death 
 
 had gone 
 These many days ; and there where she lost 
 
 life 
 
 Her carrion shell with it again was rife. 
 So teems the earth, that ere our clay be rotten 
 New hosts sweep clean the hearth, our deeds 
 
 forgotten. 
 
 But stooping still, Odysseus saw her not 
 Nor her brisk tenantry ; afar his thought, 
 And after it his vision, crossed the plain 
 And lit on Ilios, dim and lapt in rain, 
 Piled up like blocks which Titans rear to 
 
 mark 
 
 Where hero of their breed sits stiff and stark, 
 Spear in dead hand, and dead chin on dead 
 
 knees ; 
 And " Ha," cried he, " proud hinderer of our 
 
 ease, 
 
 Now hold I thee within my hollowed hand ! " 
 Straightway returning, Troy's destruction 
 
 planned, 
 
 He sends for one Epeios, craftsman good, 
 And bids him frame him out a horse in wood, 
 Big-bellied as a ship of sixty oars 
 Such as men use for traffic, not in wars, 
 Nor piracy, but roomy, deep in the hold, 
 
70 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Where men may shelter if needs be from cold, 
 Or sleep between their watches. " Scant not 
 
 you," 
 He said, " your timber not your sweat. 
 
 Drive through 
 
 This horse for me, Epeios, as if we 
 Awaited it to give the word for sea 
 And Hellas and our wives and children dear ; 
 For this is true, without it we stay here 
 Another ten-year shift, if by main force 
 We would take Troy, but ten days with my 
 
 horse." 
 
 So to their task Epeios and his teams 
 Went valiantly, and heaved and hauled great 
 
 beams 
 
 Of timber from far Ida, and hacked amain 
 And rought the framework out. Then to it 
 
 again 
 They went with adzes and their smoothing 
 
 tools, 
 And made all shapely ; next bored for their 
 
 dools 
 With augurs, and made good stock on to 
 
 stock 
 With mortise and with dovetail. Last, they 
 
 lock 
 The frames with clamps, the nether to the 
 
 upper, 
 
 And body forth a horse from crest to crupper 
 In outline. 
 
 Now their ribbing must be shaped 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 71 
 
 With axe to take the round, first rought, 
 
 then scraped 
 
 With adzes, then deep-mortised in the frame 
 To bear the weight of so much mass, whose 
 
 fame 
 When all was won, the Earth herself might 
 
 quake, 
 Supporting on her broad breast. Now they 
 
 take 
 Planks sawn and smoothed, and set them 
 
 over steam 
 Of cauldrons to be supple. These to the 
 
 beam 
 
 Above they rivet fast, and bend them down 
 Till from the belly more they seem to have 
 
 grown 
 
 Than in it to be ended, so well sunk 
 And grooved they be. There's for the 
 
 horse's trunk. 
 
 But as for head and legs, these from the block 
 Epeios carved, and fixed them on the stock 
 With long pins spigotted and clamps of 
 
 steel ; 
 
 And then the tail, downsweeping to the heel, 
 He carved and rivetted in place. Yet more 
 He did ; for cunningly he made a door 
 Beneath the belly of him, in a part 
 Where Nature lends her aid to sculptor's art, 
 And few would have the thought to look 
 
 for it, 
 Or eyes so keen to find, if they'd the wit. 
 
72 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Greatly stood he, hogmaned, with wrinkled 
 
 neck 
 
 And wrying jaw, as though upon the check 
 One rode him. On three legs he stood, with 
 
 one 
 
 Pawing the air, as if his course to run 
 Was overdue. Almost you heard the champ 
 And clatter of the bit, almost the stamp 
 And scrape of hoof ; almost his fretful crest 
 He seemed to toss on high. So much confest 
 The wondering host. " But where's the man 
 
 to ride ? " 
 
 They askt. Odysseus said, " He'll go inside. 
 Yet there shall seem a rider nay, let two 
 Bespan so brave a back." Epeios anew 
 He spurred, and had his horsemen as he would, 
 Two noble youths, star-frontletted, but nude 
 Of clothing, and unarmed, who sat as though 
 Centaurs not men, and with their knees did 
 
 show 
 
 The road to travel. Next Odysseus bid, 
 " Gild thou me him, Epeios " ; which he did, 
 And burnisht after, till he blazed afar 
 Like that great image which men hail for a 
 
 star 
 
 Of omen holy, image without peer, 
 Chryselephantine Athene with her spear, 
 Shining o'er Athens ; to which their course 
 
 they set 
 When homeward faring through the seaways 
 
 wet 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 73 
 
 From Poros or from Nauplia, or some 
 From the Euboean gulf, or where the foam 
 Washes the feet of Sounion, on whose brow 
 Like a white crown the shafts burn even now. 
 Such was the shaping of the Horse of Wood, 
 The bane of Ilios. 
 
 Ordered now they stood 
 Midway between the ships and Troy, and cast 
 The lots, who should go in from first to last 
 Of all the chieftains chosen. And the lot 
 Leapt out of Diomede, so in he got 
 And sat up in the neck. Next Aias went, 
 Clasping his shins and blinking as he bent, 
 Working the ridges of his villainous brow, 
 Like puzzled, patient monkey on a bough 
 That peers with bald, far-seeing eyes, whose 
 
 scope 
 And steadfastness seem there to mock our 
 
 hope ; 
 
 Next Antiklos, and next Meriones 
 The Cretan ; next good Teukros. After 
 
 these 
 
 Went Pyrrhos, Agamemnon, King of men, 
 Menestheus and Idomeneus, and then 
 King Menelaus ; and Odysseus last 
 Entered the desperate doorway, and made 
 
 fast. 
 And all the Achaian remnant, seeing their 
 
 best 
 
 To this great venture finally addrest, 
 Stood awed in silence ; but Nestor the old 
 
74 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Bade bring the victims, and these on the wold 
 In sight of Troy he slew, and so uplift 
 The smoke of fire, and bloodsmoke, as a gift 
 Acceptable to Him he hailed by name 
 Kronion, sky-dweller, who giveth fame, 
 Lord of the thunder ; to Here next, and 
 
 Her, 
 
 The Maid of War and holy harbinger 
 Of Father Zeus, who bears the Aegis dread 
 And shakes it when the storm peals overhead 
 And lightning splits the firmament with fire ; 
 Nor yet forgat Poseidon, dark-haired sire 
 Of all the seas, and of great Ocean's flow, 
 The girdler of the world. So back with slow 
 And pondered steps they all returned, and 
 
 dark 
 Swallowed up Troy, and Horse, and them 
 
 who stark 
 
 Abode within it. And the great stars shone 
 Out over sea and land ; and speaking none, 
 Nursing his arms, nursing within his breast 
 His enterprise, each hero sat at rest 
 Ignorant of the world of day and night, 
 Or whether he should live to see the light, 
 Or see it but to perish in this cage. 
 Only Odysseus felt his heart engage 
 The blithelier for the peril. He was stuff 
 That thrives by daring, nor can dare enough. 
 
 Three days, three nights before the Skaian 
 Gate 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 75 
 
 Sat they within their ambush, apt for fate ; 
 Three days, three nights, the Trojans swarmed 
 
 the walls 
 And towers or held high council in their 
 
 halls 
 
 What this portended, this o'erweening mass 
 Reared up so high no man stretching could 
 
 pass 
 
 His hand over the crupper, of such girth 
 Of haunch, to span the pair no man on earth 
 Could compass with both arms. But most 
 
 their eyes 
 
 Were for the riders who in godlike guise 
 Went naked into battle, as Gods use, 
 Untrammerd by our shifts of shields and 
 
 shoes, 
 
 As if we dread the earth whereof we are. 
 Sons of God, these : for bore not each a star 
 Ablaze upon his forelock ? Lo, they say, 
 Kastor and Polydeukes, who but they, 
 Come in to save their sister at the last, 
 And war for Troy, and root King Priam 
 
 fast 
 
 In his demesne, him and his heirs for ever ! 
 Now call they soothsayers to make endeavour 
 With engines of their craft to read the thing ; 
 But others urge them hale it to the King 
 " Let him dispose," they say, " of it and us, 
 And order as he will, from Pergamos 
 To heave it o'er the sheer and bring to 
 
 wreck ; 
 
7 6 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Or burn with fire ; or harbour to bedeck 
 The temple of some God : of three ways one. 
 Here it cannot abide to flout the sun 
 With arrogant flash for every beam of his." 
 
 Herewith agreed the men of mysteries, 
 Raking the bloodsick earth to have the truth, 
 And getting what they lookt for, as in sooth 
 A man will do. So then they all fell to't 
 To hale with cords and lever foot by foot 
 The portent ; and as frenzy frenzy breeds, 
 And what one has another thinks he needs, 
 So to a straining twenty other score 
 Lent hands, and ever from the concourse 
 
 more 
 
 Of them, who hauled as if Troy's life de- 
 pended 
 
 On hastening forward that wherein it ended. 
 So came the Horse to Troy, so was filled up 
 With retribution that sweet loving-cup 
 Paris had drunk to Helen overseas 
 The cup which whoso drains must taste the 
 lees. 
 
EIGHTH STAVE 
 
 THE HORSE IN TROY ; THE PASSION OF 
 KASSANDRA 
 
 HIGH over Troy the windy citadel, 
 Pergamos, towereth, where is the cell 
 And precinct of Athene. There, till reived, 
 They kept the Pallium, sacred and still 
 
 grieved 
 
 By all who held the city consecrate 
 To Her, as first it was, till she learned hate 
 For what had once been lovely, and let in 
 The golden Aphrodite, and sweet sin 
 To ensnare Prince Paris and send him awooing 
 A too-fair wife, to be his own undoing 
 And Troy's and all the line's of Dardanos, 
 That traced from Zeus to him, from him to 
 
 Tros, 
 
 From Tros to Ilos, to Laomedon, 
 Who begat Priam as his second son. 
 But out of Troy Assarakos too came, 
 From whom came Kapys ; and from him the 
 
 fame 
 
 77 
 
7 8 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Of good Anchises, with whom Kypris lay 
 In love and got Aineias. He, that day 
 Of dreadful wrath, safe only out did come, 
 And builded great Troy's line in greater 
 
 Rome. 
 Now to the forecourt flock the Trojan 
 
 folk 
 To view the portent. Now they bring to 
 
 yoke 
 
 Priam's white horses, that the stricken king 
 Himself may see the wonder-working thing, 
 Himself invoke with his frail trembling voice 
 The good Twin Brethren for his aid and 
 
 Troy's. 
 
 So presently before it Priam stands, 
 Father and King of Troy, with feeble hands 
 And mild pale eyes wherein Grief like a 
 
 ghost 
 
 Sits ; and about him all he has not lost 
 Of all his children gather, with grief-worn 
 Andromache and her first, and last, born, 
 The boy Astyanax. And there apart 
 The wise Aineias stands, of steadfast heart 
 But not acceptable for some old grudge 
 Inherited Aineias, silent judge 
 Of folly, as he had been since the sin 
 Of Paris knelled the last days to begin. 
 But he himself, that Paris, came not out, 
 But kept his house in these his days of 
 
 doubt, 
 Uncertain of his footing, being of those 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 79 
 
 On whom the faintest breath of censure 
 
 blows 
 
 Chill as the wind that from the frozen North 
 Palsies the fount o' the blood. He dared not 
 
 forth 
 Lest men should see and how not see ? he 
 
 thought 
 That Helen held him lightlier than she ought. 
 
 But Helen came there, gentle as of old, 
 Self-held, sufficient to herself, not bold, 
 Not modest nor immodest, taking none 
 For judge or jury of what she may have 
 
 done ; 
 
 But doing all she was to do, sedate, 
 Intent upon it and deliberate. 
 As she had been at first, so was she now 
 When she had put behind her her old vow 
 And had no pride but thinking of her new. 
 But she was lovelier, of more burning hue, 
 And in her eyes there shone, for who could 
 
 see, 
 
 A flickering light, half scare and half of glee, 
 Which made those iris'd orbs to wax and 
 
 wane 
 
 Like to the light of April days, when rain 
 And sun contend the sovereignty. She kept 
 Beside the King, and only closer crept 
 To let him feel her there when some harsh 
 
 word 
 
 Or look made her heart waver. Many she 
 heard, 
 
8o HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And much she saw, but knew the King her 
 
 friend, 
 
 Him only since great Hector met his end. 
 And while so pensive and demure she stood, 
 With one thin hand just peeping at her hood, 
 The which close -folded her from head to 
 
 knee, 
 Her heart within her bosom hailed her 
 
 " Free ! 
 
 Free from thy thralldom, free to save, to give, 
 To love, be loved again, and die to live ! " 
 So she yet who had said, to see her there, 
 The sweet-faced woman, blue-eyed, still and 
 
 fair 
 As windless dawn in some quiet mountain 
 
 place, 
 To such a music let her passion race ? 
 
 Now hath the King his witless welcome 
 
 paid, 
 And now invoked the gods, and the cold 
 
 shade 
 
 Which once was Hector ; now, being upheld 
 By two his sons, with shaking hands of eld 
 The knees of those two carved and gilded 
 
 youths 
 He touches while he prays, and praying 
 
 soothes 
 
 The crying heart of Helen. But not so 
 Kassandra views him pray, that well of woe 
 Kassandra, she whom Loxias deceived 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 81 
 
 With gift to see, and not to be believed ; 
 To read within the heart of Time all truth 
 And see men blindly blunder, to have ruth, 
 To burn, to cry, "Out, haro ! " and be a 
 
 mock 
 
 Ah, and to know within this gross wood- 
 block 
 
 The fate of all her kindred, and her own, 
 Unthinkable ! Now with her terror blown 
 Upon her face, to blanch it like a sheet, 
 Now with bare frozen eyes which only greet 
 The viewless neighbours of our world she 
 
 strips 
 
 The veil and shrieketh Troy's apocalypse : 
 " Woe to thee, Ilios ! The fire, the fire ! 
 
 And rain, 
 Rain like to blood and tears to drown the 
 
 plain 
 
 And cover all the earth up in a shroud, 
 One great death-clout for thee, Ilios the 
 
 proud ! 
 Touch not, handle not " Outraged then 
 
 she turned 
 To Helen " O thou, for whom Troy shall 
 
 be burned, 
 O ruinous face, O breasts made hard with 
 
 gall, 
 
 Now are ye satisfied ? Ye shall have all, 
 All Priam's sons and daughters, all his race 
 Gone quick to death, hailing thee, ruinous 
 face ! " 
 
82 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Her tragic mask she turned upon all men : 
 " The lion shall have Troy, to make his den 
 Within her pleasant courts, in Priam's high 
 
 seat 
 
 Shall blink the vulture, sated of his meat ; 
 And in the temples emptied of their Gods 
 Bats shall make quick the night, and panting 
 
 toads 
 
 Make day a loathing to the light it brings. 
 Listen ! Listen ! they flock out ; heed 
 
 their wings. 
 
 The Gods flee forth of this accursed haunt, 
 And leave the memory of it an old chant, 
 A nursery song, an idle tale that's told 
 To children when your own sons are grown 
 
 old 
 
 In Argive bonds, and have no other joy 
 Than whispering to their offspring tales of 
 
 Troy." 
 Whereat she laught O bitter sound to 
 
 hear ! 
 And struggled with herself, and grinned with 
 
 fear 
 
 And misery lest even now her fate 
 Should catch her and she be believed too late. 
 " Is't possible, O Gods ! Are ye so doomed 
 As not to know this Horse a mare, enwombed 
 Of men and swords ? Know ye not there 
 
 unseen 
 The Argive princes wait their dam shall 
 
 yean ? 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 83 
 
 Anon creeps Sparta forth, to find his balm 
 In that vile woman ; forth with itching palm 
 Mykenai creeps, snuffing what may be won 
 By filching ; forth Pyrrhos the braggart's 
 
 son 
 
 That dared do violence to Hector dead, 
 But while he lived called Gods to serve his 
 
 stead ; 
 
 Forth Aias like a beast, to mangle me 
 These things ye will not credit, but I see." 
 Then once again, and last, she turned her 
 
 switch 
 
 On Helen, hissing, " Out upon thee, witch, 
 Smooth-handed traitress, speak thy secrets 
 
 out 
 That we may know thee, how thou goest 
 
 about 
 
 Caressing, with a hand that hides a knife, 
 That which shall prove false paramour, false 
 
 wife, 
 
 Fair as the sun is fair that smiles and slays" 
 And then, " O ruinous face, O ruinous 
 
 face ! " 
 
 But nothing more, for sudden all was gone, 
 Spent by her passion. Muttering, faint and 
 
 wan 
 
 Down to the earth she sank, and to and fro 
 Rocking, drew close her hood, and shrouded 
 
 so, 
 Her wild voice drowning, died in moans 
 
 away. 
 
84 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 But Helen stood bright-eyed as glancing 
 
 day, 
 
 Near by the Horse, and with a straying hand 
 Did stroke it here and there, and listening 
 
 stand, 
 
 Leaning her head towards its gilded flank, 
 And strain to hear men's breath behind the 
 
 plank ; 
 And she had whispered if she dared some 
 
 word 
 
 Of promise ; but afraid to be o'erheard, 
 Leaned her head close and toucht it with 
 
 her cheek, 
 Then drew again to Priam, schooled and 
 
 meek. 
 
 But Menelaus felt her touch, and mum 
 Sat on, nursing his mighty throw to come ; 
 And Aias started, with some cry uncouth 
 And vile, but fast Odysseus o'er his mouth 
 Clapt hand, and checkt his foul persever- 
 ance 
 To seek in every deed his own essence. 
 
 Now when the ways were darkened, and 
 
 the sun 
 
 Sank red to sea, and homeward all had gone 
 Save that distraught Kassandra, who still 
 
 served 
 The temple whence the Goddess long had 
 
 swerved, 
 Athene, hating Troy and loving them 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 85 
 
 Who craved to snatch and make a diadem 
 Of Priam's regal crown for other brows 
 She, though foredoomed she knew, held to 
 
 her vows, 
 
 And duly paid the thankless evening rite 
 There came to Paris' house late in the night 
 De'iphobus his brother, young and trim, 
 For speech with fair-tressed Helen, for whose 
 
 slim 
 And budded grace long had he sighed in 
 
 vain ; 
 And found her in full hall, and showed his 
 
 pain 
 And need of her. To whom when she 
 
 draws close 
 
 In hot and urgent crying words he shows 
 His case, hers now, that here she tarry not 
 Lest evil hap more dread than she can wot : 
 " For this," he says, " is Troy's extremest 
 
 hour." 
 But when to that she bowed her head, the 
 
 power 
 
 Of his high vision made him vehement : 
 " Dark sets the sun," he cried, " and day is 
 
 spent " ; 
 But she said, "Nay, the sun will rise with 
 
 day, 
 And I shall bathe in light, lift hands and 
 
 pray." 
 " Thou lift up hands, bound down to a 
 
 new lord ! " 
 
86 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 He mocked ; then whispered, " Lady, with 
 
 a sword 
 I cut thy bonds if so thou wilt." 
 
 Apart 
 She moved : " No sword, but a cry of the 
 
 heart 
 Shall loose me." 
 
 Then he said, " Hear what I cry 
 From my heart unto thine : fly, Helen, fly ! " 
 Whereat she shook her head and sighed, 
 
 " Even so, 
 
 Brother, I fly where thou canst never go. 
 Far go I, out of ken of thee and thy peers." 
 He knew not what she would, but said, 
 
 " Thy fears 
 
 Are of the Gods and holy dooms and Fate, 
 But mine the present menace in the gate. 
 This I would save thee." 
 
 " I fear it not," said she, 
 " But wait it here." 
 
 He cried, " Here shalt thou see 
 Thy Spartan, and his bitter sword-point feel 
 Against thy bosom." 
 
 " I bare it to the steel," 
 Saith she. He then, " If ever man deserved 
 
 thee 
 
 By service, I am he, who'd die to serve thee." 
 Glowing she heard him, being quickly 
 
 moved 
 
 By kindness, loving ever where she was 
 loved. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 87 
 
 But now her heart was fain for rest ; the 
 night 
 
 Called her to sleep and dreams. So with a 
 light 
 
 And gentle hand upon him, " Brother, fare- 
 well/' 
 
 She said, " I stay the issue, and foretell 
 
 Honour therein at least." 
 
 Then at the door 
 
 She kissed him. And she saw his face no 
 more. 
 
NINTH STAVE 
 
 THE GODS FORSAKE TROY 
 
 Now Dawn came weeping forth, and on 
 
 the crest 
 
 Of Ida faced a chill wind from the West. 
 Forth from the gray sea wrack-laden it blew 
 And howled among the towers, and stronger 
 
 grew 
 
 As crept unseen the sun his path of light. 
 Then she who in the temple all that night 
 Had kept her rueful watch, the prophetess 
 Kassandra, peering sharply, heard the press 
 And rush of flight above her, and with sick 
 Foreboding waited ; and the air grew thick 
 With flying shapes immortal overhead. 
 
 As in late Autumn, when the leaves are 
 
 shed 
 
 And dismal flit about the empty ways, 
 And country folk provide against dark days, 
 And heap the woodstack, and their stores 
 
 repair, 
 Attent you know the quickening of the air, 
 
 88 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 89 
 
 And closer yet the swish and sweep and 
 
 swing 
 
 Of wings innumerable, emulous to bring 
 The birds to broader skies and kindlier sun, 
 And know indeed that winter is begun 
 So seeing first, then hearing, she knew the 
 
 hour 
 Was come when Troy must fall, and not a 
 
 tower 
 Be left to front the morrow. And she 
 
 covered 
 Her head and mourned, while one by one 
 
 they hovered 
 Above their shrines, then flockt and faced 
 
 the dawn. 
 
 First, in her car of shell and amber, 
 
 drawn 
 By clustering doves with burnisht wings, a- 
 
 throng, 
 
 Passes Queen Aphrodite, and her song 
 Is sweet and sharp : " I gave my sacred 
 
 zone 
 
 To warm thy bosom, Helen which by none 
 That live by labour and in tears are born 
 And sighing go their ways, has e'er been 
 
 worn. 
 
 It kindled in thine eyes the lovelight, showed 
 Thy burning self in his. Thy body glowed 
 With beauty like to mine : mine thy love- 
 laughter 
 
90 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Thy cooing in the night, thy deep sleep 
 
 after, 
 
 Thy rapture of the morning, love renewed ; 
 And all the shadowed day to sit and brood 
 On what has been and what should be again : 
 Thou wilt not ? Nay, I proffer not in vain 
 My gifts, for I am all or will be nought. 
 Lo, where I am can be no other thought." 
 
 Thus to the wooded heights of Ida she 
 Was drawn, hid in that pearly galaxy 
 Of snow-white pigeons. 
 
 Next upon the height 
 Of Pergamos uplift a beam of light 
 That for its core enshrined a naked youth. 
 Golden and fierce. She knew the God sans 
 
 ruth, 
 Him who had given woeful prescience to 
 
 her, 
 
 Apollo, once her lover and her wooer ; 
 Who stood as one stands glorying in his 
 
 grace 
 And strength, full in the sun, though on her 
 
 place 
 
 Within the temple court no sun at all 
 Shone, nor as yet upon the topmost wall 
 Was any tinge of him, but all showed gray 
 And sodden in the wind and blown sea- 
 spray. 
 Not to him dared she lift her voice in 
 
 prayer, 
 Nor scarce her eyes to see him. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 91 
 
 To him there 
 
 Came swift a spirit in shape of virgin slim, 
 With snooded hair and kirtle belted trim, 
 Short to the knee ; and in her face the gale 
 Had blown bright sanguine colour. Free 
 
 and hale 
 
 She was ; and in her hand she held a bow 
 Unstrung, and o'er her shoulders there did 
 
 go 
 
 A baldrick that made sharp the cleft betwixt 
 Her sudden breasts to that a quiver fixt, 
 Showing gold arrow - points. No God 
 
 there is 
 
 In Heaven more swift than Delian Artemis, 
 The young, the pure health -giver of the 
 
 Earth, 
 Who loveth all things born, and brings to 
 
 birth, 
 
 And after slays with merciful sudden death 
 In whom is gladness all and wholesome 
 
 breath, 
 And to whom all the praise of him who 
 
 writes, 
 Ever. 
 
 These two she saw like meteorites 
 Flare down the wind and burn afar, then 
 
 fade. 
 
 And Leto next, a mother grave and staid, 
 Drave out her chariot, which two winged 
 
 stags drew, 
 Swift following, robed in gown of inky blue, 
 
92 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And hooded ; and her hand which held the 
 
 hood 
 
 Gleamed like a patch of snow left in a wood 
 Where hyacinths bring down to earth the 
 
 sky. 
 
 And in her wake a winging company, 
 Dense as the cloud of gulls which from a 
 
 rock 
 
 At sea lifts up in myriads, if the knock 
 Of oars assail their peace, she saw, and 
 
 mourned 
 The household gods. For outward they 
 
 too turned, 
 
 The spirits of the streams and water-brooks, 
 And nymphs who haunt the pastures, or in 
 
 nooks 
 Of woodlands dwell. There like a lag of 
 
 geese 
 
 Flew in long straying lines the Oreades 
 That in wild dunes and commons have their 
 
 haunt ; 
 
 There sped the Hamadryads ; there aslant, 
 As from the sea, but wheeling ere they crost 
 Their sisters, thronged the river-nymphs, a 
 
 host ; 
 And now the Gods of homestead and the 
 
 hearth, 
 Like sad-faced mourning women, left the 
 
 garth 
 Where each had dwelt since Troy was 
 
 stablished, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 93 
 
 And been the holy influence over bed 
 And board and daily work under the sun 
 And nightlong slumber when day's work was 
 
 done : 
 
 They rose, and like a driven mist of rain 
 Forsook the doomed high city and the plain, 
 And drifted castaway ; and as they went 
 Heaviness spread o'er Ilios like a tent, 
 And past not off, but brooded all day long. 
 
 But ever coursed new spirits to the throng 
 That packt the ways of Heaven. From the 
 
 plain, 
 
 From mere and holt and hollow rose amain 
 The haunters of the silence ; from the 
 
 streams 
 
 And wells of water, from the country demes, 
 From plough and pasture, bottom, ridge 
 
 and crest 
 
 The rustic Gods rose up and joined the rest. 
 Like a long wisp of cloud from out his banks 
 Streamed Xanthos, that swift river, to the 
 
 ranks 
 Of flying shapes ; and driven by that same 
 
 mind 
 
 That urged him to it came Simoeis behind, 
 And other Gods and other, of stream and 
 
 tree 
 
 And hill and vale for nothing there can be 
 On earth or under Heaven, but hath in it 
 Essence whereby alone its form may hit 
 
94 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Our apprehension, channelled in the sense 
 Which feedeth us, that we through vision 
 
 dense 
 
 See Gods as trees walking, or in the wind 
 That singeth in the bents guess what's 
 
 behind 
 Its wailing music. 
 
 And now the unearthly flock, 
 Emptying every water, wood, bare rock 
 And pasture, beset Ida, and their wings 
 Beat o'er the forest which about her springs 
 And makes a sea of verdure, whence she lifts 
 Her soaring peaks to bathe them in the 
 
 drifts 
 
 Of cloud, and rare reveal them unto men 
 For Zeus there hath his dwelling, out of ken 
 Of men alike and gods. But now the brows, 
 The breasting summits, still eternal snows, 
 And all the faces of the mountain held 
 A concourse like in number to the field 
 Of Heaven upon some breathless summer 
 
 night 
 Printed with myriad stars, some burning 
 
 bright, 
 
 Some massed in galaxy, a cloudy scar, 
 And others faint, as infinitely far. 
 There rankt the Gods of Heaven, Earth, and 
 
 Sea, 
 
 Brethren of them now hastening from the fee 
 Of stricken Priam. Out of his deep cloud 
 Zeus flamed his levin, and his thunder loud 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 95 
 
 Volleyed his welcome. With uplifted hands 
 Acclaiming, God's oncoming each God stands 
 To greet. And thus the Hierarchy at one 
 Sits to behold the bitter business done 
 Which Paris by his luxury bestirred. 
 
 But in the city, like a stricken bird 
 Grieving her desolation and despair, 
 As voiceless and as lustreless, astare 
 For imminent Death, Kassandra croucht 
 
 beneath 
 
 Her very doom, herself the bride of Death ; 
 For in the temple's forecourt reared the mass 
 Of that which was to bring the woe to pass, 
 And hidden in him both her murderers 
 Wrung at their nails. 
 
 And slow the long day wears 
 While all the city broods. The chiefs keep 
 
 house, 
 
 Or gather on the wall, or make carouse 
 To simulate a freedom they feel not ; 
 And at street corners men in shift or plot 
 Whisper together, or in the market-place 
 Gather, and peer each other in the face 
 Furtively, seeking comfort against care ; 
 Whose eyes, meeting by chance, shift other- 
 where 
 
 In haste. But in the houses, behind doors 
 Shuttered and barred, the women scrub their 
 
 floors, 
 Or ply their looms as busily : for they 
 
96 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Ever cure care with care, and if a day 
 Be heavy lighten it with heavier task ; 
 And for their griefs wear beauty like a mask, 
 And answer heart's presaging with a song 
 On their brave lips, and render right for 
 
 wrong. 
 
 Little, by outward seeming, do they know 
 Of doom at hand, of fate or blood or woe, 
 Nor how their children, playing by their 
 
 knees, 
 
 Must end this day of busyness-at-ease 
 In shrieking night, with clamour for their 
 
 bread, 
 
 And a red bath, and a cold stone for a bed 
 Under the staring moon. 
 
 Now sinks the sun 
 
 Blood-red into the heavy sea and dun, 
 And forth from him, as he were stuck with 
 
 swords, 
 Great streams of light go upward. Then 
 
 the lords 
 
 Of havoc and unrest prepare their storms, 
 And o'er the silent city, vulture forms 
 Eris and Enyo, Alke, loke, 
 The biter, the sharp-bitten, the mad, the 
 
 fey- 
 Hover and light on pinnacle and tower : 
 The gray Erinnyes, watchful for the hour 
 When Haro be the wail. And down the sky 
 Like a white squall flung Ate with a cry 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 97 
 
 That sounded like the wind in a ship's 
 
 shrouds, 
 As shrill and wild at once. The driving 
 
 clouds 
 
 Surging together, blotted out the sea, 
 The beached ships, the plain with mound and 
 
 tree, 
 And slantwise came the sheeted rain, and 
 
 fast 
 
 The darkness settled in. Kassandra cast 
 Her mantle o'er her head, and with slow feet 
 Entered her shrine deserted, there to greet 
 Her fate when it should come ; and merciful 
 
 Sleep 
 Befriended her. 
 
 Now from his lair did creep 
 Odysseus forth unarmed, his sword and spear 
 There in the Horse, and warily to peer 
 And spy his whereabouts the Ithacan 
 Went doubtful. Then his dreadful work 
 
 began, 
 
 As down the bare way of steep Pergamos 
 Under the dark he sought for Paris' house. 
 
 H 
 
TENTH STAVE 
 
 ODYSSEUS COMES AGAIN TO PARIS* HOUSE 
 
 THERE in her cage roamed Helen light and 
 
 fierce, 
 
 Unresting, with bright eyes and straining ears, 
 Nor ever stayed her steps ; but first the hall 
 She ranged, touching the pillars ; next to 
 
 the wall 
 
 Went out and shot her gaze into the murk 
 Whereas the ships should lie ; then to her 
 
 work 
 Upon the great loom turned and wove a 
 
 shift, 
 
 But idly, waiting always for some lift 
 In the close-wrapping fog that might discover 
 The moving hosts, the spearmen of her 
 
 lover 
 
 Lover and husband, master and lord of life, 
 Coming at last to take a slave to wife. 
 And as wide-eyed she stared to feel her heart 
 Leap to her side, she felt the warm tears 
 
 start, 
 
 98 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 99 
 
 And thankt the Goddess for the balm they 
 
 brought. 
 
 Yet to her women, withal so highly wrought 
 By hope and care and waiting, she was mild 
 And gentle-voiced, and playful as a child 
 That sups the moment's joy, and nothing 
 
 heeds 
 
 Time past or time to come, but fills all needs 
 With present kindness. She would laugh 
 
 and talk, 
 
 Take arms, suffer embraces, even walk 
 The terrace 'neath the eyes of all her fate, 
 And seem to heed what they might show or 
 
 prate, 
 As if her whole heart's heart were in this 
 
 house 
 
 And not at fearful odds and perilous. 
 And should one speak of Paris, as to say, 
 " Would that our lord might see thee go so 
 
 About his house ! " Gently she'd bend her 
 
 head 
 Down to her breast and pluck a vagrant 
 
 thread 
 Forth from her tunic's hem, and looking 
 
 wise, 
 
 Gaze at her hand which on her bosom's rise 
 Lit like a butterfly and quivered there. 
 
 Now in the dusk, with Paris otherwhere 
 At council with the chieftains, into the hall 
 To Helen there, was come, adventuring all, 
 
ioo HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Odysseus in the garb of countryman, 
 A herdsman from the hills, with stain of tan 
 Upon his neck and arms, with staff and scrip, 
 And round each leg bound crosswise went a 
 
 strip 
 
 Of good oxhide. Within the porch he came 
 And louted low, and hailed her by her name, 
 Among her maidens easy to be known, 
 Though not so tall as most, and not full 
 
 blown 
 
 To shape and flush like a full-hearted rose ; 
 But like a summer wave her bosom flows 
 Lax and most gentle, and her tired sweet face 
 Seems pious as the moon in a blue space 
 Of starless heaven, and in her eyes the hue 
 Of early morning, gray through mist of blue. 
 Not by a flaunted beauty is she guessed 
 Queen of them all, but by the right expressed 
 In her calm gaze and fearless, and that hold 
 Upon her lips which Gods have. Nay, not 
 
 cold, 
 
 Thou holy one, not cold thy lips, which say 
 All in a sigh, and with one word betray 
 The passion of thy heart ! But who can wis 
 The fainting piercing message of thy kiss ? 
 O blest initiate let him live to tell 
 Thy godhead, show himself thy miracle ! 
 But when she saw him there with his head 
 
 bowed 
 And humble hands, deeply her fair face 
 
 glowed, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 101 
 
 And broad across the iris swam the black 
 Until her eyes showed darkling. " Friend, 
 
 your lack 
 Tell me," she said, " and what is mine to 
 
 give 
 
 Is yours ; but little my prerogative 
 Here in this house, where I am not the 
 
 queen 
 
 You call me, but another name, I ween, 
 Serves me about the country you are of, 
 Which Ilios gives me too, but not in love. 
 Yet are we all alike in evil plight, 
 And should be tender of each other's right, 
 And of each other's wrongdoing, and wrongs 
 
 done 
 
 Upon us. Have you wife and little one 
 Hungry at home ? Have you a son afield ? 
 Or do you mourn ? Alas, I cannot wield 
 The sword you lack, nor bow nor spear 
 
 afford 
 To serve ..." 
 
 He said, " Nay, you can sheathe the sword, 
 Slack bowstring, and make spear a hunter's 
 
 toy. 
 
 Lady, I come to end this war of Troy 
 In your good pleasure." 
 
 With her steady eyes 
 
 Unwinking fixt, " Let you and me devise," 
 Said she, " this happy end of bow and spear, 
 So shall we serve the land. You have my 
 
 ear : 
 
102 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Speak then." 
 
 "But so," he said, "these maidens have it. 
 But we save Troy alone, or never save it." 
 Turning she bid them leave her with a 
 
 nod, 
 And they obeyed. Swift then and like a 
 
 God 
 She seemed, with bright all-knowing eyes and 
 
 calm 
 
 Gesture of high-held head, and open palm 
 To greet. " Laertes' son, what news bringst 
 
 thou?" 
 " Lady," he said, " the best. The hour is 
 
 now. 
 
 We stand within the heaven-establisht walls, 
 We gird the seat. Within an hour it falls, 
 The seat divine of Dardanos and Tros, 
 After our ten years' travail and great loss 
 Of heroes not yet rested, but to rest 
 Soon." 
 
 Then she laid her hand upon her breast 
 To stay it. " Who are ye that stand here- 
 by?" 
 u Desperate men," he said, " prepared to 
 
 die 
 If thou wilt have it so. Chief is there 
 
 none 
 
 Beside the ships but -Nestor. All are gone 
 Forth in the Horse. Under thy covering 
 
 hand 
 Thou holdest all Achaia. Here we stand, 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 103 
 
 Epeios, Pyrrhos, Antiklos, with these 
 
 Cretan Idomeneus, Meriones, 
 
 Aias the Lokrian, Teukros, Diomede 
 
 Of the loud war-cry, next thy man indeed. 
 
 Golden-haired Menelaus the robbed King, 
 
 And Agamemnon by him, and I who bring 
 
 This news and must return to take what lot 
 
 Thou choosest us; for all is thine, God 
 
 wot, 
 
 To end or mend, to make or mar at will." 
 A weighty utterance, but she heard the 
 
 thrill 
 
 Within her heart, and listened only that 
 To know her love so near. So near he sat 
 Hidden when she that toucht the Horse's 
 
 flank 
 Could have toucht him ! " Odysseus ! " her 
 
 voice sank 
 
 To the low tone of the soft murmuring dove 
 That nests and broods, " Odysseus, heard 
 
 my love 
 
 My whisper of his name when close I stood 
 And stroked the Horse ? " 
 
 "I heard and understood," 
 He said, "and Lokrian Aias would have 
 
 spoken 
 Had I not clapt a hand to his mouth else 
 
 broken 
 
 By garish day had been our house of dream, 
 And our necks too. I heard a woman scream 
 Near by and cry upon the Ruinous Face, 
 
io 4 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 But none made answer to her." 
 
 Nought she says 
 
 To that but " I am ready ; let my lord 
 Come when he will. Humbly I wait his 
 
 word." 
 " That word I bring," Odysseus said, " he 
 
 comes. 
 Await him here." 
 
 Her wide eyes were the homes 
 Of long desire. " Ah, let me go with thee 
 Even as I am ; from this dark house take 
 
 me 
 While Paris is abroad ! " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " Not so, but he must find thee here abed 
 And Paris here." 
 
 The light died out ; a mask 
 Of panic was her face, what time her task 
 Stared on a field of white horror like blood : 
 " Here ! But there must be strife then ! " 
 
 " Well and good," 
 Said he. 
 
 Then she, shivering and looking small, 
 "And one must fall?" she said; he, "One 
 
 must fall." 
 Reeling she turned her pincht face other 
 
 way 
 And muttered with her lips, grown cold and 
 
 . 
 
 Then fawning came at him, and with her 
 hands 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 105 
 
 Besought him, but her voice made no 
 
 demands, 
 
 Only her haunted eyes were quick, and prayed, 
 " Ah, not to fall through me ! " 
 
 " By thee," he said, 
 " The deed is to be done." 
 
 She droopt adown 
 
 Her lovely head ; he heard her broken moan, 
 " Have I not caused enough of blood- 
 shedding, 
 And enough women's tears ? Is not the 
 
 sting 
 
 Sharp enough of the knife within my side ? " 
 No more she could. 
 
 Then he, " Think not to avoid 
 The lot of man, who payeth the full price 
 For each deed done, and riddeth vice by 
 
 vice : 
 
 Such is the curse upon him. The doom is 
 By God decreed, that for thy forfeit bliss 
 In Sparta thou shalt pay the price in Troy, 
 Dishonour for lost honour, pain for joy ; 
 By what hot thought impelled, by that alone 
 Win back ; by violence violence atone. 
 If by chicane thou fleddest, by chicane 
 Win back thy blotted footprints. Out again 
 With all thine arts of kisses slow and long, 
 Of smiles and stroking hands, and crooning 
 
 song 
 
 Whenas full-fed with love thou lulledst 
 asleep ; 
 
106 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Renew thine eyebright glances, whisper and 
 
 creep 
 And twine about his neck thy wreathing 
 
 arms : 
 As we with spears so do thou with thy 
 
 charms, 
 
 Arm thee and wait the hour of fire and smoke 
 To purge this robbery. Paris by the stroke 
 Of him he robbed shall wash out his old 
 
 cheat 
 
 In blood, and thou, woman, by new deceit 
 Of him redeem thy first. For thus God 
 
 saith, 
 Traitress, thou shalt betray thy thief to 
 
 death." 
 
 He ceased, and she by misery made wild 
 And witless, shook, and like a little child 
 Gazed piteous, and asked, " What must I 
 
 do?" 
 He answered, " Hold him by thee, falsely 
 
 true, 
 
 Until the King stand armed within the house 
 Ready to take his blood-price. Even thus, 
 By shame alone shalt thou redeem thy 
 
 shame." 
 And now she claspt his knee and cried his 
 
 name : 
 
 " Mercy ! I cannot do it. Let me die 
 Sooner than go to him so. What, must I lie 
 With one and other, make myself a whore, 
 And so go back to Sparta, nevermore 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 107 
 
 To hold my head up level with my slaves, 
 Nor dare to touch my child ? " 
 
 Said he, " Let knaves 
 Deal knavishly till freedom they can win ; 
 And so let sinners purge themselves of sin." 
 Then fiercely looking on her where she 
 
 croucht 
 
 Fast by his knees, his whole mind he avoucht : 
 " How many hast thou sent the way of death 
 By thy hot fault ? What ghosts like wander- 
 ing breath 
 
 Shudder and wail unhouseled on the plain, 
 Shreds of Achaian honour ? What hearts in 
 
 pain 
 Cry the night through ? What souls this 
 
 very night 
 
 Fare forth ? Art thou alone to sup delight, 
 Alone to lap in pleasantness, who first 
 And only, with thy lecher and his thirst, 
 Wrought all the harm ? Only for thy 
 
 smooth sake 
 
 Did Paris reive, and Menelaus ache, 
 And Hector die ashamed, and Peleus' son 
 Stand to the arrow, and Aias Telamon 
 Find madness and self-murder for the crown 
 Of all his travail ? " He eyed her up and 
 
 down 
 
 Sternly, as measuring her worth in scorn. 
 " Not thus may traffic any woman born 
 While men endure cold nights and burning 
 
 days, 
 
io8 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Hunger and wretchedness. 7 ' 
 
 She stands, she says, 
 
 " Enough I cannot answer. Tell me plain 
 What I must do." 
 
 " At dark," he said, " we gain 
 The Gates and open them. A trumpet's 
 
 blast 
 
 Will sound the entry of the host. Hold fast 
 Thy Paris then. We storm the citadel, 
 High Pergamos ; that won, the horn will tell 
 The sack begun. But hold thou Paris bound 
 Fast in thine arms. Once more the horn 
 
 shall sound. 
 That third is doom for him. Release him 
 
 then." 
 All blank she gazed. " Unarmed to face 
 
 armed men ? " 
 " Unarmed," he said, " to meet his judgment 
 
 day." 
 
 Now was thick silence broken ; now no 
 
 way 
 
 For her to shift her task nor he his fate. 
 Keenly she heeds. " 'Tis Paris at the gate ! 
 What now ? Whither away ? Where wilt 
 
 thou hide ? " 
 
 He lookt her in the face. " Here I abide 
 What he may do. Was it not truth I 
 
 spake 
 
 That all Hellas lay in thy hand ? Now take 
 What counsel or what comfort may avail." 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 109 
 
 Paris stood in the door and cried her 
 
 Hail. 
 " Hail to thee, Rose of the World ! " then 
 
 saw the man, 
 
 And knit his brows upon him, close to scan 
 His features ; but Odysseus had his hood 
 Shadowing his face. Some time the Trojan 
 
 stood 
 Judging, then said, "Thou seek'st ? What 
 
 seekest thou ? " 
 " A debt is owed me. I seek payment 
 
 now." 
 
 So he was told ; but he drew nearer yet. 
 " I would know more of thee and of thy 
 
 debt," 
 He said. 
 
 And then Odysseus, " This thy strife 
 Hath ruined all my fields which are my life, 
 Brought murrain on my beasts, cold ash to 
 
 my hearth, 
 
 Emptiness to my croft. Hunger and dearth, 
 Are these enough ? Who pays me ? " 
 
 Then Paris, 
 
 " I pay, but first will know what man it is 
 I am to pay, and in what kind." So said, 
 Snatching the hood, he whipt it from his head 
 And lookt and knew the Ithacan. " Now 
 
 by Zeus, 
 
 Treachery here ! " He swung his sword- 
 arm loose 
 Forth of his cloak and set hand to his sword ; 
 
no HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 But Helen softly called him : " Hath my 
 
 lord 
 
 No word of greeting for his bondwoman ? " 
 Straightway he went to her, and left the man, 
 And took her in his arms, and held her close. 
 And light of foot, Odysseus quit the house. 
 
ELEVENTH STAVE 
 
 THE BEGUILING OF PARIS 
 
 Now Paris tipt her chin and turned her 
 
 face 
 
 Upwards to his that fondly he might trace 
 The beauty of her budded lips, and stoop 
 And kiss them softly ; and fingered in the 
 
 loop 
 That held her girdle, and closer pressed, on 
 
 fire, 
 
 Towards her ; for her words had stung desire 
 Anew ; and wooing in his fond boy's way, 
 Whispered and lookt his passion ; then to 
 
 pray 
 Began : " Ah, love, long strange to me, 
 
 behold 
 
 Thy winter past, and come the days of gold 
 And pleasance of the spring ! For in thine 
 
 eyes 
 
 I see his light and hail him as he flies ! 
 Nay, cloud him not, nor veil him " for she 
 
 made 
 
 in 
 
ii2 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 To turn her face, saying, " Ah, let them 
 
 fade: 
 
 The soul thou prisonest here is grayer far." 
 But he would give no quarter now. " O 
 
 star, 
 
 O beacon-star, shine on me in the night 
 That I may wash me in thy bath of light, 
 Taking my fill of thee ; so cleansed all 
 And healed, I rise renewed to front what call 
 May be ! " which said, with conquest in his 
 
 bones 
 
 And in his eyes assurance, in high tones 
 He called her maids, bade take her and 
 
 prepare 
 
 The couch, and her to be new-wedded there ; 
 For long had they been strangers to their 
 
 bliss. 
 
 So by the altar standeth she submiss 
 And watchful, praying silent and intense 
 To a strange-figured Goddess, to his sense 
 Who knew but Aphrodite. " Love, what 
 
 now ? 
 Who is thy God? What secret rite hast 
 
 thou?" 
 
 For grave and stern above that altar stood 
 Here the Queen of Heaven. 
 
 In dry mood 
 She answered him, " Chaste wives to her do 
 
 pray 
 Before they couch, Blest be the strife ! You 
 
 say 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 113 
 
 We are to be new-wedded. Pour with me 
 Libation that we love not fruitlessly." 
 
 So said, she took the well-filled cup and 
 
 poured, 
 And prayed, saying, " O Mother, not 
 
 abhorred 
 
 Be this my service of thee. Count it not 
 Offence, nor let my prayers be forgot 
 When reckoning comes of things done and 
 
 not done 
 
 By me thy child, or to me, hapless one, 
 Unloving paramour and unloved wife ! " 
 
 " Her6, to thee for issue of the strife ! " 
 Cried Paris then, and poured. So Helen 
 
 went 
 And let her maids adorn her to his bent. 
 
 Then took he joy of her, and little guessed 
 Or cared what she might give or get. Possest 
 Her body by his body, but her mind 
 Searcht terribly the issue. As one blind 
 Explores the dark about him in broad day 
 And fingers in the air, so as she lay 
 Lax in his arms, her fainting eyes, aglaze 
 For terror coming, sought escape all ways. 
 Alas for her ! What way for woman fair, 
 Whose joy no fairer makes her than despair ? 
 Her burning lips that kisses could not cool, 
 Her beating heart that not love made so full, 
 The surging of her breast, her clinging hands : 
 Here are such signs as lover understands, 
 
 i 
 
1 1 4 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 But fated Paris nowise. Her soul, distraught 
 To save him, proved the net where he was 
 
 caught. 
 
 For more she anguisht lest love be his bane 
 The fiercelier spurred she him, to make him 
 
 fain 
 Of that which had been ruinous to all. 
 
 But all the household gathered on the wall 
 While these two in discordant bed were 
 
 plight, 
 
 And watcht the Achaian fires. No beacon- 
 light 
 Showed by the shore, but countless, flickering, 
 
 streamed 
 
 Innumerable lights, wove, dipt and gleamed 
 Like fireflies on a night of summer heat, 
 Withal one way they moved, though many 
 
 beat 
 
 Across and back, and mingled with the rest. 
 Anon a great glare kindled from the crest 
 Of Ida, and was answered by a blaze 
 Behind the ships, which threw up in red haze 
 Huge forms of prow and beak. Then from 
 
 the Mound 
 
 Of Ilos fire shot up, from sacred ground, 
 And out the mazy glory of moving lights 
 One sped and flared, as of the meteorites 
 In autumn some fly further, brighter courses. 
 A chariot ! They heard the thunder of the 
 
 horses ; 
 And as they flew the torch left a bright wake. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 115 
 
 And thus to one another woman spake, 
 
 " Lo, more lights race ! They follow him, 
 
 they near, 
 Catch and draw level. Hark ! Now you 
 
 can hear 
 The tramp of men ! " 
 
 Says one, " That baleful sheen 
 Is light upon their spears. The Greeks, I 
 
 ween, 
 Are coming up to rescue or requite." 
 
 But then her mate : " They mass, they fill 
 
 the night 
 With panic terror." 
 
 True, that all night things 
 Fled as they came. They heard the flickering 
 
 wings 
 
 Of countless birds in haste, and as they flew 
 So fled the dark away. Light waxed and 
 
 ^grew 
 
 Until the dead of night was vivified 
 And radiant opened out the countryside 
 With pulsing flames of fire, which gleamed 
 
 and glanced, 
 
 Flickered, wavered, yet never stayed advance. 
 As the sun rising high o'er Ida cold 
 Beats a sea-path in flakes of molten gold, 
 So stretcht from shore to Troy that litten 
 
 stream 
 That moved and shuddered, restless as a 
 
 dream, 
 Yet ever nearing, till on spear and shield 
 
n6 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 They saw light like the moon on a drowned 
 
 field, 
 
 And in the glare of torches saw and read 
 Gray faces, like the legions of the dead, 
 Silent about the walls, and waiting there. 
 
 But in the fragrant chamber Helen the fair 
 Lay close in arms, and Paris slept, his head 
 Upon her bosom, deep as any dead. 
 
 Sudden there smote the blast of a great 
 
 horn, 
 
 Single, long-held and shuddering, and far- 
 borne ; 
 
 And then a deathless silence. Paris stirred 
 On that soft pillow, and listened while they 
 
 heard 
 
 Many men running frantically, with feet 
 That slapt the stones, and voices in the 
 
 street 
 Of question and call " Oh, who are ye that 
 
 run ? 
 What of the night ? " O peace ! " And 
 
 some lost one 
 Wailed like a woman, and her a man did 
 
 curse, 
 And there were scuffling, prayers, and then 
 
 worse 
 
 A silence. But the running ended not 
 While Paris lay alistening with a knot 
 Of Helen's loose hair twisting round his 
 finger. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 117 
 
 "O love," he murmured low, " I may not 
 
 linger. 
 
 The street's awake. Alas, thou art too kind 
 To be a warrior's bride." Sighing, she 
 
 twined 
 
 Her arm about his neck and toucht his face, 
 And pressed it gently back to its warm place 
 Of pillowing. And Paris kissed her breast 
 And slept ; but her heart's riot gave no rest 
 As quaking there she lay, awaiting doom. 
 
 Then afar off rose clamour, and the room 
 Was fanned with sudden light and sudden 
 
 dark, 
 
 As on a summer night in a great park 
 Blazed forth you see each tuft of grass or 
 
 mound. 
 
 Anon the drowning blackness, while the sound 
 Of Zeus's thunder hardens every close : 
 So here the chamber glared, then dipt, and 
 
 rose 
 
 That far confused tumult, and now and then 
 The scurrying feet of passion-driven men. 
 Thrilling she waited with sick certainty 
 Of doom inexorable, while the struck city 
 Fought its death - grapple, and the windy 
 
 height 
 
 Of Pergamos became a shambles. White 
 The holy shrines stared on a field of blood, 
 And with blank eyes the emptied temples 
 
 stood 
 While murder raved before them, and below 
 
n8 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 And all about the city ran the woe 
 
 Of women for their children. Then the 
 
 flame 
 
 Burst in the citadel, and overcame 
 The darkness, and the time seemed of broad 
 
 day. 
 
 And Helen stared unwinking where she lay 
 Pillowing Paris. 
 
 Now glad and long and shrill 
 The second trumpet sounds. They have the 
 
 hill- 
 High Troy is down, is down ! Starting, he 
 
 wakes 
 And turns him in her arms. His face she 
 
 takes 
 
 In her two hands and turns it up to hers. 
 Nothing she says, nothing she does, nor stirs 
 From her still scrutiny, nor so much as blinks 
 Her eyes, deep-searching, of whose blue he 
 
 drinks, 
 
 And fond believes her all his own, while she 
 Marvels that aught of his she e'er could be 
 In times bygone. But now he is on fire 
 Again, and urges on her his desire, 
 And loses all the sense of present needs 
 For him in burning Troy, where Priam bleeds 
 Head-smitten, trodden on his palace-floor, 
 And white Kassandra yieldeth up her flower 
 To Aias' lust, and of the Dardan race 
 Survive he only, renegade disgrace, 
 He only and Aineias the wise prince. 
 
HELEN REDEEMED 119 
 
 But now is crying fear abroad and wins 
 The very household of the shameful lover ; 
 Now are the streets alive, for worse in cover 
 Like a trapt rat to die than fight the odds 
 Under the sky. Now women shriek to the 
 
 Gods, 
 
 And men run witlessly, and in and out 
 The Greeks press, burning, slaying, and the 
 
 rout 
 
 Screameth to Heaven. As at sea the mews 
 Pack, their wings battling, when some fresh 
 
 wrack strews 
 
 The tideway, and in greater haste to stop 
 Others from prey, will let their morsel drop, 
 And all the while make harsh lament so here 
 The avid spoilers bickered in their fear 
 To be manoeuvred out of robbery, 
 And tore the spoil, and mangled shamefully 
 Bodies of men to strip them, and in haste 
 To forestall ravishers left the victims chaste. 
 Ares, the yelling God, and Ate white 
 Swept like a snow-storm over Troy that night ; 
 And towers rockt, and in the naked glare 
 Of fire the smoke climbed to the upper air ; 
 And clamour was as of the dead broke loose. 
 
 But Menelaus his stern way pursues, 
 And to the wicked house with chosen band 
 Cometh, his good sword naked in his hand ; 
 And now, while Paris loves and holds her fast 
 In arms, the third horn sounds a shattering 
 
 blast, 
 
120 HELEN REDEEMED 
 
 Long-held, triumphant ; and about the door 
 Gathers the household, to cry, to pray, to 
 
 implore, 
 And at the last break in and scream the 
 
 truth 
 
 " The Greeks ! The Greeks ! Save your- 
 selves ! " 
 
 Then in sooth 
 
 Starts Paris out of bed, and as he goes 
 Sees in the eyes of Helen all she knows 
 And all believes ; and with his utter loss 
 Of her rises the man in him that was 
 Ere luxury had entered blood and bone 
 Of him. No word he said, but let one groan, 
 And turned his dying eyes to hers, and read 
 Therein his fate, that to her he was dead, 
 Long dead and cold in grave. Whereat he 
 
 past 
 
 Out of the door, and met his end at last 
 As man, not minion. 
 
 But the woman fair 
 
 Lay on her face, half buried in her hair, 
 Naked and prone beneath her saving sin, 
 Not yet enheartened new life to begin. 
 
ENVOY 
 
 BUT thou didst rise, Maid Helen, as from 
 
 sleep, 
 
 A final tryst to keep 
 
 With thy true lover, in whose hands thy life 
 Lay, as in arms ; his wife 
 In heart as well as deed ; his wife, his friend, 
 His soul's fount and its end ! 
 For such it is, the marriage of true minds, 
 Each in each sanction finds ; 
 So if her beauty lift her out of thought 
 Whither man's to be brought 
 To worship her perfection on his knees, 
 So in his strength she sees 
 Self glorified, and two make one clear orb 
 Whereinto all rays absorb 
 Which stream from God and unto God 
 
 return. 
 
 So, as he fared, I yearn 
 To be, and serve my years of pain and loss 
 'Neath my walled Ilios, 
 With my eyes ever fixt to where, a star, 
 Thou and thy sisters are, 
 Helen and Beatrice, with thee embraced, 
 Hands in thy hands, and arms about thy 
 
 waist. 
 
 1911-12. 
 
HYPSIPYLE 
 
 QUEEN of the shadows, Maid and Wife, 
 Twifold in essence, as in life, 
 The lamp of Death, the star of Birth, 
 Half cradled and half mourned by Earth, 
 By Hell half won, half lost ! aid me 
 To sing thy fond Hypsipyle, 
 Thy bosom's mate who, unafraid, 
 Renounced for thee what part she had 
 In sun and wind upon the hill, 
 In dawn about the mere, in still 
 Woodlands, in kiss of lapping wave, 
 In laughter, in love all this she gave ! 
 And shared thy dream-life, visited 
 The sunless country of the dead, 
 There to abide with thee, their Queen, 
 In that gray region, shadow-seen 
 By them that cast no shadows, yet 
 Themselves are shadows. Nor forget, 
 Kore, her love made manifest 
 To thee, familiar of her breast 
 And partner of her whispering mouth. 
 123 
 
i2 4 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Thee too, Our Lady of the South, 
 Uranian Kypris, I invoke, 
 Regent of starry space, with stroke 
 Of splendid wing, in whose white wake 
 Stream those who, filled with thee, forsake 
 Their clinging shroudy clots, and rise, 
 Lover and loved, to thy pure skies, 
 To thy blue realm ! O lady, touch 
 My lips with rue, for she loved much. 
 
 What poet in what cloistered nook, 
 Indenting in what roll of a book 
 His rhymes, can voice the tides of love ? 
 Nay, thrilling lark, nay, moaning dove, 
 The nightingale's full-charged throat 
 That cheereth now, and now doth gloat, 
 And now recordeth bitter-sweet 
 Longing, too wise to image it : 
 These be your minstrels, lovers ! Choose 
 From their winged choir your urgent Muse ; 
 Let her your speechless joys relate 
 Which men with words sophisticate, 
 Striving by reasons make appear 
 To head what heart proclaims so clear 
 To heart ; as if by wit to wis 
 What mouth to mouth tells in a kiss, 
 Or in their syllogisms dry 
 Freeze a swift glance's cogency. 
 Nay, but the heart's so music-fraught, 
 Music is all in love, words naught. 
 One heart's a rote, with music stored 
 
HYPSIPYLE 125 
 
 Though mute ; but two hearts make a chord 
 
 Of piercing music. One alone 
 
 Is nothing : two make the full tone. 
 
 I 
 
 On Enna's uplands, on a lea 
 Between the mountains and the sea, 
 Shadowed anon by wandering cloud, 
 Or flickering wings of birds a-crowd, 
 And now all golden in the sun. 
 See Kore, see her maidens run 
 Hither and thither through those hours 
 Of dawn among the wide-eyed flowers, 
 While gentian, crocus, asphodel 
 (With rosy star in each white bell), 
 Anemone, blood-red with rings 
 Of paler fire, that plant that swings 
 A crimson cluster in the wind 
 They pluck, or sit anon to bind 
 Of these earth-stars a coronet 
 For their smooth-tressed Queen, who yet 
 Strays with her darling interlaced, 
 Hypsipyle the grave, the chaste 
 Her whose gray shadow-life with his 
 Who singeth now for ever is. 
 
 She, little slim thing, Kore's mate, 
 Child-faced, gray-eyed, of sober gait, 
 Of burning mind and passion pent 
 To image-making, ever went 
 Where wonned her Mistress ; for those two 
 
126 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 By their hearts' grace together grew, 
 The one to need, the one to give 
 (As women must if they would live, 
 Who substance win by waste of self 
 And only spend to hoard their pelf : 
 " O heart, take all of mine !" " O heart, 
 That which thou tak'st of thee is part 
 No robbery therefore : mine is thine, 
 Take then ! ") : so she and Proserpine 
 Intercommunion^ each bright day, 
 And when night fell together lay 
 Cradled in arms, or cheek to cheek 
 Whispered the darkness out. Thou meek 
 And gentle vision ! let me tell 
 Thy beauties o'er I love so well : 
 Thy sweet low bosom's rise and fall, 
 Pulsing thy heart's clear madrigal ; 
 Or how the blue beam from thine eyes 
 Imageth all love's urgencies ; 
 Thy lips' frail fragrance, as of flowers 
 Remembered in penurious hours 
 Of winter-exile ; of thy brow, 
 Not written as thy breast of snow 
 With love's faint charact'ry, for his wing 
 Leaves not the heart long ! Last I sing 
 Thy thin quick fingers, in whose pleaching 
 Lieth all healing, all good teaching 
 Wherewith, touching my discontent, 
 I know how thou art eloquent ! 
 Remember'd joy, Hypsipyle ! 
 Now may that serve to comfort me, 
 
HYPSIPYLE 127 
 
 While I, O Maiden dedicate, 
 
 Seek voice for singing thy gray Fate ! 
 
 Now, as they went, one heart in two, 
 Brusht to the knees by flowers, by dew 
 Anointed, by the wind caressed, 
 By the light kissed on eyes and breast, 
 'Twas Kor talked ; Hypsipyle 
 Listened, with eyes far-set, for she 
 Of speech was frugal, voicing low 
 And rare her heart's deep underflow 
 Content to lie, like fallow sweet 
 For rain or sun to cherish it, 
 Or scattered seed substance to find 
 In her deep-funded, quiet mind. 
 And thus the Goddess : " Blest art thou, 
 Hypsipyle, who canst not know 
 Until the hour strikes what must come 
 To pass ! But I foresee the doom 
 And stay to meet it. Even here 
 The place, and now the hour ! " Then fear 
 Took her who spake so fearless, cold 
 Threaded her thronging veins behold ! 
 A hand on either shoulder stirs 
 That slim, sweet body close to hers, 
 And need fires need till, lip with lip, 
 They seal and sign their fellowship, 
 While Kore, godhead all forgot, 
 Clings whispering, " Child, leave me not 
 Whenas to darkness and the dead 
 I go ! " And clear the answer sped 
 
128 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 From warm mouth murmuring kiss and cheer, 
 " Never I leave thee, O my dear ! " 
 Thereafter stand they beatingly, 
 Not speaking ; and the hour draws nigh. 
 
 And all the land shows passing fair, 
 Fair the broad sea, the living air, 
 The misty mountain-sides, the lake 
 Flecked blue and purple ! To forsake 
 These, and those bright flower-gatherers 
 Scattered about this land of theirs, 
 That stoop or run, that kneel to pick, 
 That cry each other to come quick 
 And see new treasure, unseen yet ! 
 Remembered joy ah, how forget ! 
 
 But mark how all must come to pass 
 As was foreknowledged. In the grass 
 Whereas the Goddess and her mate 
 Stood, one and other, prompt for fate 
 Listless the first and heavy-eyed, 
 Astrain the second she espied 
 That strange white flower, unseen before, 
 With chalice pale, which thin stalk bore 
 And swung, as hanging by a hair, 
 So fine it seemed afloat in air, 
 Unlinkt and wafted for the feast 
 Of some blest mystic, without priest 
 Or acolyte to tender it : 
 Whereto the maid did stoop and fit 
 Her hand about its silken cup 
 
HYPSIPYLE 129 
 
 To close it, that her mouth might sup 
 The honey-drop within. The bloom 
 Saw Kore then, and knew her doom 
 Foretold in it ; and stood in tranc 
 Fixed and still. No nigromance 
 Used she, but read the fate it bore 
 In seedless womb and petals frore. 
 Chill blew the wind, waiting stood She, 
 Waiting her mate, Hypsipyle. 
 
 Then in clear sky the thunder tolled 
 Sudden, and all the mountains rolled 
 The dreadful summons round, and still 
 Lay all the lands, only the rill 
 Made tinkling music. Once more drave 
 Peal upon peal and lo ! a grave 
 Yawned in the Earth, and gushing smoke 
 Belched out, as driven, and hung, and broke 
 With sullen puff ; like tongues the flame 
 Leapt following. Thence A'ldoneus came, 
 Swart-bearded king, with iron crown'd, 
 In iron mailed, his chariot bound 
 About with iron, holding back 
 Amain two steeds of glistering black 
 And eyeballs white-rimmed fearfully, 
 And nostrils red, and crests flying free ; 
 Who held them pawing at the verge, 
 Tossing their spume up, as the surge 
 Flung high against some seaward bluff. 
 Nothing he spake, or smooth or gruff, 
 But drave his errand, gazing down 
 
 K 
 
1 30 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Upon the Maid, whose blown back gown 
 
 Revealed her maiden. Still and proud 
 
 Stood she among her nymphs, unbowed 
 
 Her comely head, undimmed her eye, 
 
 Inseparate her lips and dry, 
 
 Facing his challenge of her state, 
 
 Neither denying, nor desperate, 
 
 Pleading no mercy, seeing none, 
 
 Her wild heart masked in face of stone. 
 
 But they, her bevy, clustered thick 
 
 As huddled sheep, set their eyes quick, 
 
 And held each other, hand or waist, 
 
 Paling or flushing as fear raced 
 
 Thronging their veins they knew not, 
 
 they, 
 The gathered fates that broke this day, 
 
 And all the land seemed passing fair 
 To one who knew, and waited there. 
 
 " Goddess and Maid," then said the King, 
 " Long have I sought this day should bring 
 An end of torment. Know me thou 
 God postulant, with whom below 
 A world awaits her queen, while here 
 I seek and find one without peer ; 
 Nor deem her heedless nor unschooled 
 In what in Heaven is writ and ruled. 
 Decreed of old my bride-right was, 
 Decreed thy Mother's pain and loss, 
 Decreed thy loathing, and decreed 
 
HYPSIPYLE 131 
 
 That which thou shunnest to be thy need ; 
 
 For thou shalt love me, Lady, yet, 
 
 Though little liking now, and fret 
 
 Of jealous care shall grave thy heart 
 
 And draw thee back when time's to part 
 
 If fond Demeter have her will 
 
 Against thine own." 
 
 The Maid stood still 
 
 And guarded watched, and her proud eyes' 
 Scrutiny bade his own advise 
 Whether indeed their solemn stare 
 Saw Destiny and read it there 
 Beyond her suitor, or within 
 Her own heart heard the message ring. 
 Awhile she gazed : her stern aspect, 
 Young and yet fraught with Godhead, checkt 
 Both Him who claimed, and her who'd cling, 
 And them who wondered. " O great King," 
 She said, and mournful was her crying 
 As when night-winds set pine-trees sighing, 
 " King of the folk beyond the tide 
 Of sleep, behold thy chosen bride 
 Not shunning thee, nor seeking. Take 
 That which Gods neither mar nor make, 
 But only They, the Three, who spin 
 The threads which hem and mesh us in, 
 Both Gods and men, till she who peers 
 The longest cuts them with her shears. 
 Take, take, A'idoneus, and take her, 
 My fosterling." 
 
 
1 32 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Then He, " O star 
 Of Earth, O Beacon of my days, 
 Light of my nights, whose beamy rays 
 Shall pierce the foggy cerement 
 Wherein my dead grope and lament 
 Beyond all loss the loss of light, 
 Come ! and be pleasant in my sight 
 This thy beloved. Perchance she too 
 Shall find a suitor come to woo ; 
 For love men leave not with their bones 
 That is the soul's, and half atones 
 And half makes bitterer their loss, 
 Remembering what their fortune was." 
 
 Trembling Hypsipyle uplift 
 Her eyes towards the hills, where swift 
 The shadows flew, but no more fleet 
 Than often she with flying feet 
 And flying raiment, she with these 
 Her mates, whom now estranged she sees 
 As if the shadow-world had spread 
 About her now, and she was dead 
 Her mates no more ! cut off by fear 
 From these two fearless ones. A tear 
 Welled up and hovered, hung a gem 
 Upon her eyelid's dusky hem, 
 As raindrops linkt and strung arow 
 Broider with stars the winter bough. 
 This was her requiem and farewell 
 To them, thus rang she her own knell ; 
 Nor more gave she, nor more asked they, 
 But took and went the fairy way. 
 
HYPSIPYLE 133 
 
 For thus with unshed tears made blind 
 Went she : thus go the fairy kind 
 Whither fate driveth ; not as we 
 Who fight with it, and deem us free 
 Therefore, and after pine, or strain 
 Against our prison bars in vain. 
 For to them Fate is Lord of Life 
 And Death, and idle is a strife 
 With such a master. They not know 
 Life past, life coming, but life now ; 
 Nor back look they to long, nor forth 
 To hope, but sup the minute's worth 
 With draught so quick and keen that each 
 Moment gives more than we could reach 
 In all our term of three-score years, 
 Whereof full score we give to fears 
 Of losing them, and other score 
 Dreaming how fill the twenty more. 
 
 Now is the hour, Bride of the Night ! 
 The chariot turns, the great steeds fight 
 The rocky entry ; flies the dust 
 Behind the wheels at each fierce thrust 
 Of giant shoulder, at each lunge 
 Of giant haunch. Down, down they plunge 
 Into the dark, with rioting mane, 
 And the earth's door shuts-to again. 
 Now fly, ye Oreads, strain your arms, 
 Let eyes and hair voice your alarms 
 Hair blown back, mouths astretch for fear, 
 Strained eyeballs cry that Mother dear 
 Her daughter's rape ; fly like the gale 
 
i 3 4 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 That down the valleys drives the hail 
 In scurrying sheets, and lays the corn 
 Flat, which when man of woman born 
 Seeth, he bows him to the grass, 
 Whispering in hush, The Oreads pass. 
 (In shock he knows ye, and in mirth, 
 Since he is kindred of that earth 
 Which bore ye in her secret stress, 
 Images of her loveliness, 
 To her dear paramour the Wind.) 
 Follow me now that car behind. 
 
 II 
 
 O ye that know the fairy throng, 
 And heed their secret under-song ; 
 In flower or leaf's still ecstasy 
 Of birth and bud their passion see, 
 In wind or calm, in driving rain 
 Or frozen snow discern them strain 
 To utter and to be ; who lie 
 At dawn in dewy brakes to spy 
 The rapture of their flying feet- 
 Follow me now those coursers fleet, 
 Sucked in their wake, down ruining 
 Through channelled night, where only sing 
 The shrill gusts streaming through the hair 
 Of them who sway and bend them there, 
 And peer in vain with shielded eyes 
 To rend the dark. Clinging it lies, 
 Thick as wet gossamer that shrouds 
 
HYPSIPYLE 135 
 
 October brushwoods, or low clouds 
 That from the mountain tops roll down 
 Into the lowland vales, to drown 
 Men's voices and to choke their breath 
 And make a silence like to death. 
 But this was hot and dry ; it came 
 And smote them, like the gush of flame 
 Fanned in a smithy, that outpours 
 And floods with fire the open doors. 
 
 Downward their course was, swift as flight 
 Of meteor flaring through the night, 
 Steady and dreadful, with no sound 
 Of wheels or hoofs upon the ground, 
 Nor jolt, nor jar ; for once past through 
 Earth's portals, steeds and chariot flew 
 On wings invisible and strong 
 And even-oaring, such as throng 
 The nights when birds of passage sweep 
 O'er cities and the folk asleep : 
 Such was their awful flight. Afar 
 Showed Hades glimmering like a star 
 Seen red through fog : and as they sped 
 To that, the frontiers of the dead 
 Revealed their sullen leagues and bare, 
 And sad forms flitting here and there, 
 Or clustered, waiting who might come 
 Their empty ways with news of home. 
 Yet all one course at length must hold, 
 Or late or soon, and all be tolled 
 By Charon in his dark-prowed boat. 
 Thither was swept the chariot 
 
136 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 And crossed dry-wheeled the coiling flood 
 Of Styx, and o'er the willow wood 
 And slim gray poplars which do hem 
 The further shore, Hell's diadem 
 So by the tower foursquare and great 
 Where King A'fdoneus keeps his state 
 And rules his bodyless thralls they stand. 
 
 Dark ridge and hollow showed the land 
 Fold over fold, like waves of soot 
 Fixt in an anguish of pursuit 
 For evermore, so far as eye 
 Could range ; and all was hot and dry 
 As furnace is which all about 
 Etna scorcheth in days of drouth, 
 And showeth dun and sinister 
 That fair isle linked to main so fair. 
 Nor tree nor herbage grew, nor sang 
 Water among the rocks : hard rang 
 The heel on metal, or on crust 
 Grew tender, or went soft in dust ; 
 Neither for beast nor bird nor snake 
 Was harbourage ; nor could such slake 
 Their thirst, nor from the bitter heat 
 Hide, since the sun not furnished it ; 
 But airless, shadowless and dense 
 The land lay swooning, dead to sense 
 Beneath that vault of stuprous black, 
 Motionless hanging, without wrack 
 Of cloud to break and pass, nor rent 
 To hint the blue. Like the foul tent 
 
HYPSIPYLE 137 
 
 A foul night makes, it sagged ; for stars 
 Showed hopeless faces, with two scars 
 In each, their eyes' immortal woe, 
 Ever to seek and never know : 
 In all that still immensity 
 These only moved these and the sea, 
 Which dun and sullen heaved, with surge 
 And swell unseen, save at the verge 
 Where fainted off the black to gray 
 And showed such light as on a day 
 Of sun's eclipse men tremble at. 
 
 Here the dead people moved or sat, 
 Casting no shadow, hailing none 
 Boldly ; but in fierce undertone 
 They plied each other, or on-sped 
 Their way with signal of the head 
 For answer, or arms desperate 
 Flung up, or shrug disconsolate. 
 And this the quest of every one : 
 "What hope have ye?" And answer, 
 
 " None." 
 
 Never passed shadow shadow but 
 That answer got to question put. 
 In that they lived, in that, alas ! 
 Lovely and hapless, Thou must pass 
 Thy days, with this for added lot 
 Aching, to nurse things unforgot. 
 
 Remember'd joy, Hypsipyle ! 
 The Oread choir, the Oread glee : 
 
138 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 The nimble air of quickening hills, 
 
 The sweet dawn light that floods and fills 
 
 The hollowed valleys ; the dawn wind 
 
 That bids the world wake, and on blind 
 
 Eyelids of sleeping mortals lays 
 
 Cool palms that urge them see and praise 
 
 The Day-God coming with the sun 
 
 To hearten toil ! He warned you run 
 
 And hide your beauties deep in brake 
 
 Of fern or briar, or reed of lake, 
 
 Or in wet crevice of the rock, 
 
 There to abide until the clock 
 
 You reckon by, with shadowy hands, 
 
 Lay benediction on the lands 
 
 And landsmen, and the eve-jar's croak 
 
 Summon ye, lightfoot fairy folk, 
 
 To your activity full tide 
 
 Over the empty earth and wide. 
 
 Here be your food, fair nymph, and coy 
 
 Of mortal ken remember'd joy ! 
 
 Remember'd joy ! Ah, stormy nights, 
 Ah, the mad revel when wind fights 
 With wind, and slantwise comes the rain 
 And shatters at the window-pane, 
 To wake the hind, who little knows 
 Whose fingers drum those passionate blows, 
 Nor what swift indwellers of air 
 Ye be who hide in forms so fair 
 Your wayward motions, cruel to us, 
 While lovely, and dispiteous ! 
 
HYPSIPYLE 139 
 
 Ah, nights of flying scud and rout 
 When scared the slim young moon rides out 
 In her lagoon of open sky, 
 Or older, marks your revelry 
 As calm and large she oars above 
 Your drifting lives of ruth or love. 
 Boon were those nights of dusted gold 
 And glint of fireflies ! Boon the cold 
 And witching frost ! All's one, all's one 
 To thee, whose nights and days go on 
 Now in one span of changeless dusk 
 On one earth, crackling like the husk 
 Of the dropt mast in winter wood : 
 Remember'd joy 'tis all thy food, 
 Hypsipyle, to whose fond sprite 
 I vow my praise while I have light. 
 
 Dumbly she wandered there, as pale 
 With lack of light, with form as frail 
 As those poor hollow congeners 
 Whose searching eyes encountered hers, 
 Petitioning as mute as she 
 Some grain of hope, where none might be, 
 Daring not yet to voice their moan 
 To her whose case was not their own ; 
 For where they go like breath in a shell 
 That wails, my love goes quick in Hell. 
 
 Alas, for her, the sweet and slim ! 
 Slowly she pines ; her eyes grow dim 
 With seeking ; her smooth, sudden breasts 
 
1 40 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Hang languidly ; those little nests 
 For kisses which her dimples were, 
 In cheeks graved hollow now by care 
 Vanish, and sharply thrusts her chin, 
 And sharp her bones of arm and shin. 
 Reproach she looks, about, above, 
 Denied her light, denied her love, 
 Denied for what she sacrificed, 
 Doomed to be fruitless agonist. 
 (O God, and I must see her fade, 
 Must see and anguish in my shade !) 
 Nor help nor comfort gat she now 
 From her whose need called forth her vow ; 
 For close in arms Queen Kore dwelt 
 In that great tower A'idoneus built 
 To cherish her ; deep in his bed, 
 Loved as the Gods love whom they wed ; 
 Turned from pale maiden to pale wife, 
 Pale now with love's insatiate strife 
 First to appease, and then renew 
 The wild desire to mingle two 
 Natures, to long, to seek, to shun, 
 To have, to give, to make two one 
 That must be two if they would each 
 Learn all the lore that love can teach. 
 So strove the mistress, while the maid 
 Went alien among the dead, 
 Unspoken, speaking none, but watcht 
 By them who knew themselves outmatcht 
 By her, translated whole, nor guessed 
 What miseries gnawed within that breast, 
 
HYPSIPYLE 141 
 
 Which could be toucht, which could give 
 
 meat 
 
 To babe ; which was not eye-deceit 
 As theirs, poor phantoms. So went she 
 Grudged but unscathed beside the sea, 
 Or sat alone by that sad strand 
 Nursing her worn cheek in her hand ; 
 And did not mark, as day on day 
 Lengthened the arch of changeless gray, 
 How she was shadowed, how to her 
 Stretcht arms another prisoner ; 
 Nor knew herself desirable 
 By any thankless guest of Hell 
 Withal each phantom seemed no less 
 Whole-natured to her heedlessness. 
 
 Midway her round of solitude 
 She used to haunt a dead sea-wood 
 Where among boulders lifeless trees 
 Stuck rigid fingers to the breeze 
 That stream of faint hot air that flits 
 Aimless at noon. 'Tis there she sits 
 Hour after hour, and as a dove 
 Croons when her breast is ripe for love, 
 So sings this exile, quiet, sad chants 
 Of love, yet knows not what she wants ; 
 And singing there in undertone, 
 Is one day answered by the moan 
 Of hidden mourner ; but no fear 
 Hath she for sound so true, though near ; 
 Nay, but sings out her elegy, 
 
1 42 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Which, like an echo, answers he. 
 
 Again she sings ; he suits her mood, 
 
 Nor breaks upon her solitude : 
 
 So she, choragus, calls the tune, 
 
 And as she leads he follows soon. 
 
 As bird with bird vies in the brake, 
 
 She sings no note he will not take 
 
 As when she pleads, " Ah, rrfy lost love, 
 
 The night is dark thou art not of," 
 
 Quick cometh answering the phrase, 
 
 " O love, let all our nights be days ! " 
 
 This, rapt, with beating heart, she heeds 
 
 And follows, " Sweet love, my heart bleeds ! 
 
 Come, stay the wound thyself didst give " ; 
 
 Then he, " I come to bid thee live." 
 
 And so they carol, and her heart 
 
 Swells to believe his counterpart, 
 
 And strophe striketh clear, which he 
 
 Caps with his brave antistrophe ; 
 
 And as a maiden waxes bold, 
 
 And opens what should not be told 
 
 When all her auditory she sees 
 
 Within her mirror, so to trees 
 
 And rocks, and sullen sounding main 
 
 She empties all her passioned pain ; 
 
 And " love, love, love," her burden is, 
 
 And " I am starving for thee," his. 
 
 Moved, melted, all on fire she stands, 
 
 Holding abroad her quivering hands, 
 
 Raises her sweet eyes faint with tears 
 
 And dares to seek him whom she hears ; 
 
HYPSIPYLE 143 
 
 And from her parted lips a sigh 
 
 Stealeth, as knowing he is nigh 
 
 And her fate on her then she'd shun 
 
 That which she seeks ; but the thing's done. 
 
 Hollow-voiced, dim, spake her a shade, 
 " O thou that cosiest, nymph or maid 
 If nymph, then maiden, since for aye 
 Virgin is immortality, 
 Nor love can change what Death cannot 
 Look on me by love new-begot ; 
 Look on me, child new-born, nor start 
 To see my form who knowest my heart ; 
 For it is thine. O Mother and Wife, 
 Take then my love thou gavest it life ! " 
 
 So spake one close : to whom she lent 
 The wonder of her eyes' content 
 That lucent gray, as if moonlight 
 Shone through a sapphire in the night 
 And saw him faintly imaged, rare 
 As wisp of cloud on hillside bare, 
 A filamental form, a wraith 
 Shaped like that man who in the faith 
 Of one puts all his hope : who stood 
 Trembling in her near neighbourhood, 
 A thing of haunted eyes, of slim 
 And youthful seeming ; yet not dim, 
 Yet not unmanly in his fashion 
 Of speech, nor impotent of passion 
 
I 4 4 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 The which his tones gave earnest of 
 
 And his aspect of hopeless love ; 
 
 Who, drawing nearer, came to stand 
 
 So close beside her that one hand 
 
 Lit on her shoulder yet no touch 
 
 She felt : " O maiden overmuch," 
 
 He grieved, " O body far too sweet 
 
 For such as I, frail counterfeit 
 
 Of man, who yet was once a man, 
 
 Cut off before the midmost span 
 
 Of mortal life was but half run, 
 
 Or ere to love he had found one 
 
 Like thee yet happy in that fate, 
 
 That waiting, he is fortunate : 
 
 For better far in Hell to fare 
 
 With thee than commerce otherwhere, 
 
 Sharing the snug and fat outlook 
 
 Of bed and board and ingle-nook 
 
 With earth-bound woman, earth-born child. 
 
 Nay, but high love is free and wild 
 
 And centreth not in mortal things ; 
 
 But to the soul giveth he wings, 
 
 And with the soul strikes partnership, 
 
 So may two let corruption slip 
 
 And breasting level, with far eyes 
 
 Lifted, seek haven in the skies, 
 
 Untrammerd by the earthly mesh. 
 
 O thou," said he, " of fairy flesh, 
 
 Immortal prisoner, take of me 
 
 Love ! 'tis my heritage in fee ; 
 
 For I am very part thereof, 
 
HYPSIPYLE 145 
 
 And share the godhead." 
 
 So his love 
 
 Pled he with tones in love well-skilled 
 Which on her bosom beat and thrilled, 
 And pierced. No word nor look she had 
 To voice her heart, or sad or glad. 
 Rapt stood she, wooed by eager word 
 And by her need, whose cry she heard 
 Above his crying ; but she guessed 
 She was desired, beset, possessed 
 Already, handfasted to sight, 
 And yielding so, her heart she plight. 
 
 Thus was her mating : of the eyes 
 And ears, and her love half surmise, 
 Detected by her burning face 
 Which saw, not felt, his fierce embrace. 
 For on her own she knew no hand 
 When caging it he seemed to stand, 
 And round her waist felt not the warm 
 Sheltered peace of the belting arm 
 She saw him clasp withal. When rained 
 His words upon her, or eyes strained 
 As though her inmost shrine to pierce 
 Where hid her heart of hearts, her ears 
 Conceived, although her body sweet 
 Might never feel a young life beat 
 And leap within it. Ah, what cry 
 That mistress e'er heard poet sigh 
 Could voice thy beauty ? Or what chant 
 Of music be thy ministrant ? 
 
 L 
 
146 HYPSIPYLE 
 
 Since thou art Music, poesy 
 
 Must both thy spouse and increase be ! 
 
 In the hot dust, where lizards crouch 
 And pant, he made her bridal couch ; 
 Thither down drew her to his side 
 And, phantom, taught her to be bride 
 With words so ardent, looks so hot 
 She needs must feel what she had not, 
 Guess herself in beleaguered bed 
 And throb response. Thus she was wed. 
 As she whom Zeus loved in a cloud, 
 So lay she in her lover's shroud, 
 And o'er her members crept the chill 
 We know when mist creeps up a hill 
 Out of the vale at eve. As grows 
 The ivy, rooting as it goes, 
 In such a quick close envelope 
 She lay aswoon, nor guessed the scope 
 Nor tether of his hot intent, 
 Nor what to that inert she lent, 
 Save when at last with half-turned head 
 And glimmering eyes, encompassed 
 She saw herself, a bride possest 
 By ghostly bridegroom, held and prest 
 To unfelt bosom, saw his mouth 
 Against her own, which to his drouth 
 Gave no allay that she could sense, 
 Nor took of her sweet recompense. 
 So moved by pity, stirred by rue, 
 Out of their onslaught young love grew. 
 
HYPSIPYLE 147 
 
 Love that with delicate tongues of fire 
 Can kindle hearts inflamed desire 
 In her for him who needed it ; 
 And so she claimed and by eyes' wit 
 Had what she would : and now made war, 
 Being, as all sweet women are, 
 Prudes till Love calls them, and then fierce 
 In love's high calling. Thus with her ears 
 She fed on love, and to her eyes 
 Lent deeds of passionate emprise 
 Till at the last, the shadowy strife 
 Ended, she owned herself all wife. 
 
 High mating of the mind ! O love, 
 Since this must be, on this she throve ! 
 Remember'd joy, Hypsipyle, 
 Since this must be, O love, let be ! 
 
 1911. 
 
OREITHYIA 
 
 OREITHYIA, by the North Wind carried 
 To stormy Thrace from Athens where you 
 
 tarried 
 
 Down by Ilissus all a blowy day 
 Among the asphodels, how rapt away 
 Thither, and in what frozen bed wert 
 
 married ? 
 
 " I was a King's tall daughter still unwed, 
 Slim and desirable my locks to shed 
 Free from the fillet. He my maiden belt 
 Undid with busy fingers hid but felt, 
 And made me wife upon no marriage bed. 
 
 " As idly there I lay alone he came 
 And blew upon my side, and beat a flame 
 Into my cheeks, and kindled both my eyes. 
 I suffered him who took no bodily guise : 
 The light clouds know whether I was to 
 blame. 
 
 " Into my mouth he blew an amorous breath ; 
 I panted, but lay still, as quiet as death. 
 149 
 
1 5 o 
 
 OREITHYIA 
 
 The whispering planes and sighing grasses 
 
 know 
 
 Whether it was the wind that loved me so : 
 I know not only this, c O love,' he saith, 
 
 " O long beset with love, and overloved, 
 O easy saint, untempted and unproved, 
 O walking stilly virgin ways in hiding, 
 Come out, thou art too choice for such 
 
 abiding ! 
 She never valued ease who never roved. 
 
 " ' Thou mayst not see thy lover, but he now 
 Is here, and claimeth thy low moonlit brow, 
 Thy wonderful eyes, and lips that part and 
 
 pout, 
 And polished throat that like a flower shoots 
 
 out 
 From thy dark vesture folded and crossed 
 
 low.' 
 
 " With that he had his way and went his way ; 
 For Gods have mastery, and a maiden's nay 
 Grows faint ere it is whispered all. I sped 
 Homeward with startled face and tiptoe tread, 
 And up the stair, and in my chamber lay. 
 
 " Crouching I lay and quaked, and heard the 
 
 wind 
 Wail round the house like a mad thing 
 
 confined, 
 
OREITHYIA 151 
 
 And had no rest ; turn wheresoever I would 
 This urgent lover stormed my solitude 
 And beat against the haven of my mind. 
 
 " And over all a clamour and dis-ease 
 Filled earth and air, and shuddered in my 
 
 knees 
 
 So that I could not stand, but by the wall 
 Leaned pitifully breathing. Still his call 
 Volleyed against the house and tore the trees. 
 
 " Then out my turret-window as I might 
 I leaned my body to the blind wet night ; 
 That eager lover leapt me, circled round, 
 Wreathed, folded, held me prisoner, wrapt 
 
 and bound 
 In manacles of terror and delight. 
 
 " That night he sealed me to him, and I went 
 Thenceforth his leman, submiss and content ; 
 So from the hall and feast, whenas I heard 
 His clear voice call, I flitted like a bird 
 That beats the brake, and garnered what he 
 lent. 
 
 " I was no maid that was no wife ; my days 
 Went by in dreams whose lights are golden 
 
 haze 
 And skies are crimson. Laughing not, nor 
 
 crying, 
 
152 OREITHYIA 
 
 I strayed all witless with my loose hair flying, 
 Bearing that load that women think their 
 praise. 
 
 " And felt my breasts grow heavy with that 
 
 food 
 
 That women laugh to feel and think it good ; 
 But I went shamefast, hanging down my head, 
 With girdle all too strait to serve my stead, 
 And bore an unguessed burden in my blood. 
 
 " There was a winter night he came again 
 And shook the window, till cried out my 
 
 pain 
 
 Unto him, saying, * Lord, I dare not live ! 
 Lord, I must die of that which thou didst 
 
 give ! 
 Pity me, Lord ! ' and fell. The winter rain 
 
 " Beat at the casement, burst it, and the wind 
 Filled all the room, and swept me white and 
 
 blind 
 
 Into the night. I heard the sound of seas 
 Beleaguer earth, I heard the roaring trees 
 Singing together. We left them far behind. 
 
 " And so he bore me into stormy Thrace, 
 Me and my load, and kissed back to my face 
 The sweet new blood of youth, and to my 
 limbs 
 
OREITHYIA 153 
 
 The wine of life ; and there I bore him twins, 
 Zeihes and Calais, in a rock- bound place." 
 
 Oreithyia, by the North Wind carried 
 
 To stormy Thrace, think you of how you 
 
 tarried 
 And let him woo and wed ? " Ah, no, for 
 
 now 
 
 He's kissed all Athens from my open brow. 
 I am the Wind's wife, wooed and won and 
 
 married." 
 
 1897. 
 
CLYTl 
 
 r 
 
 HEARKEN, O passers, what thing 
 
 Fortuned in Hellas. A maid, 
 
 Lissom and white as the roe, 
 
 Lived recess'd in a glade. 
 
 Clyti, Hamadryad, 
 
 She was called that I sing 
 
 Flower so fair, so frail, that to bring her a woe, 
 
 Surely a pitiful thing ! 
 
 A wild bright creature of trees, 
 
 Brooks, and the sun among leaves, 
 
 Clytie, grown to be maid : 
 
 Ah, she had eyes like the sea's 
 
 Iris of green and blue ! 
 
 White as sea-foam her brows, 
 
 And her hair reedy and gold : 
 
 So she grew and waxt supple and fit to be 
 
 spouse 
 In a king's palace of old. 
 
 All in a kirtle of green, 
 
 With her tangle of red-gold hair, 
 
156 CLYTIE 
 
 In the live heart of an oak, 
 
 Clytie, harbouring there, 
 
 Throned there as a queen, 
 
 Clytie wondering woke : 
 
 Ah, child, what set thee too high for thy 
 
 sweet demesne, 
 And who ponder'd the doleful stroke ? 
 
 For the child that was maiden grown, 
 
 The queen of the forest places, 
 
 Clytie, Hamadryad, 
 
 Tired of the joy she had, 
 
 And the kingdom that was her own ; 
 
 And tired of the quick wood-races, 
 
 And joy of herself in the pool when she 
 
 wonder'd down, 
 And tired of her budded graces. 
 
 And the child lookt up to the Sun 
 
 And the burning track of his car 
 
 In the broad serene above her : 
 
 " O King Sun, be thou my lover, 
 
 For my beauty is just begun. 
 
 I am fresh and fair as a star ; 
 
 Come, lie where the lilies are : 
 
 Behold, I am fair and dainty and white all over, 
 
 And I waste in the wood unknown ! " 
 
 Rose-flusht, daring, she strain'd 
 Her young arms up, and she voiced 
 The wild desire of her heart. 
 
CLYTIE 
 
 '57 
 
 The woodland heard her, the faun, 
 
 The satyr, and things that start, 
 
 Peering, heard her ; the dove, crooning, 
 
 complain'd 
 
 In the pine-tree by the lawn. 
 Only the runnel rejoiced 
 In his rushy hollow apart 
 To see her beauty flash up 
 White and red as the dawn. 
 
 Sorrow, ye passers-by, 
 
 The quick lift of her word, 
 
 The crimson blush of her pride ! 
 
 Heard her the heavens' lord 
 
 In his flaming seat in the sky : 
 
 " Overbold of her years that will not be 
 
 denied ; 
 
 She would be the Sun-God's bride ! " 
 His brow it was like the flat of a sword, 
 And levin the glance of his side. 
 
 And he bent unto her, and his mouth 
 
 Burnt her like coals of fire ; 
 
 He gazed with passionate eyes, 
 
 Like flame that kindles and dries, 
 
 And his breath suckt hers as the white rage 
 
 of the South 
 Draws life ; his desire 
 Was like to a tiger's drouth. 
 What shall the slim maiden avail ? 
 Alas, and alas for her youth ! 
 
158 CLYTlfi 
 
 Tremble, O maids, that would set 
 
 Your love-longing to the Sun ! 
 
 For Clytie mourn, and take heed 
 
 How she loved her king and did bleed 
 
 Ere kissing had yet begun. 
 
 For lo ! one shaft from his terrible eyes she 
 
 met, 
 
 And it burnt to her soul, and anon 
 She paled, and the fever-fret 
 Did bite to her bones ; and wan 
 She fell to rueing the deed. 
 
 Mark ye, maidens, and cower ! 
 
 Lo, for an end of breath, 
 
 Clytie, hardy and frail, 
 
 Anguisht after her death. 
 
 For the Sun-flower droops and is pale 
 
 When her king hideth his power, 
 
 And ever draggeth the woe of her piteous 
 
 tale, 
 
 As a woman that laboureth 
 Yet never reacheth the hour : 
 So Clytie yearns to the Sun, for her wraith 
 Moans in the bow'd sunflower. 
 
 Clyti6, Hamadryad, 
 
 Called was she that I sing : 
 
 Flower so fair and frail that to work her 
 
 this woe, 
 Surely a pitiful thing ! 
 
 1894. 
 
LAI OF GOBERTZ 1 
 
 OF courteous Limozin wight, 
 
 Gobertz, I will indite : 
 
 From Poicebot had he his right 
 
 Of gentlehood ; 
 Made monk in his own despite 
 In San Leonart the white, 
 Withal to sing and to write 
 
 Cob las he could. 
 
 Learning had he, and rare 
 
 Music, and gat saber : 
 
 No monk with him to compare 
 
 In that monast'ry. 
 Full lusty he was to bear 
 Cowl and chaplet of hair 
 God willeth monks for to wear 
 
 For sanctity. 
 
 There in dortoir as he lay, 
 To this Gobertz, by my fay, 
 
 1 I owe the substance of this lat to my friend Ezra Pound, who 
 unearthed it, ^a/ud0y e/Xu/x^a TroXXfl, in some Provcnjal repertory. 
 
 159 
 
160 LAI OF GOBERTZ 
 
 Came fair women to play 
 
 In his sleep ; 
 
 Then he had old to pray, 
 Fresh and silken came they, 
 With eyen saucy and gray 
 
 That set him weep. 
 
 May was the month, and soft 
 The singing nights ; up aloft 
 The quarter moon swam and scoffed 
 
 His unease. 
 
 Rose this Gobertz, and doffed 
 His habit, and left that croft, 
 Crying Eleison oft 
 
 At Venus' knees. 
 
 Heartly the road and the town 
 Maulon, over the down, 
 Sought he, and the renown 
 
 Of Savaric ; 
 
 To that good knight he knelt down, 
 Asking of him in bown 
 Almesse of laurel crown 
 
 For his music. 
 
 Fair him Savaric spake, 
 
 " If coblas you know to make, 
 
 Song and music to wake 
 
 For your part, 
 Horse and lute shall you take 
 
LAI OF GOBERTZ 161 
 
 Of Jongleur^ lightly forsake 
 Cloister for woodland brake 
 With good heart." 
 
 Down the high month of May 
 Now rideth Gobertz his way 
 To Aix, to Puy, to Alais, 
 
 To Albi the old ; 
 In Toulouse mindeth to stay 
 With Count Simon the Gay, 
 There to abide what day 
 
 Love shall hold. 
 
 Shrill riseth his song : 
 
 Cobla, lai, or tenzon, 
 
 None can render him wrong 
 
 In that meinie 
 Love alone, that erelong 
 Showed him in all that throng 
 Of ladies Tibors the young, 
 
 None but she. 
 
 She was high-hearted and fair, 
 Low-breasted, with hair 
 Gilded, and eyes of vair 
 
 In burning face : 
 On her Gobertz astare, 
 Looking, stood quaking there 
 To see so debonnair 
 
 Hold her place. 
 
 M 
 
1 62 LAI OF GOBERTZ 
 
 Proud donzela and free, 
 To clip nor to kiss had she 
 Talent, nor for minstrelsy 
 
 Was she fain ; 
 Mistress never would be, 
 Nor master have ; but her fee 
 She vowed to sweet Chastity, 
 
 Her suzerain. 
 
 Then this Gobertz anon 
 Returneth to Maulon, 
 To Savaric maketh moan 
 
 On his knees. 
 Other pray'r hath he none 
 Save this, " Sir, let me begone 
 Whence 1 came, since fordone 
 
 My expertise." 
 
 Quod Savaric, " Hast thou sped 
 So ill in amors ? " Answered 
 This Gobertz, " By my head, 
 
 She scorneth me." 
 " Hauberc and arms then, instead 
 Of lute and begarlanded 
 Poll, take you," he said, 
 
 " For errantry." 
 
 Now rides he out, a dubbed knight, 
 The Spanish road, for to fight 
 Paynimry ; day and night 
 Urgeth he ; 
 
LAI OF GOBERTZ 163 
 
 In Saragoza the bright, 
 And Pampluna with might 
 Seeketh he what respite 
 
 For grief there be. 
 
 War-dimmed grew his gear, 
 Grim his visage ; in fear 
 Listened Mahound his cheer 
 
 Deep in Hell. 
 Fled his legions to hear 
 Gobertz the knight draw near. 
 Now he closeth the year 
 
 In Compostell. 
 
 Offering there hath he made 
 Saint James, candles him paid, 
 Gold on the shrine hath laid ; 
 
 Now Gobertz 
 
 Is for Toulouse, where that maid 
 Tibors wonned unafraid 
 Of Love and his accolade 
 
 That breaketh hearts. 
 
 He rode north and by east, 
 Nor rider spared he nor beast, 
 Nor tempered spur till at least 
 
 Forth of Spain ; 
 Not for mass-bell nor priest, 
 For fast-day nor yet for feast 
 Stayed he, till voyage ceased 
 
 In Aquitaine. 
 
164 LAI OF GOBERTZ 
 
 Now remaineth to tell 
 What this Gobertz befell 
 When that he sought hostel 
 
 In his land. 
 
 Dined he well, drank he well, 
 Envy then had somedeal 
 With women free in bordel 
 
 For to spend. 
 
 In poor alberc goeth he 
 Where bought pleasure may be, 
 Careless proffereth fee 
 
 For his bliss. 
 O Gobertz, look to thee. 
 Such a sight shalt thou see 
 Will make the red blood to flee 
 
 Thy heart, ywis. 
 
 Fair woman they bring him in 
 Shamefast in her burning sin, 
 All afire is his skin 
 
 Par amors. 
 
 Look not of her look to win, 
 Dare not lift up her chin, 
 Gobertz ; in that soiled fond thing 
 
 Lo, Tibors ! 
 
 " O love, O love, out, alas ! 
 That it should come to this pass, 
 And thou be even as I was 
 In green youth, 
 
LAI OF GOBERTZ 165 
 
 Whenas delight and solace 
 Served I with wantonness, 
 And burned anon like the grass 
 To this ruth ! " 
 
 But then lift she her sad eyes, 
 Gray like wet morning skies, 
 That wait the sun to arise, 
 
 Tears to amend. 
 " Gobertz, amic" so she cries, 
 By Jesus' agonies 
 Hither come I by lies 
 
 Of false friend. 
 
 " Sir Richart de Laund he hight, 
 Who fair promised me plight 
 Of word and ring, on a night 
 
 Of no fame ; 
 So then evilly bright 
 Had his will and delight 
 Of me, and fled unrequite 
 
 For my shame ! 
 
 " Alas, and now to my thought 
 Flieth the woe that I wrought 
 Thee, Gobertz, that distraught 
 
 Thou didst fare. 
 Now a vile thing of nought 
 Fare I that once was so haught 
 And free, and could not be taught 
 
 By thy care." 
 
1 66 LAI OF GOBERTZ 
 
 But Gobertz seeth no less 
 Her honour and her sweetness, 
 Soon her small hand to kiss 
 
 Taketh he, 
 
 Saying, " Now for that stress 
 Drave thee here thou shalt bless 
 God, for so ending this 
 
 Thy penury." 
 
 Yet she would bid him away, 
 Seeking her sooth to say, 
 In what woful array 
 
 She was cast. 
 
 " Nay," said he, " but, sweet may, 
 Here must we bide until day : 
 Then to church and to pray 
 
 Go we fast." 
 
 Now then to all his talent, 
 Seeing how he was bent, 
 Him the comfort she lent 
 
 Of her mind. 
 
 Cried Gobertz, well content, 
 " If love by dreariment 
 Cometh, that was well spent, 
 
 As I find." 
 
 Thereafter somewhat they slept, 
 When to his arms she had crept 
 For comfort, and freely wept 
 Sin away. 
 
LAI OF GOBERTZ 167 
 
 Up betimes then he leapt, 
 Calling her name : forth she stept 
 Meek, disposed, to accept 
 What he say. 
 
 By hill road taketh he her 
 
 To the gray nuns of Beaucaire, 
 
 There to shred off her hair 
 
 And take veil. 
 Himself to cloister will fare 
 Monk to be, with good care 
 For their two souls. May his pray'r 
 
 Them avail ! 
 
 1911. 
 
THE SAINTS' MAYING 
 
 SINCE green earth is awake 
 Let us now pastime take, 
 Not serving wantonness 
 Too well, nor niggardness, 
 Which monks of men would make. 
 
 But clothed like earth in green, 
 With jocund hearts and clean, 
 We will take hands and go 
 Singing where quietly blow 
 The flowers of Spring's demesne. 
 
 The cuckoo haileth loud 
 The open sky ; no cloud 
 Doth fleck the earth's blue tent ; 
 The land laughs, well content 
 To put off" winter shroud. 
 
 Now, since 'tis Easter Day, 
 All Christians may have play ; 
 The young Saints, all agaze 
 For Christ in Heaven's maze, 
 May laugh who wont to pray. 
 169 
 
i yo THE SAINTS' MAYING 
 
 Then welcome to our round 
 They light on homely ground : 
 Agnes, Saint Cecily, 
 Agatha, Dorothy, 
 Margaret, Hildegonde ; 
 
 Next come with Barbara 
 Lucy and Ursula ; 
 And last, queen of the Nine, 
 Clear-eyed Saint Catherine 
 Joyful arrayeth her. 
 
 Then chooseth each her lad, 
 And after frolic had 
 Of dance and carolling 
 And playing in a ring, 
 Seek all the woodland shade. 
 
 And there for each his lass 
 Her man a nosegay has, 
 Which better than word spoken 
 Might stand to be her token 
 And emblem of her grace. 
 
 For Cecily, who bent 
 Her slim white neck and went 
 To Heaven a virgin still, 
 The nodding daffodil, 
 That bends but is not shent. 
 
 Lucy, whose wounded eyes 
 Opened in Heaven star-wise, 
 
THE SAINTS' MAYING 171 
 
 The lady-smock, whose light 
 Doth prank the grass with white, 
 Taketh for badge and prize. 
 
 Because for Lord Christ's hest 
 Men shore thy warm bright breast, 
 Agatha, see thy part 
 Showed in the burning heart 
 Of the white crocus best. 
 
 What fate was Barbara's 
 Shut in the tower of brass, 
 We figure and hold up 
 Within the stiff king-cup 
 That crowns the meadow grass. 
 
 Agnes, than whose King Death 
 Stayed no more delicate breath 
 On earth, we give for dower 
 Wood-sorrel, that frail flower 
 That Spring first quickeneth. 
 
 Dorothy, whose shrill voice 
 Bade Heathendom rejoice, 
 The sweet-breath'd cowslip hath ; 
 And Margaret, who in death 
 Saw Heaven, her pearly choice. 
 
 Then she of virgin brood 
 Whom Prince of Britain woo'd, 
 Ursula, takes by favour 
 
172 THE SAINTS' MAYING 
 
 The hyacinth whose savour 
 Enskies the sunny wood. 
 
 Hildegonde, whose spirit high 
 The Cross did not deny, 
 Yet blusht to feel the shame, 
 Anemones must claim, 
 Whose roses early die. 
 
 Last, she who gave in pledge 
 Her neck to the wheel's edge, 
 Taketh the fresh primrose 
 Which (even as she her foes) 
 Redeems the wintry hedge. 
 
 So garlanded, entwined, 
 Each as may prompt her mind, 
 The Saints renew for Earth 
 And Heaven such seemly mirth 
 As God once had design'd. 
 
 And when the day is done, 
 And veil'd the goodly Sun, 
 Each man his maid by right 
 Doth kiss and bid Good-night ; 
 And home goes every one. 
 
 The maids to Heaven do hie 
 To serve God soberly ; 
 The lads, their loves in Heaven, 
 What lowly work is given 
 They do, to win the sky. 
 
 1896. 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 CHTHONOE MYRTILLA 
 
 RHODOPE PASIPHASSA 
 
 GORGO SITYS 
 
 SCENE 
 The women's house in the House of Paris in Troy. 
 
 TIME. The Tenth year of the War. 
 
 Helen's women are lying alone In the twilight 
 hour. Chthonoe' presently rises and throws 
 a little incense upon the altar flame. Then 
 she begins to speak to the Image of Aphrodite 
 in a low and tired voice. 
 
 CHTHONOE" 
 
 GODDESS of burning and little rest, 
 By the hand swaying on thy breast, 
 By glancing eye and slow sweet smile 
 
 1 Helen Redeemed, the first poem in this book, was originally 
 conceived as a drama. Here is a scene from it, the first after the 
 Prologue, which would have been spoken by Odysseus. The action 
 of the play would have begun with the entry of Helen. 
 
 173 
 I 
 
174 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 Tell me what long look or what guile 
 Of thine it was that like a spear 
 Pierced her heart, who caged me here 
 In this close house, to be with her 
 Mistress at once and prisoner ! 
 
 Far from earth and her pleasant ways 
 I lie, whose nights are as my days 
 In this dim house, where on the wall 
 I watch the shadows rise and fall 
 And know not what is reckt or done 
 By men and horses out in the sun, 
 Nor heed their traffic, nor their cheer 
 As forth they go or back, but hear 
 The fountain plash into the pond, 
 The brooding doves, and sighs of fond 
 Lovers whose lips yearn as they sever 
 For longer joy, joy such as never 
 Hath man but in the mind. But what 
 Men do without, that I know not 
 Who see them but as shadows thrown 
 Upon a screen. I see them blown 
 Like clouds of flies about the plain 
 Where the winds sweep them and make vain 
 Their panoplies. They hem the verge 
 Of this high wall to guard us urge 
 Galloping horses into war 
 And meet in shock of battle, far 
 Below us and our dreams : withal 
 Ten years have past us in this thrall 
 Since Helen came with eyes agleam 
 To Troy, and trod the ways of dream. 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 175 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Men came about us, crying, " The Greeks ! 
 Ships out at sea with high-held peaks 
 Like questing birds ! " But I lay still 
 Kissing, nor turned. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 So I, until 
 
 The herald broke into my sleep, 
 Crying Agamemnon on the deep 
 With ships from high Mykenai. Then 
 I minded he was King of Men 
 But not of women in the arms 
 They loved. 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 I heard their shrill alarms 
 Faint and far off, like an old fame. 
 Below this guarded house men came 
 Chariots and horses clasht ; they cried 
 King Agamemnon in his pride, 
 Or Hector, or young Diomede ; 
 But I was kissing, could not heed 
 Aught save the eyes that held mine bound. 
 Anon a hush anon the sound 
 Of hooves resistless, pounding a cry, 
 " Achilles ! Save yourselves ! " But I 
 Clinging I lay, and sighed in sign 
 That love must weary at last, even mine 
 Even mine, Sweetheart ! 
 
1 76 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 Who watcht when flared 
 Lord Hector like a meteor, dared 
 The high stockade and fired the ships ? 
 I watcht his lips who had had my lips. 
 
 SITYS 
 
 And when he slew Menoikios' son, 
 Sister, what then ? 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 My cheek was wan 
 For lack of kissing so I blew 
 On slumbering lids to draw anew 
 The eyes of him who had loved me well, 
 But now was faint. 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 O Kypris, tell 
 The deeds of men, not lovers ! 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 Here 
 
 Came one all palsied in his fear, 
 Chattering and white, to Paris abed, 
 Flusht in his sleep told Hector dead, 
 Dead and dishonoured, while he slept. 
 He sighed and turned. But Helen wept. 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 177 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Not I. I turned and felt warm draught 
 Of breath upon my cheek, and laught 
 Softly, and snuggling, slept. 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 Fie, fie ! 
 
 Goddess, drugged in thy dreams we lie, 
 Logs, not women, logs in the sun ! 
 
 SITYS 
 
 Thou art sated. So fretteth One, 
 The very fount of Love's sweet well, 
 The chord of Love made visible, 
 Sickened of her own loveliness, 
 Haggard as hawk too long in jess, 
 Aching for flight. 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 Recall the bout 
 
 When Paris armed him and went out 
 Into the lists, and all men thronged 
 
 To see 
 
 SITYS 
 
 Lord Paris and him he wronged 
 Fight for her, who should have her ! We 
 
 stood 
 Upon the walls, and she with her hood 
 
 N 
 
178 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 Close to her cheek. But I saw the flicker 
 In her blue eyes ! 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 But I was quicker, 
 And saw the man she looked upon, 
 And after what her blue eyes shone 
 Like cyanus in morning light. 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Husband and lover she saw fight, 
 Man to man, with death between. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 Hatred coucht, as long and lean 
 
 As a lone wolf, on her man's crest 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 And bit the Trojan ! 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 Thine was the rest, 
 Goddess ! And Helen lit the fire, 
 With her disdain, of his desire. 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 Her eyes burned like the frosty stars 
 Of winter midnight. 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 179 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 His the scars ! 
 Bitten in his wax-pale cheek. 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 Nay, in his heart 
 
 SITYS 
 
 Nay, in his bleak 
 And writhen smile you see it ! 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Nay! 
 In his sick soul. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 Let him go his way ! 
 Hear my thought of a happier thing 
 Sparta's trees in flood of spring 
 Where Eurotas' banks abrim 
 Drown the reeds, and foam-clots swim 
 Like a scattered brood of duck ! 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 Flowers anod ! White flowers to pluck, 
 
 Stiffened in the foamy curds ! 
 
 Ah, the green thickets quick with birds ! 
 
 SITYS 
 Calling Itys ! Itys ! Itys ! 
 
i8o THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 She calls not here her house it is 
 In Sparta ! 
 
 RHODOPE (with a sob} 
 Peace ! 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 From my heart a cry 
 Send me back, Goddess, ere I die 
 To those dear places and clean things 
 To see my people, feel the wings 
 Of the gray night fold over me, 
 And touch my mother's knees, and be 
 Her child, as long ago I was 
 Before I lay burning in Ilios ! 
 
 \They hide their faces in their knees. 
 Then one by one they 
 
 Let me sing an old sweet air, 
 
 Mother of Argos, to Thee, 
 
 For hope in my heart is fair 
 
 As light on the hills seen from afar at sea ; 
 
 And my weary eyes turn there 
 
 As to the haven where my soul would be. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 I will arise and make choice 
 The house of my tumbled breast, 
 For she cometh, I hear the voice 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 181 
 
 Of her wings of healing, and she shall be my 
 
 guest ; 
 
 And my joys shall be her joys, 
 And my home her home, O wind of the 
 
 South West ! 
 
 GORGO 
 
 As a bird that listens and thrills, 
 
 Hidden deep in the night, 
 
 For the sound of the little rills 
 
 That run musically towards the light ; 
 
 As a hart to the high hills 
 
 Turneth his dying eyes, my soul takes flight. 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 Ah, to be folded deep 
 
 In the shade of Taygetus, 
 
 In my mother's arms to sleep 
 
 Even as a child when I lay harboured thus ! 
 
 Oh, that I were as thy sheep, 
 
 Lacedaemon, my land, cradle and nurse of us ! 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 In Argos they sow the grain, 
 In Troy blood is their sowing ; 
 There a green mantle covers the plain 
 Where the sweet green corn and sweet short 
 
 grass are growing ; 
 But here passion and pain 
 Blood and dust upon earth, and a hot wind 
 
 blowing. 
 
1 82 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 SlTYS 
 
 To the hold on the far red hill 
 From the hold on the wide green lea, 
 Over the running water, follow who will 
 Therapnae's hawk with the dove of Amyklae. 
 But I would lie husht and still, 
 And feel the new grass growing quick over 
 me ! 
 
 [The scene grows dark as they sit. 
 
 Their eyes are full of tears. 
 
 Presently one looks up, listening, 
 
 then another^ then another. They 
 
 are all alert.~\ 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 Who prayeth peace ? I feel her peace 
 Steal through me as a quiet air 
 Enters the house with sweet increase 
 Of light to healing, praise to prayer ! 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 What do I know of guiltiness 
 When she is here, and with grave eyes 
 Seeketh the ways of quietness 
 And lampeth them ? 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Arise, arise ! 
 
 [They all stand waiting."] 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 183 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 Hark ! Her footfall like the dew 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 As a flower by frost made sere 
 Long before the sun breaks through, 
 Feeleth him, I know her near. 
 
 [Helen stands in the doorway.'} 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 This is she, the source of light, 
 Source of light and end of it, 
 Argive Helen, slim and sweet, 
 For whose bosom and delight, 
 For whose eyes, those wells of peace, 
 Paris wrought, as well he might, 
 Ten years' woe for Troy and Greece. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 Starry wonder that she was, 
 Caged like sea-bird in his arms, 
 See her passion thrill, then pass 
 From him who, doting on her charms, 
 So became abominable. 
 Watch her bosom dip and swell, 
 See her nostrils fan and curve 
 At his touch who loved not well, 
 
1 84 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 But loved too much, who broke the spell ; 
 Watch her proud head stiffen and swerve. 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Upon the wall with claspt white hands 
 
 See her vigil keep intent, 
 
 Argive Helen, lo ! she stands 
 
 Looking seaward where the fires 
 
 Hem the shore innumerable ; 
 
 Sign of that avenging host, 
 
 All Achaia's chivalry, 
 
 Past the tongue of man to tell, 
 
 Peers and kindred of her sires 
 
 Come to win back Helen lost. 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 There to her in that gray hour, 
 That gray hour before the sun, 
 Cometh he she waiteth for, 
 Menelaus like a ghost, 
 Like a dry leaf tempest-tost, 
 Stalking restless, her reproach. 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 There alone, those two, long severed been, 
 Eye each other, one wild heart between. 
 
 SITYS 
 
 " O thou ruinous face, 
 O thou fatally fair, 
 
THE ARGIVE WOMEN 185 
 
 O the pity of thee ! 
 What dost thou there, 
 Watching the madness of me ? " 
 
 CHTHONOE 
 
 Him seemed her eyes were pools of dark 
 To drown him, yet no word she spake ; 
 But gazing, grave as a lonely house, 
 All her wonder thrilled to wake. 
 
 RHODOPE 
 
 " By thy roses and snow, 
 By thy sun-litten hair, 
 By thy low bosom and slow 
 Pondered kisses, O hear ! 
 
 " By thy glimmering eyes, 
 By thy burning cheek, 
 By thy murmuring sighs, 
 Speak, Helen, O speak ! 
 
 " Ruinous Face, O Ruinous Face, 
 Art thou come so early," he said, 
 " So early forth from the wicked bed ? " 
 
 GORGO 
 
 Him she pondered, grave and still, 
 Stirring not from her safe place : 
 He marked the glow, he felt the thrill, 
 He saw the dawn new in her face. 
 
1 86 THE ARGIVE WOMEN 
 
 MYRTILLA 
 
 Within her low voice wailed the tone 
 Of one who grieves and prays for death : 
 " Lord, I am come to be alone, 
 Alone here with my sorrow," she saith. 
 
 PASIPHASSA 
 
 " False wife, what pity was thine 
 For hearth and altar, for man and child ? 
 What is thy sorrow worth unto mine ? " 
 She rocked, moaning, " I was beguiled ! " 
 
 SITYS 
 
 Ten years' woe for Troy and Greece 
 
 By her begun, the slim, the sweet, 
 
 Ended by her in final peace 
 
 Of him who loved her first of all ; 
 
 Nor ever swerved from his high passion, 
 
 But through misery and shame 
 
 Saw her spirit like a flame 
 
 Eloquent of her sacred fashion 
 
 Hers whose eyes are homes of light, 
 
 To which she tends, from which she came. 
 
 1912. 
 
GNATHO 
 
 GNATHO, Satyr, homing at dusk. 
 Trotting home like a tired dog, 
 By mountain slopes 'twixt the junipers 
 And flamed oleanders near the sea, 
 Found a girl-child asleep in a fleece, 
 Frail as wax, golden and rose ; 
 Whereat at first he skipt aside 
 And stayed him, nosing and peering, whereto 
 Next he crept, softly breathing, 
 Blinking his fear. None was there 
 To guard ; the sun had dipt in the sea, 
 Faint fire empurpled the flow 
 Of heaving water ; no speck, no hint 
 Of oar or wing on the main, on the deep 
 Sky, empty as a great shell, 
 Fainting in its own glory. This thing, 
 This rare breath, this miracle 
 Alone with him in the world ! His 
 To wonder, fall to, with craning eyes 
 Fearfully daring ; next, since it moved not, 
 Stooping, to handle, to stroke, to peer upon 
 Closely, nosing its tender length, 
 187 
 
1 88 GNATHO 
 
 Doglike snuffing at last to kiss 
 In reverence wonderful, lightlier far 
 Than thistledown falls, brushing the Earth. 
 But the child awoke and, watching him, 
 
 cried not, 
 
 Cruddled visage, choppy hands, 
 Blinking eyes, red-litten, astare, 
 Horns and feet nay, crowed and strained 
 To reach this wonder. 
 
 As one a glass 
 
 Light as foam, hued like the foam, 
 A breath-bubble of fire, will carry, 
 He in arms lifted his freight, 
 Looking wonderfully upon it 
 With scarce a breath, and humbleness 
 To be so brute ebbed to the flood 
 Of pride in his new assured worth 
 Trusted so, who could be vile ? 
 
 So to his cave in the wood he bore her, 
 Fleeting swift as a fear thro' the dark trees. 
 
 There in the silence of tall trees, 
 
 Under the soaring shafts, 
 
 Far beneath the canopied leafage, 
 
 In the forest whisper, the thick silences ; 
 
 Or on the wastes 
 
 Of sheltered mountains where the spires 
 
 Of solemn cypress frame the descent 
 
 Upon the blue, and open to sea 
 
 Here grew lanthe maiden slim 
 
GNATHO 189 
 
 With none to spy but this gnarled man-brute ; 
 
 Most fair, most hid, like a wood-flower 
 
 Slim for lack of light ; so she grew 
 
 In flowering line of limb 
 
 And flower of face, retired and shy, 
 
 Urged by the bland air ; unknown, 
 
 Lonely and lovely, husbanding 
 
 Her great possessions her's now, 
 
 Another's when he cared to claim them. 
 
 For thus went life : to lead the herds 
 
 Of pricking deer she saw the great stags 
 
 Battle in empty glades, then mate ; 
 
 Thus on the mountains chose the bears, 
 
 And in the woods she heard the wolves 
 
 Anguishing in their loves 
 
 Thro' the dense nights, far in the forest. 
 
 And so collected went she, and sure 
 
 Her time would come and with it her master. 
 
 But Gnatho watcht her under his brows 
 When she lay heedless, spilling beauty 
 How ever lovelier, suppler, sleeker, 
 How more desirable, how near ; 
 How rightly his, how surely his 
 Then gnaw'd his cheek and turn'd his head. 
 
 For unsuspect, some dim forbidding 
 Rose within him and knockt at his heart 
 And said, Not thine, but for reverence. 
 And some wild horror desperate drove him, 
 Suing a pardon from unknown Gods 
 
190 GNATHO 
 
 For untold trespass, to seek the sea, 
 Upon whose shore, to whose cool breathing 
 He'd stretch his arms, broken with strife 
 Of self and self ; and all that water 
 Steadfast lapt and surged. Came tears 
 To furrow his cheeks, came strength to 
 
 return 
 
 To her, and bear with longer breath 
 Her sweet familiarities, blind 
 Obedience to nascent blind desire 
 Till again he lookt and burn'd again. 
 
 Thus his black ferment boil'd. O' nights 
 He'd dream and revel frenziedly 
 As with the love-stung nymphs. Awake, 
 In a chill sweat, he'd tear at himself, 
 Claw at his flesh and leap in the brook, 
 Drench the red embers of his vice 
 Into a mass abhorred. Clean then, 
 He'd seek his bed and pass unscath'd 
 The bower of fern where the sleek limbs 
 Of white lanthe, mesht in her hair, 
 Lay lax in sleep. But Gnatho now 
 Saw only God, as on some still peak 
 Snowy and lonely under the stars 
 We look, and see God in all that calm. 
 
 One night of glamour, under a moon 
 That seemed to steep the air with gold, 
 They two sat stilly and watcht the sea 
 
GNATHO 191 
 
 Tremulously heaving over a path 
 Of light like a river of molten gold. 
 Warm blew the breeze to land ; she lean'd 
 Her idle head, idly played 
 Her fingers in his belt, and he 
 Embracing held her, yielding, subdued ; 
 Sideways saw the curve of her cheek, 
 Downcast lashes, droopt lip 
 Which seem'd to court his pleasure 
 
 Then 
 
 On waves of fire came racing his needs 
 With zest of rage to possess and tear 
 That which his frenzy, maskt as love, 
 Courted : so he lean'd to her ear, 
 Thrilled in torrents hoarse his case 
 " Love, I burn, I burn ! 
 Slake me, love ! " He raved in whisper. 
 And she lookt up with her wide full eyes, 
 Saying, " My love ! " and yielded herself. 
 
 Deep night settled on hill and plain, 
 The moon went out, the concourse of stars 
 Lay strewn above, and with golden eyes 
 Peered on them lockt. Far and faint 
 The great stags belled ; far and faint 
 Quested the wolves ; the leopards' howling 
 Lent desolation to night ; and low 
 The night-jar purr'd. At sea one light 
 Swayed restlessly, and on the rocks 
 Sounded the tireless lapping deep. 
 Lockt they lay thro' all the silences. 
 
192 GNATHO 
 
 Dawn stole in with whimper of rain 
 And a wailing wind from the sea 
 Gray sea, gray dawn and scurrying clouds 
 And scud of rain. The fisher boat, 
 The sands, the headlands fringed with broom 
 And tamarisk were blotted. 
 
 Alone, 
 
 Caged in the mist of earth 
 That beat his torment back to himself, 
 So that in vain he sought for the Gods, 
 And lifted up hands in vain 
 To witness this white wreck prone and still 
 Gnatho the Satyr blinkt on his work. 
 
 1898-1912. 
 
TO THE GODS OF THE 
 COUNTRY 
 
 SUN and Moon, shine upon me ; 
 
 Make glad my days and clear my nights ! 
 
 O Earth, whose child I am, 
 Grant me thy patience ! 
 
 O Heaven, whose heir I may be, 
 Keep quick my hope ! 
 
 Your steadfastness I need, O Hills ; 
 O Rain, thy kindness ! 
 
 Snow, keep me pure ; 
 
 O Fire, teach me thy pride ! 
 
 From you, ye Winds, I ask your blitheness ! 
 1909. 
 
 193 
 
FOURTEEN SONNETS 
 1896 
 
 195 
 
ALMA SDEGNOSA 
 
 NOT that dull spleen which serves i' the world 
 
 for scorn, 
 
 Is hers I watch from far off, worshipping 
 As in remote Chaldaea the ancient king 
 
 Adored the star that heralded the morn. 
 
 Her proud content she bears as a flag is borne 
 Tincted the hue royal ; or as a wing 
 It lifts her soaring, near the daylight spring, 
 
 Whence, if she lift, our days must pass 
 forlorn. 
 
 The pure deriving of her spirit-state 
 Is so remote from men and their believing, 
 They shrink when she is cold, and estimate 
 That hardness which is but a God's dismay : 
 As when the Heaven-sent sprite thro' Hell 
 
 sped cleaving, 
 Only the gross air checkt him on his way. 
 
 197 
 
THE WINDS' POSSESSION 
 
 WHEN winds blow high and leaves begin to 
 
 fall, 
 
 And the wan sunlight flits before the blast ; 
 When fields are brown and crops are garnered 
 
 all, 
 And rooks, like mastered ships, drift wide 
 
 and fast ; 
 Maid Artemis, that feeleth her young blood 
 
 Leap like a freshet river for the sea, 
 Speedeth abroad with hair blown in a flood 
 To snufFthe salt west wind and wanton free. 
 
 Then would you know how brave she is, how 
 
 high 
 
 Her ancestry, how kindred to the wind, 
 Mark but her flashing feet, her ravisht eye 
 That takes the boist'rous weather and feels it 
 
 kind : 
 
 And hear her eager voice, how tuned it is 
 To Autumn's clarion shrill for Artemis. 
 
 198 
 
ASPETTO REALE 
 
 THAT hour when thou and Grief were first 
 
 acquainted 
 Thou wrotest, " Come, for I have lookt on 
 
 death/' 
 
 Piteous I held my indeterminate breath 
 And sought thee out, and saw how he had 
 
 painted 
 Thine eyes with rings of black ; yet never 
 
 fainted 
 
 Thy radiant immortality underneath 
 Such stress of dark ; but then, as one that 
 
 saith, 
 
 " I know Love liveth," sat on by death 
 untainted. 
 
 O to whom Grief too poignant was and dry 
 To sow in thee a fountain crop of tears ! 
 O youth, O pride, set too remote and high 
 For touch of solace that gives grace to men ! 
 Thy life must be our death, thy hopes our 
 
 fears : 
 We weep, thou lookest strangely we know 
 
 thee then ! 
 
 199 
 
KIN CONFESSED 
 
 LONG loving, all our love was husbanded 
 Until one morning on the brown hillside, 
 One misty Autumn morn when Sun did hide 
 His radiance, yet was felt. No words we 
 
 said, 
 
 But in one flash transfigured, glorified, 
 All her heart's tumult beating white and red, 
 She fell prone on her face and hid her wide 
 Over-brimmed eyes in dewy fern. 
 
 I prayed, 
 
 Then spake, " In us two now is manifest 
 That throbbing kindred whereof thou art 
 
 graft 
 
 And I the grafted, in this holy place." 
 She, turning half, with sober shame confest 
 Discovery, then hid her rosy face. 
 I read her wilding heart, and my heart 
 laught. 
 
 200 
 
QUEL GIORNO Pltl . . . 
 
 THAT day it was the last of many days, 
 Nor could we know when such days might 
 be given 
 
 Again we read how Dante trod the ways 
 Of utmost Hell, and how his heart was riven 
 By sad Francesca, whose sin was forgiven 
 
 So far that, on her Paolo fixing gaze, 
 
 She supt on his again, and thought it 
 Heaven, 
 
 She knew her gentler fate and felt it praise. 
 
 We read that lovers' tale ; each lookt at each ; 
 But one was fearless, innocent of guile ; 
 So did the other learn what she could teach : 
 We read no more, we kiss'd not, but a smile 
 Of proud possession flasht, hover'd a while 
 'Twixt soul and soul. There was no need for 
 speech. 
 
 201 
 
ABSENCE 
 
 WHEN she had left us but a little while 
 Methought I sensed her spirit here and 
 
 there 
 
 About my house : upon the empty stair 
 Her robe brusht softly ; o'er her chamber 
 
 still 
 
 There lay her fragrant presence to beguile 
 Numb heart, dead heart. I knelt before 
 
 her chair. 
 
 And praying felt her hand laid on my hair, 
 Felt her sweet breath, and guess'd her wistful 
 smile. 
 
 Then thro' my tears I lookt about the room, 
 But she was gone. I heard my heart beat 
 
 fast ; 
 The street was silent ; I could not see her 
 
 now. 
 
 Sorrow and I took up our load, and past 
 To where our station was with heads bent low, 
 And autumn's death-moan shiver'd thro' the 
 
 gloom. 
 
 202 
 
PRESENCE 
 
 WHEN she had left us but a little while, 
 I still could hear the ringing of her voice, 
 
 Still see athwart the dusk her shy half-smile 
 And that sweet trust wherein I most rejoice. 
 
 Then in her self-same tones I heard, " Go 
 thou, 
 
 Set to that work appointed thee to do, 
 Remembering I am with thee here and now, 
 
 Watchful as ever. See, my eyes shine true ! " 
 
 1 lookt, and saw the concourse of clear stars, 
 Steadfast, of limpid candour, and could 
 
 discover 
 
 Her soul look on me thro' the prison-bars 
 Which slunk like sin from such an honest 
 Lover : 
 
 And thro' the vigil-pauses of that night 
 She beam'd on me ; and my soul felt her 
 light. 
 
 203 
 
DREAM ANGUISH 
 
 My thought of thee is tortured in my sleep 
 Sometimes thou art near beside me, but a 
 
 cloud 
 Doth grudge me thy pale face, and rise to 
 
 creep 
 
 Slowly about thee, to lap thee in a shroud ; 
 And I, as standing by my dead, to weep 
 Desirous, cannot weep, nor cry aloud. 
 Or we must face the clamouring of a crowd 
 Hissing our shame ; and I who ought to 
 
 keep 
 Thine honour safe and my betrayed heart 
 
 proud, 
 Knowing thee true, must watch a chill doubt 
 
 leap 
 The tired faith of thee, and thy head 
 
 bow'd, 
 
 Nor budge while the gross world holdeth thee 
 cheap ! 
 
 Or there are frost-bound meetings, and 
 reproach 
 
 204 
 
DREAM ANGUISH 205 
 
 At parting, furtive snatches full of fear ; 
 Love grown a pain ; we bleed to kiss, and 
 
 kiss 
 Because we bleed for love ; the time doth 
 
 broach 
 
 Shame, and shame teareth at us till we tear 
 Our hearts to shreds yet wilder love for 
 
 this! 
 
HYMNIA-BEATRIX 
 
 BEFORE you pass and leave me gaunt and 
 
 chill 
 
 Alone to do what I have joyed in doing 
 In your glad sight, suffer me, nor take ill 
 If I confess you prize and me pursuing. 
 As the rapt Tuscan lifted up his eyes 
 Whither his Lady led, and lived with her, 
 Strong in her strength, and in her wisdom 
 
 wise, 
 
 Love-taught with song to be her thurifer ; 
 So I, that may no nearer stand than he 
 To minister about the holy place, 
 Am well content to watch my Heaven in 
 
 thee 
 And read my Credo in thy sacred face. 
 
 For even as Beatrix Dante's wreath did 
 
 bind, 
 So, Hymnia, hast thou imparadised my mind. 
 
 206 
 
LUX E TENEBRIS 
 
 I THANK all Gods that I can let thee go, 
 Lady, without one thought, one base desire 
 To tarnish that clear vision I gained by fire, 
 
 One stain in me I would not have thee know. 
 
 That is great might indeed that moves me so 
 To look upon thy Form, and yet aspire 
 To look not there, rather than I should 
 mire 
 
 That winged Spirit that haunts and guards 
 thy brow. 
 
 So now I see thee go, secure in this 
 
 That what I have is thee, that whole of thee 
 
 Whereof thy fair infashioning is sign : 
 
 For I see Honour, Love, and Wholesomeness, 
 
 And striving ever to reach them, and to be 
 
 As they, I keep thee still ; for they are thine. 
 
 207 
 
DUTY 
 
 OH, I am weak to serve thee as I ought ; 
 My shroud of flesh obscures thy deity, 
 So thy sweet Spirit that should embolden 
 
 me 
 To shake my wings out wide, serves me for 
 
 nought, 
 
 But receives tarnish, vile dishonour, wrought 
 By that thou earnest to bless O agony 
 And unendurable shame ! that, loving thee, 
 I dare not love, fearing my poisonous 
 thought ! 
 
 Man is too vile for any such high grace, 
 For that he seeks to honour he can but mar ; 
 
 So had I rather shun thy starry face 
 And fly the exultation to know thee near 
 For if one glance from me wrought thee a 
 
 scar 
 
 'Twould not be death, but life that I should 
 fear. 
 
 208 
 
WAGES 
 
 SOMETIMES the spirit that never leaves me 
 
 quite 
 
 Taps at my heart when thou art in the way, 
 Saying, Now thy Queen cometh : therefore 
 
 pray, 
 
 Lest she should see thee vile, and at the sight 
 Shiver and fly back piteous to the light 
 That wanes when she is absent. Then, as 
 
 I may, 
 
 I wash my soiled hands and muttering, say, 
 Lord, make me clean ; robe Thou me in Thy 
 white ! 
 
 So for a brief space, clad in ecstasy, 
 Pure, disembodied, I fall to kiss thy feet, 
 And sense thy glory throbbing round about ; 
 Whereafter, rising, I hold thee in a sweet 
 And gentle converse that lifts me up to be, 
 When thou art gone, strange to the gross 
 world's rout. 
 
 209 
 
EYE-SERVICE 
 
 MESEEMS thine eyes are two still-folded lakes 
 Wherein deep water reflects the guardian 
 
 sky, 
 
 Searching wherein I see how Heaven is nigh 
 And our broad Earth at peace. So my Love 
 
 takes 
 My soul's thin hands and, chafing them, she 
 
 makes 
 My life's blood lusty and my life's hope 
 
 high 
 
 For the strong lips and eyes of Poesy, 
 To hold the world well squandered for their 
 sakes. 
 
 I looked thee full this day : thine unveiled 
 
 eyes 
 Rayed their swift-searching magic forth ; 
 
 and then 
 
 I felt all strength that love can put in men 
 Whenas they know that loveliness is wise. 
 For love can be content with no less prize, 
 To lift us up beyond our mortal ken. 
 
CLOISTER THOUGHTS 
 
 (AT WESTMINSTER) 
 
 WITHIN these long gray shadows many dead 
 Lie waiting : we wait with them. Do you 
 
 believe 
 That at the last the threadbare soul will 
 
 give 
 
 All his shifts over, and stand dishevelled, 
 Naked in truth ? Then we shall hear it said, 
 " Ye two have waited long, daring to live 
 Grimly through days tormented ; now 
 
 reprieve 
 Awaiteth you with all these ancient dead ! " 
 
 The slope sun letteth down thro' our dark 
 
 bars 
 His ladder from the skies. Hand fast in 
 
 hand, 
 With quiet hearts and footsteps quiet and 
 
 slow, 
 
 Like children venturous in an unknown land 
 We will come to the fields whose flowers are 
 
 stars, 
 And kneeling ask, " Lord, wilt Thou crown 
 
 us now ? " 
 
 211 
 
THE CHAMBER IDYLL 
 
 THE blue night falleth, the moon 
 
 Is over the hill ; make fast, 
 
 Fasten the latch, I am tired : come soon, 
 
 Come ! I would sleep at last 
 
 In your bosom, my love, my love ! 
 
 The airy chamber above 
 
 Has the lattice ajar, that night 
 
 May breathe upon you and me, my love, 
 
 And the moon bless our marriage-rite 
 
 Come, lassy, to bed, to bed ! 
 
 The roof-thatch overhead 
 
 Shall cover the stars' bright eyes ; 
 
 The fleecy quilt shall be coverlid 
 
 For your meek virginities, 
 
 And your wedding, my bride, my bride ! 
 
 See, we are side to side, 
 Virgin in deed and name 
 Come, for love will not be denied, 
 Tarry not, have no shame : 
 Are we not man and bride ? 
 
 1894. 
 
 213 
 
EPIGRAMMATA 
 
 1910 
 
 215 
 
THE OLD HOUSE 
 
 Mossy gray stands the House, four-square to 
 
 the wind, 
 
 Embosomed in the hills. The garden old 
 Of yew and box and fishpond speaks her 
 
 mind, 
 Sweet -ordered, quaint, recluse, fold within 
 
 fold 
 Of quietness ; but true and choice and 
 
 kind 
 A sober casket for a heart of gold. 
 
 BLUE IRIS 
 
 Blue is the Adrian sea, and darkly blue 
 The ./Egean ; and the shafted sun thro' them, 
 That fishes grope to, gives the beamy hue 
 Rayed from her iris's deep diadem. 
 
 217 
 
THE ROSEBUD 
 
 In June I brought her roses, and she cupt 
 One slim bud in her hand and cherisht it, 
 And put it to her mouth. Rose and she 
 
 supt 
 Each other's sweetness; but the flower was 
 
 lit 
 By her kind eyes, and glowed. Then in her 
 
 breast 
 She laid it blushing, warm and doubly blest. 
 
 SPRING ON THE DOWN 
 
 When Spring blows o'er the land, and sun- 
 
 light flies 
 
 Across the hills, we take the upland way. 
 I have her waist, the wooing wind her eyes 
 And lips and cheeks. His kissing makes her 
 
 As flowers. " Thou hast two lovers, O my 
 
 dear," 
 Say I ; and she, " He takes what thou dost 
 
 fear." 
 
 218 
 
SNOWY NIGHT 
 
 The snow lies deep, ice -fringes hem the 
 
 thatch ; 
 I knock my shoes, my Love lifts me the 
 
 latch, 
 Shows me her eyes O frozen stars, they 
 
 shine 
 Kindly ! I clasp her. Quick ! her lips are 
 
 mine. 
 
 EVENING MOOD 
 
 Late, when the sun was smouldering down 
 
 the west, 
 
 She took my arm and laid her cheek to me ; 
 The fainting twilight held her, and I guess'd 
 All she would tell, but could not let me 
 
 see 
 
 Wonder and joy, the rising of her breast, 
 And confidence, and still expectancy. 
 
 219 
 
THE PARTING 
 
 Breathless was she and would not have us 
 
 part : 
 " Adieu, my Saint," I said, " 'tis come to 
 
 this." 
 
 But she leaned to me, one hand at her heart, 
 And all her soul sighed trembling in a kiss. 
 
 220 
 
DEDICATION OF A BOOK 
 
 To the Fountain of my long Dream, 
 To the Chalice of all my Sorrow, 
 To the Lamp held up, and the Stream 
 Of Light that beacons the Morrow ; 
 
 To the Bow, the Quiver and Dart, 
 To the Bridle-rein, to the Yoke 
 Proudly upborne, to the Heart 
 On Fire, to the Mercy-stroke ; 
 
 To Apollo herding his Cattle, 
 To Proserpina grave in Dis ; 
 To the high Head in the Battle, 
 And the Crown I consecrate this. 
 
 191 1. 
 
Printrtly R, ft R. CLARK, LIMITED, Edinburgh. 
 
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