Delphi Poetry Anthology: The World's Greatest Poems (Delphi Poets Series Book 50) (182 page)

                  
        
“In solitude and peace
Here I grew up, amid the loveliest scenes
Of unpolluted nature. Sweet it was,
   
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As the white mists of morning roll’d away,
To see the upland’s wooded heights appear
Dark in the early dawn, and mark the slope
With gorse-flowers glowing, as the sun illumed
Their golden glory with his deepening light;
   
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Pleasant at noon beside the vocal brook
To lay me down, and watch the floating clouds,
And shape to fancy’s wild similitudes
Their ever-varying forms; and oh how sweet!
To drive my flock at evening to the fold,
   
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And hasten to our little hut, and hear
The voice of kindness bid me welcome home.
“Amid the village playmates of my youth
Was one whom riper years approved a friend.
A gentle maid was my poor Madelon;
   
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I loved her as a sister, and long time
Her undivided tenderness possess’d,
Until a better and a holier tie
Gave her one nearer friend; and then my heart
Partook her happiness, for never lived
   
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A happier pair than Arnaud and his wife.

“
Lorraine was call’d to arms, and with her youth
Went Arnaud to the war. The morn was fair,
Bright shone the sun, the birds sung cheerfully,
And all the fields seem’d joyous in the spring;
   
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But to Domremi wretched was that day,
For there was lamentation, and the voice
Of anguish, and the deeper agony
That spake not. Never can my heart forget
   
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The feelings that shot through me, when the horn
Gave its last call, and through the castle-gate
The banner moved, and from the clinging arms
Which hung on them, as for a last embrace,
Sons, brethren, husbands, went.
                          
“More frequent now
Sought I the converse of poor Madelon,
  
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For now she needed friendship’s soothing voice.
All the long summer did she live in hope
Of tidings from the war; and as at eve
She with her mother by the cottage door
Sat in the sunshine, if a traveller
   
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Appear’d at distance coming o’er the brow,
Her eye was on him, and it might be seen
By the flush’d cheek what thoughts were in her heart,
And by the deadly paleness which ensued,
How her heart died within her. So the days
   
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And weeks and months pass’d on; and when the leaves
Fell in the autumn, a most painful hope
That reason own’d not, that with expectation
Did never cheer her as she rose at morn,
Still linger’d in her heart, and still at night
   
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Made disappointment dreadful. Winter came,
But Arnaud never from the war return’d,
He far away had perish’d; and when late
The tidings of his certain death arrived,
Sore with long anguish underneath that blow
   
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She sunk. Then would she sit and think all day
Upon the past, and talk of happiness
That never could return, as though she found
Best solace in the thoughts which minister’d
To sorrow: and she loved to see the sun
   
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Go down, because another day was gone,
And then she might retire to solitude
And wakeful recollections, or perchance
To sleep more wearying far than wakefulness,
Dreams of his safety and return, and starts
   
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Of agony; so neither night nor day
Could she find rest, but pined and pined away.

“DEATH! to the happy thou art terrible;
But how the wretched love to think of thee
Oh thou true comforter, the friend of all
   
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Who have no friend beside! By the sick bed
Of Madelon I sat, when sure she felt
The hour of her deliverance drawing near;
I saw her eye kindle with heavenly hope,
I had her latest look of earthly love,
   
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I felt her hand’s last pressure.... Son of Orleans!
I would not wish to live to know that hour,
When I could think upon a dear friend dead,
And weep not: but they are not bitter tears,...
Not painful now; for Christ hath risen, first fruits
Of them that slept; and we shall meet again,
   
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Meet, not again to part: the Grave hath lost
It’s victory.

                          
“I remember as her bier
Went to the grave, a lark sprung up aloft,
And soar’d amid the sunshine, carolling
   
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So full of joy, that to the mourner’s ear
More mournfully than dirge or passing bell,
The joyous carol came, and made us feel
That of the multitude of beings, none
But man was wretched.

                          
“Then my soul awoke,
For it had slumber’d long in happiness,
   
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And never feeling misery, never thought
What others suffer. I, as best I might,
Solaced the keen regret of Elinor;
   
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And much my cares avail’d, and much her son’s,
On whom, the only comfort of her age,
She center’d now her love. A younger birth,
Aged nearly as myself was Theodore,
An ardent youth, who with the kindest care
Had sooth’d his sister’s sorrow. We had knelt
   
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By her death-bed together, and no bond
In closer union knits two human hearts
Than fellowship in grief.
“It chanced as once
Beside the fire of Elinor I sat,
   
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The night was comfortless, the loud blast howl’d,
And as we drew around the social hearth,
We heard the rain beat hard. Driven by the storm
A warrior mark’d our distant taper’s light;
We heapt the fire, and spread the friendly board.
‘’Tis a rude night;’ the stranger cried: ‘safe housed
Pleasant it is to hear the pelting rain.
   
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I too could be content to dwell in peace.
Resting my head upon the lap of love,
But that my country calls. When the winds roar,
Remember sometimes what a soldier suffers,
   
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And think on Conrade.’

               
“Theodore replied,
‘Success go with thee! Something we have known
Of war, and tasted its calamity;
And I am well content to dwell in peace,
Albeit inglorious, thanking the good God
   
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Who made me to be happy.’

                
“Did that God’
Cried Conrade, ‘form thy heart for happiness,
When Desolation royally careers
Over thy wretched country? Did that God
Form thee for Peace when Slaughter is abroad,
   
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When her brooks run with blood, and Rape, and Murder,
Stalk through her flaming towns? Live thou in peace,
Young man! my heart is human: I must feel
For what my brethren suffer,’ While he spake
Such mingled passions character’d his face
   
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Of fierce and terrible benevolence,
That I did tremble as I listen’d to him.
And in my heart tumultuous thoughts arose
Of high achievements, indistinct, and wild,
And vast,.. yet such they were as made me pant
As though by some divinity possess’d.
   
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‘But is there not some duty due to those
We love?’ said Theodore; ‘Is there an employ
More righteous than to cheer declining age,
And thus with filial tenderness repay
   
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Parental care?

                
“
Hard is it,’ Conrade cried,
Ay, hard indeed, to part from those we love;
And I have suffer’d that severest pang.
I have left an aged mother; I have left
One upon whom my heart has fasten’d all
   
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Its dearest, best affections. Should I live
Till France shall see the blessed hour of peace,
I shall return; my heart will be content,
My duties then will have been well discharged,
And I may then be happy. There are those
   
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Who deem such thoughts the fancies of a mind
Strict beyond measure, and were well content,
If I should soften down my rigid nature
Even to inglorious ease, to honour me.
But pure of heart and high in self-esteem
   
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I must be honour’d by myself: all else,
The breath of Fame, is as the unsteady wind Worthless.’

    
                      
“
So saying from his belt he took
The encumbering sword. I held it, listening to him,
And wistless what I did, half from the sheath
   
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Drew forth its glittering blade. I gazed upon it,
And shuddering, as I touch’d its edge, exclaim’d,
How horrible it is with the keen sword
To gore the finely-fibred human frame!
   
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I could not strike a lamb.

                          
“
He answer’d me
‘Maiden, thou sayest well. I could not strike
A lamb!..But when the merciless invader
Spares not grey age, and mocks the infant’s shriek
As it doth writhe upon his cursed lance,
And forces to his foul embrace the wife
   
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Even where her slaughter’d husband bleeds to death.
Almighty God! I should not be a man
If I did let one weak and pitiful feeling
Make mine arm impotent to cleave him down.
   
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Think well of this, young man!’ he cried, and took
The hand of Theodore; ‘think well of this;
As you are human, as you hope to live
In peace, amid the dearest joys of home,
Think well of this! You have a tender mother;
As you do wish that she may die in peace,
   
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As you would even to madness agonize
To hear this maiden call on you in vain
For help, and see her dragg’d, and hear her scream
In the blood-reeking soldier’s lustful grasp,
   
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Think that there are such horrors! that even now,
Some city flames, and haply, as in Roan,
Some famish’d babe on his dead mother’s breast
Yet hangs and pulls for food!.. Woe be to those
By whom the evil comes! And woe to him,..
For little less his guilt,..who dwells in peace,
   
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When every arm is needed for the strife!’
“
When we had all betaken us to rest,
Sleepless I lay, and in my mind revolved
The high-soul’d warrior’s speech. Then Madelon
Rose in remembrance; over her the grave
   
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Had closed; her sorrows were not register’d
In the rolls of fame; but when the tears run down
The widow’s cheek, shall not her cry be heard
In Heaven against the oppressor? will not God
In sunder smite the unmerciful, and break
   
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The sceptre of the wicked?.. Thoughts like these
Possess’d my soul, till at the break of day
I slept; nor did my heated brain repose
Even then; for visions, sent, as I believe,
   
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From the Most-High, arose. A high-tower’d town
Hemm’d in and girt with enemies, I saw,
Where Famine on a heap of carcasses,
Half envious of the unutterable feast,
Mark’d the gorged raven clog his beak with gore.
I turn’d me then to the besieger’s camp,
   
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And there was revelry: a loud lewd laugh
Burst on mine ear, and I beheld the chiefs
Sit at their feast, and plan the work of death.
My soul grew sick within me; I look’d up,
   
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Reproaching Heaven,.. lo! from the clouds an arm
As of the avenging Angel was put forth,
And from his hand a sword, like lightning, fell.

“From that night I could feel my burthen’d soul
Heaving beneath incumbent Deity.
I sate in silence, musing on the days
   
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To come, unheeding and unseeing all
Around me, in that dreaminess of thought
When every bodily sense is as it slept,
And the mind alone is wakeful. I have heard
   
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Strange voices in the evening wind; strange forms
Dimly discover’d throng’d the twilight air.
The neighbours wonder’d at the sudden change,
They call’d me crazed; and my dear Uncle too,
Would sit and gaze upon me wistfully,
A heaviness upon his aged brow,
   
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And in his eye such sorrow, that my heart
Sometimes misgave me. I had told him all
The mighty future labouring in my breast,
But that the hour, methought, not yet was come.

“At length I heard of Orleans, by the foe
   
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Wall’d in from human help: thither all thoughts
All hopes were turn’d; that bulwark beaten down,
All were the invaders. Then my troubled soul
Grew more disturb’d, and shunning every eye,
I loved to wander where the woodland shade
   
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Was deepest, there on mightiest deeds to brood
Of shadowy vastness, such as made my heart
Throb loud: anon I paused, and in a state
Of half expectance, listen’d to the wind.