Selected Poems (Penguin Classics) (7 page)

You’ve the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen steam and wheeze,

[20] And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint grey olive-trees.

VI

Is it better in May, I ask you? You’ve summer all at once;

In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns.

’Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce risen three fingers well,

The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows out its great red bell

Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick and sell.

VII

Is it ever hot in the square? There’s a fountain to spout and splash!

In the shade it sings and springs; in the shine such foam-bows flash

On the horses with curling fish-tails, that prance and paddle and pash

Round the lady atop in her conch – fifty gazers do not abash,

[30] Though all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash.

VIII

All the year long at the villa, nothing to see though you linger,

Except yon cypress that points like death’s lean lifted forefinger.

Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i’ the corn and mingle,

Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle.

Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill,

And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill.

Enough of the seasons, – I spare you the months of the fever and chill.

IX

Ere you open your eyes in the city, the blessed church-bells begin:

No sooner the bells leave off than the diligence rattles in:

[40]
You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a pin.

By-and-by there’s the travelling doctor gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth;

Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the market beneath.

At the post-office such a scene-picture – the new play, piping hot!

And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves were shot.

Above it, behold the Archbishop’s most fatherly of rebukes,

And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some little new law of the Duke’s!

Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend Don So-and-so

Who is Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarca, Saint Jerome and Cicero,

‘And moreover,’ (the sonnet goes rhyming,) ‘the skirts of Saint Paul has reached,

[50] Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctuous than ever he preached.’

Noon strikes, – here sweeps the procession! our Lady borne smiling and smart

With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords stuck in her heart!

Bang-whang-whang
goes the drum,
tootle-te-tootle
the fife;

No keeping one’s haunches still: it’s the greatest pleasure in life.

X

But bless you, it’s dear – it’s dear! fowls, wine, at double the rate.

They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what oil pays passing the gate

It’s a horror to think of. And so, the villa for me, not the city!

Beggars can scarcely be choosers: but still – ah, the pity, the pity!

Look, two and two go the priests, then the monks with cowls and sandals,

[60] And the penitents dressed in white shirts, a-holding the yellow candles;

One, he carries a flag up straight, and another a cross with handles,

And the Duke’s guard brings up the rear, for the better prevention of scandals:

Bang-whang-whang
goes the drum,
tootle-te-tootle
the fife.

Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no such pleasure in life!

Fra Lippo Lippi

I am poor brother Lippo, by your leave!

You need not clap your torches to my face.

Zooks, what’s to blame? you think you see a monk!

What, ’tis past midnight, and you go the rounds,

And here you catch me at an alley’s end

Where sportive ladies leave their doors ajar?

The Carmine’s my cloister: hunt it up,

Do, – harry out, if you must show your zeal,

Whatever rat, there, haps on his wrong hole,

[10] And nip each softling of a wee white mouse,

Weke, weke
, that’s crept to keep him company!

Aha, you know your betters! Then, you’ll take

Your hand away that’s fiddling on my throat,

And please to know me likewise. Who am I?

Why, one, sir, who is lodging with a friend

Three streets off – he’s a certain … how d’ye call?

Master – a … Cosimo of the Medici,

I’ the house that caps the corner. Boh! you were best!

Remember and tell me, the day you’re hanged,

[20] How you affected such a gullet’s-gripe!

But you, sir, it concerns you that your knaves

Pick up a manner nor discredit you:

Zooks, are we pilchards, that they sweep the streets

And count fair prize what comes into their net?

He’s Judas to a tittle, that man is!

Just such a face! Why, sir, you make amends.

Lord, I’m not angry! Bid your hangdogs go

Drink out this quarter-florin to the health

Of the munificent House that harbours me

[30] (And many more beside, lads! more beside!)

And all’s come square again. I’d like his face –

His, elbowing on his comrade in the door

With the pike and lantern, – for the slave that holds

John Baptist’s head a-dangle by the hair

With one hand (‘Look you, now,’ as who should say)

And his weapon in the other, yet unwiped!

It’s not your chance to have a bit of chalk,

A wood-coal or the like? or you should see!

Yes, I’m the painter, since you style me so.

[40] What, brother Lippo’s doings, up and down,

You know them and they take you? like enough!

I saw the proper twinkle in your eye –

’Tell you, I liked your looks at very first.

Let’s sit and set things straight now, hip to haunch.

Here’s spring come, and the nights one makes up bands

To roam the town and sing out carnival,

And I’ve been three weeks shut within my mew,

A-painting for the great man, saints and saints

And saints again. I could not paint all night –

[50] Out! I leaned out of window for fresh air.

There came a hurry of feet and little feet,

A sweep of lute-strings, laughs, and whifts of song, –

Flower o’ the broom
,

Take away love, and our earth is a tomb!

Flower o’ the quince
,

I let Lisa go, and what good in life since?

Flower o’ the thyme
– and so on. Round they went.

Scarce had they turned the corner when a titter

Like the skipping of rabbits by moonlight, – three slim shapes,

[60] And a face that looked up … zooks, sir, flesh and blood,

That’s all I’m made of! Into shreds it went,

Curtain and counterpane and coverlet,

All the bed-furniture – a dozen knots,

There was a ladder! Down I let myself,

Hands and feet, scrambling somehow, and so dropped,

And after them. I came up with the fun

Hard by Saint Laurence, hail fellow, well met, –

Flower o’ the rose
,

If I’ve been merry, what matter who knows?

[70]
And so as I was stealing back again

To get to bed and have a bit of sleep

Ere I rise up tomorrow and go work

On Jerome knocking at his poor old breast

With his great round stone to subdue the flesh,

You snap me of the sudden. Ah, I see!

Though your eye twinkles still, you shake your head –

Mine’s shaved – a monk, you say – the sting’s in that!

If Master Cosimo announced himself,

Mum’s the word naturally; but a monk!

[80] Come, what am I a beast for? tell us, now!

I was a baby when my mother died

And father died and left me in the street.

I starved there, God knows how, a year or two

On fig-skins, melon-parings, rinds and shucks,

Refuse and rubbish. One fine frosty day,

My stomach being empty as your hat,

The wind doubled me up and down I went.

Old Aunt Lapaccia trussed me with one hand,

(Its fellow was a stinger as I knew)

[90] And so along the wall, over the bridge,

By the straight cut to the convent. Six words there,

While I stood munching my first bread that month:

‘So, boy, you’re minded,’ quoth the good fat father

Wiping his own mouth, ’twas refection-time, –

‘To quit this very miserable world?

Will you renounce’ … ‘the mouthful of bread?’ thought I;

By no means! Brief, they made a monk of me;

I did renounce the world, its pride and greed,

Palace, farm, villa, shop and banking-house,

[100] Trash, such as these poor devils of Medici

Have given their hearts to – all at eight years old.

Well, sir, I found in time, you may be sure,

’Twas not for nothing – the good bellyful,

The warm serge and the rope that goes all round,

And day-long blessed idleness beside!

‘Let’s see what the urchin’s fit for’ – that came next.

Not overmuch their way, I must confess.

Such a to-do! They tried me with their books:

Lord, they’d have taught me Latin in pure waste!

[110]
Flower o’ the clove
,

All the Latin I construe is, ‘amo’ I love!

But, mind you, when a boy starves in the streets

Eight years together, as my fortune was,

Watching folk’s faces to know who will fling

The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he desires,

And who will curse or kick him for his pains, –

Which gentleman processional and fine,

Holding a candle to the Sacrament,

Will wink and let him lift a plate and catch

[120] The droppings of the wax to sell again,

Or holla for the Eight and have him whipped, –

How say I? – nay, which dog bites, which lets drop

His bone from the heap of offal in the street, –

Why, soul and sense of him grow sharp alike,

He learns the look of things, and none the less

For admonition from the hunger-pinch.

I had a store of such remarks, be sure,

Which, after I found leisure, turned to use.

I drew men’s faces on my copy-books,

[130] Scrawled them within the antiphonary’s marge,

Joined legs and arms to the long music-notes,

Found eyes and nose and chin for A’s and B’s,

And made a string of pictures of the world

Betwixt the ins and outs of verb and noun,

On the wall, the bench, the door. The monks looked black.

‘Nay,’ quoth the Prior, ‘turn him out, d’ye say?

In no wise. Lose a crow and catch a lark.

What if at last we get our man of parts,

We Carmelites, like those Camaldolese

[140] And Preaching Friars, to do our church up fine

And put the front on it that ought to be!’

And hereupon he bade me daub away.

Thank you! my head being crammed, the walls a blank,

Never was such prompt disemburdening.

First, every sort of monk, the black and white,

I drew them, fat and lean: then, folk at church,

From good old gossips waiting to confess

Their cribs of barrel-droppings, candle-ends, –

To the breathless fellow at the altar-foot,

[150] Fresh from his murder, safe and sitting there

With the little children round him in a row

Of admiration, half for his beard and half

For that white anger of his victim’s son

Shaking a fist at him with one fierce arm,

Signing himself with the other because of Christ

(Whose sad face on the cross sees only this

After the passion of a thousand years)

Till some poor girl, her apron o’er her head,

(Which the intense eyes looked through) came at eve

[160] On tiptoe, said a word, dropped in a loaf,

Her pair of earrings and a bunch of flowers

(The brute took growling), prayed, and so was gone.

I painted all, then cried ‘’Tis ask and have;

Choose, for more’s ready!’ – laid the ladder flat,

And showed my covered bit of cloister-wall.

The monks closed in a circle and praised loud

Till checked, taught what to see and not to see,

Being simple bodies, – ‘That’s the very man!

Look at the boy who stoops to pat the dog!

[170] That woman’s like the Prior’s niece who comes

To care about his asthma: it’s the life!’

But there my triumph’s straw-fire flared and funked;

Their betters took their turn to see and say:

The Prior and the learned pulled a face

And stopped all that in no time. ‘How? what’s here?

Quite from the mark of painting, bless us all!

Faces, arms, legs and bodies like the true

As much as pea and pea! it’s devil’s-game!

Your business is not to catch men with show,

[180] With homage to the perishable clay,

But lift them over it, ignore it all,

Make them forget there’s such a thing as flesh.

Your business is to paint the souls of men –

Man’s soul, and it’s a fire, smoke … no, it’s not …

It’s vapour done up like a new-born babe –

(In that shape when you die it leaves your mouth)

It’s … well, what matters talking, it’s the soul!

Give us no more of body than shows soul!

Here’s Giotto, with his Saint a-praising God,

[190] That sets us praising, – why not stop with him?

Why put all thoughts of praise out of our head

With wonder at lines, colours, and what not?

Paint the soul, never mind the legs and arms!

Rub all out, try at it a second time.

Oh, that white smallish female with the breasts,