Wilfrid Scawen Blunt: Verses about Drunkenness

O Thou enfolded in grief,
Man, with thy mantle of scorn!
Arise and warn!
Unloved prophet of ill
Who sittest clothed in thy grief,
In thy pride of unbelief,
In thy silence of love forsworn!
Speak thy word to the world;
Let it be as a sword to thy will;
Let it be as a spear that is hurled,
A banner of wrath unfurled,
A garment rent and torn.

Speak. They shall listen to thee,
A single voice at their feast.
To the last and least,
They shall hear what they loathe to hear.
In the day of their Jubilee,
Of their coronation feast,
With the wine at their insolent lips,
Though they lend no ear
And their shoutings ring
From the decks of a thousand ships
Acclaiming their new--crowned king
With a coronation cheer,
They shall hear.

Speak, in their jubilant hour,
In the midst of their might and mirth.
Be thy theme the Earth,
The ancient tale of the lands of fame,
Empires of earlier birth,
Which held the world in their lust of power
As their own for dower
And abused their trust.
Make thy theme of the wrath that came,
The smoke that rose, the devouring flame,
The day of glory, the night of shame
And the end of dust.

O thou enrobed in thy tears!
Thou hast heard the children sing,
The children that pass in the street,
The innocent ones with their chauntings proud,
The rhyme of their marching feet.
How their voices sting!
What is the word they say
In their play,
The hymn their young lips fashion?
They have marched through the crowded ways
With flags and glory and shoutings loud
While the sun has looked down ablaze,
Amazed at their joyous passion.

Each one carries a sword,
A wooden sword in his hand,
With ribbon and belt and cord,
And a gun on his shoulder glorious,
Proud each one as a lord.
``Soldiers,'' they shout. ``We are soldiers come
From a battle--field. For, hark, the drum!
From a field of fight victorious.''
``Soldiers! Soldiers! Soldiers!'' Weary am I
Of that word forlorn,
Of the king's command,
Of the children's insolent cry,
A nation's cry whom the nations scorn
For its childish pride.
Better were these unborn!

England! Where is she? Where?
Land of the fortunate free
Which hath ceased to be?
What hath she done with her fame?
The nations that envied her
Turned to her in their care,
Sought her light upon land and sea,
Called as once on her ancient name,
The name of her liberty.
But her ears were shut to their prayer;
Her place was a sepulchre,
She had ceased in her strength to be,
She was no more free.

She fell as a star from its place,
As a bird from its path in the sky,
As a spring run dry,
A fruit in its rottenness,
As a drunken woman prone on her face
While the world went by,
And she knew not her own disgrace.
O thou, who hast seen her fall,
Who hast witnessed her agony,
Who hast looked on the face of the dead!
Lift up thy voice in the night and cry
``The harvest is harvested.
As these shall have made their bed,
So let them lie!''

How many singers before me! Are there yet songs unsung?
Dost thou, my sad soul, remember where was her dwellingplace?
Tents in Jiwá, the fair wádi, speak ye to me of her.
Fair house of 'Abla my true love, blessing and joy to thee!
Doubting I paused in the pastures, seeking her camel--tracks,
high on my swift--trotting nága tall as a citadel,
Weaving a dream of the past days, days when she dwelt in them,
'Abla, my true love, in Házzen, Sammán, Mutathéllemi.
There on the sand lay the hearth--stones, black in their emptiness,
desolate more for the loved ones fled with Om Héythami,
Fled to the land of the lions, roarers importunate.
Daily my quest of thee darkens, daughter of Mákhrami.

Truly at first sight I loved her, I who had slain her kin,
ay, by the life ofthy father, not in inconstancy.
Love, thou hast taken possession. Deem it not otherwise.
Thou in my heart art the first one, first in nobility.
How shall I win to her people? Far in Anéyzateyn
feed they their flocks in the Spring--time, we in the Gháïlem.
Yet it was thou, my beloved, willed we should sunder thus,
bridled thyself the swift striders, black night encompassing.
Fear in my heart lay a captive, seeing their camel--herds
herded as waiting a burden, close to the tents of them,
Browsing on berries of khímkhim, forty--two milch--camels,
black as the underwing feathers set in the raven's wing.
Then was it 'Abla enslaved thee showing her tenderness,
white teeth with lips for the kissing: sweet was the taste of them,
Sweet as the vials of odours sold by the musk sellers,
fragrant the white teeth she showed thee, fragrant the mouth of her.
So is a garden new planted fresh in its greenery,
watered by soft--falling raindrops, treadless, untenanted.
Lo, on it rain--clouds have lighted, soft showers, no hail in them,
leaving each furrow a lakelet bright as a silverling.
Pattering, plashing they fell there, rains at the sunsetting,
wide--spreading runlets of water, streams of fertility,
Mixed with the humming of bees' wings droning the day--light long,
never a pause in their chaunting, gay drinking--choruses.
Blithe iteration of bees' wings, wings struck in harmony,
sharply as steel on the flint--stone, light--handed smithy strokes.
Sweet, thou shalt rest till the morning all the night lightly there,
while I my red horse bestriding ride with the forayers.
Resting--place more than the saddle none have I, none than he
war--horse of might in the rib--bones: deep is the girth of him.

Say, shall a swift Shadaníeh bear me to her I love,
one under ban for the drinker, weaned of the foal of her,
One with the tail carried archwise, long though the march hath been,
one with the firm foot atrample, threading the labyrinths?
Lo, how she spurneth the sand--dunes, like to the ear--less one,
him with the feet set together: round him young ostriches
Troop like the cohorts of Yémen, herded by 'Ajemis,
she--camel cohorts of Yémen, herded by stammerers.
Watching a beacon they follow, led by the crown of him
carried aloft as a howdah, howdah where damsels sit,
Him the small--headed, returning, fur--furnished Ethiop,
black slave, to Thu--el--Ashíra: there lie his eggs in it.
Lo, how my nága hath drunken deeply in Dóhradeyn;
how hath she shrunk back in Déylam, pools of the enemy,
Shrunk from its perilous cisterns, scared by the hunting one,
great--headed shrieker of evening, clutched to the flank of her.
Still to her off--side she shrinketh, deemeth the led--cat there
Clawing the more that she turneth;--thus is her fear of them.
Lo, she hath knelt in Ridá--a, pleased there and murmuring
soft as the sweet--fluting rushes crushed by the weight of her.
Thickly as pitch from the boiling oozeth the sweat of her,
pitch from the cauldron new--lighted, fire at the sides of it,
Oozeth in drops from the ear--roots. Wrathful and bold is she,
proud in her gait as a stallion hearing the battle--cry.

Though thou thy fair face concealest still in thy veil from me,
yet am I he that hath captured horse--riders how many!
Give me the praise of my fair deeds. Lady, thou knowest it,
kindly am I and forbearing, save when wrong presseth me.
Only when evil assaileth, deal I with bitterness;
then am I cruel in vengeance, bitter as colocynth.

Sometime in wine was my solace. Good wine, I drank of it,
suaging the heat ofthe evening, paying in white money,
Quaffing in goblets of saffron, pale--streaked with ivory,
hard at my hand their companion, the flask to the left of me.
Truly thus bibbing I squandered half my inheritance;
yet was my honour a wideword. No man had wounded it.
Since that when sober my dew--fall rained no less generous:
thou too, who knowest my nature, thou too be bountiful!
How many loved of the fair ones have I not buffeted,
youths overthrown! Ha, the blood--streams shrill from the veins of them.
Swift--stroke two--handed I smote him, thrust through the ribs of him;
forth flowed the stream of his life--blood red as anemone.
Ask of the horsemen of Málek, O thou his progeny,
all they have seen of my high deeds. Then shalt thou learn of them
How that I singly among them, clad in war's panoply,
stout on my war--horse theswift one charged at their chivalry.
Lo, how he rusheth, the fierce one, singly in midst of them,
waiting anon for the archers closing in front of us.
They that were nearest in battle, they be my proof to thee
how they have quailed at my war--cry, felt my urbanity.
Many and proud are their heroes, fear--striking warriors,
men who nor flee nor surrender, yielding not easily.
Yet hath my right arm o'erborne them, thrust them aside from me,
laid in their proud backs the long spear: slender the shaft of it.
See, how it splitteth asunder mail--coat and armouring;
not the most valiant arefuge hath from the point of it.
Slain on the ground have I left him, prey to the lion's brood,
feast of the wrists and the fingers. Ha, for the sacrifice!

Heavy his mail--coat, its sutures, lo, I divided them
piercing the joints of the champion; brave was the badge of him.
Quick--handed he with the arrows, cast in the winter--time,
raider of wine--sellers' sign--boards, blamed as a prodigal.
He, when he saw me down riding, making my point at him,
showed me his white teeth in terror, nay, but not smilingly.
All the day long did we joust it. Then were his finger tips
stained as though dipped in the íthlem, dyed with the dragon's blood,
Till with a spear--thrust I pierced him, once and again with it,
last, with a blade of the Indies, fine steel its tempering,
Smote him, the hero of stature, tall as a tamarisk,
kinglike, in sandals of dun hide, noblest of all of them.

Oh, thou, my lamb, the forbidden! prize of competitors,
why did they bid me not love thee? why art thou veiled from me?
Sent I my hand--maiden spy--like: Go thou, I said to her,
bring me the news of my true love, news in veracity.
Go. And she went, and returning: These in unguardedness
sit, and thy fair lambamong them, waiting thy archery.
Then was it turned she towards me, fawn--necked in gentleness,
noble in bearing, gazelle--like, milk--white the lip of it.

Woe for the baseness of 'Amru, lord of ingratitude!
Verily thanklessness turneth souls from humanity.
Close have I kept to the war--words thy father once spoke to me,
how I should deal in the death--play, when lips part and teeth glitter,
When in the thick of the combat heroes unflinchingly
cry in men's ears their defiance, danger forgot by them.
Close have I kept them and stood forth their shield from the enemy,
calling onall with my war--cries, circling and challenging.
There where the horsemen rode strongest I rode out in front of them,
hurled forth my war--shout and charged them; no man thought blame of me.
Antar! they cried; and their lances, well--cords in slenderness,
pressed to the breast of my war--horse still as I pressed on them.
Doggedly strove we and rode we. Ha, the brave stallion!
now is his breast dyed with blood--drops, his star--front with fear of them!
Swerved he, as pierced by the spear--points. Then in his beautiful
eyes stood the tears of appealing, words inarticulate.
If he had learned our man's language, then had he called to me:
if he had known our tongue's secret, then had he cried to me.

Thus to my soul came consoling; grief passed away from it
hearing the heroes applauding, shouting: Ho, Antar, ho!
Deep through the sand--drifts the horsemen charged with teeth grimly set,
urging their war--steeds, the strong--limbed, weight bearers all of them.
Swift the delúls too I urged them, spurred by my eagerness
forward to high deeds of daring, deeds of audacity.
Only I feared lest untimely drear death should shorten me
ere on the dark sons of Démdem vengeance was filled for me.
These are the men that reviled me, struck though I struck them not,
vowed me to bloodshed and evil or ere I troubled them.
Nay, let their hatred o'erbear me! I care not. The sire of them
slain lies for wild beasts and vultures. Ha! for the sacrifice!

An old heart's mourning is a hideous thing,
And weeds upon an aged weeper cling
Like night upon a grave. The city there,
Gaunt as a woman who has once been fair,
Lay black with winter, and the silent rain
Fell thro' the heavens darkly, like a stain
Upon her face. The dusky houses rose,
Unlovely shapes laid naked on the ooze,
Grimed with long sooty tears. The night fell down,
And gathered all the highways in its frown.
This was my home. I saw men pass and pass
Nor stop to look into a neighbour's face.
I dared not look in their's because my eyes
Were faint and travel--jarred and would not rise
From the dull earth, and hunger made them dim,
The hunger of a seven years' angry dream
Of love and peace and home unsatisfied.
And now my heart thus grievously denied
Rose, like a caged bird in the nesting time
Who beats against the bars that prison him,
In all its greenness of youth's wounds and pain
And would not cease till these should bleed again.

For I had gone a hunter through the world,
And set my tent in every land, and hurled
My spears at life because my joys were dead;
And many a fair field of the Earth was red
Where I had passed, and many a wind might tell
Of stricken souls that to my arrows fell.
I would not stop to listen to their cries
But went my way and thought that I was wise.

A wanderer's life, whether his lone chase be man
Or only those poor outlaws under ban
The creatures of the field his hand destroys
Through rage of wantonness or need of noise,
Is the fierce solace of its anger given
To a hurt soul which dares not turn to Heaven.
With me it was a vengeance of love lost,
A refuge proved for passions tempest--tossed,
An unguent for despairs that could not kill.
I wandered in the desert and the hill
Seeking dry places, and behold my grief
Fled with my footprints and I found relief.
And it had happened to me, as befalls
Men bred in cities who have left their walls
For gain or pleasure, that the wilderness
Grew lastly wearisome. I loved it less.

And once a desperate chase had led me on
To an unknown land when daylight was near done,
And I sat weary by my slaughtered prey
And watched the cranes which northward fled away
Rank upon rank into the depths of air,
And still the horizon lifeless vast and bare
Stretched wide around, and like a vault of dread
The arch of heaven hemmed me overhead,
And the great eye of the dead beast was set
Upon my own. I felt my cheek was wet.
Oh surely then, for all man's heart be hard,
Though he have taken Nature by the beard
And lived alone as to the manner born,
And though his limbs be strung with toil, and worn
To all Earth's dangers, yet at such a time
His coward soul will overmaster him,
Saying ``Beware, thou child of Earth, even now
Look at the world how wide it is and thou
How small! And thou hast dared to be alone.''
And lo, the last long flight of cranes was gone,
And darkness with its folding pity crept
Over the plain. I hid my face and wept,
Till sleep fell on me. But, when dawn was come,
I turned my steps to what had been my home.

The palace gardens! I had fled aside
From the gaunt streets in easement of my pride
After the lamps were lit, for to my brain
The tumult and the passers--by were pain:
The gardens where in those far summer times
A boy I came to watch the pantomimes
Among a laughing crowd of white--capped bonnes
And red--cheeked children and loud country clowns,
Or where, along the wall in graver sense
And screened from winds in their petite Provence,
With the first chestnut blossoms old men sat
And cheered their melancholy souls with chat,
Thawing like frozen apples in the sun!
The old men and the children all were gone.
The leaves, their canopy, lay torn and dead
And crushed in spongy heaps beneath my tread.
The fountains recreant to their laughter lay
Murk pools of silence shrouded from the day,
As though no doves had ever at their brink
Stooped in full June to plume themselves and drink.
Only the trees stood, witness of the past.
Sad trees, I greeted them. I held them fast
Like a friend's hands. They were as changed and bare
As my own life, but calm in the despair
Of their long winter's martyrdom, and I
A very child in my philosophy!
Till I remembered that no Spring would come
To mock the winter of my own long doom
With any merriment. And ``Trees'' I cried,
``Your hearts within are all too greenly dyed
To match with mine.'' I let their branches go
And sat upon a bench to feed my woe
With memories long hidden out of mind,
But which trooped back that night and rode the wind.

These wooden benches, what sad ghosts of pleasures
Had used them nightly crouching o'er their treasures,
My own long murdered joys, since there we sat
Blind in our love and insolent to Fate!
Each one a witness proved of our lost vows,
Our prayers, our protests, all our souls' carouse;
Each one inscribed through the unheeding years
With letters of a name I wrote in tears.
'Twas here I saw her first, a pure sweet woman
Fair as a goddess but with smile all human,
Her children at her knees who went and came
At each new wayward impulse of their game,
And she reproving with her quiet eyes
Veiling the mirth they could not all disguise.
The echo of her voice with its mute thrill
Lived in these glades and stirred my pulses still,
Though I had lived to hear it in what tone
Of passionate grief and souls' disunion.
She stood, a broken lily, by that tree,
Sunlight and shade for ever changingly
Chequering the robe she wore of virgin white,
When first I touched the goal of my delight
Her woman's hand and hid it in my hands.
Here shone the glory of her countenance
Nobler for tears when weakness for a space
Held full dominion in that heaven her face
And she confessed herself of grief divine
And love grown young, a vintage of new wine,
And I was crowned her king. O silent trees,
You heard it and you know how to the lees
We drained the cup of life and found it good,
Gathering love's manna for our daily food,
In scorn of the vain rest. You heard and knew
What the world only guessed where all was true.
And have you dreamed on in your quiet grove
While seven years were built against our love!

'Twas on this bench I sat that day of June
Thinking of death a whole sweet afternoon,
Till I was sick of sorrow and my tongue
Weary of its long silence (I was young
And the birds sang so loud); and when the night
Came as it now came, and the lamps grew bright
In the long street, lit like a diamond chain,
I rose and said: ``I will not bear the pain.
What is my pride worth that for it this smart
Should harrow up the green things of my heart
For twelve importunate hours in such a sort?
And pleasure is so sweet and life so short.''
And as a martyr, who long time has lain
Frozen in a dungeon, sees amid his pain,
When he has fasted on for many days,
Bright visions of hot feasts and hearths ablaze
With welcome, and who sells his gloomy creed,
And is overcome of pleasure, so my need
Conquered my pride; and I arose and went
Striding, with smiles at my new found intent,
Down these same gravel alleys to the gate
And so beyond, like one inebriate,
Thinking the while of the brave baths and food
Set for the renegade, until I stood
Once more before her door I had forsworn.
I did not stop to question thoughts forlorn,
But knocked as I had knocked a thousand times.
St. Roch's was ringing its last evening chimes,
And I still thought about the martyr's dream.
I saw the light within the threshold gleam
Which opened to me, and the voice I knew
Said in all sweetness, as the door swung to,
``Come. We are just in time. How fortunate
You too like me have happened to be late.''
I swear I said no word of the sad plans
I had plotted on this bench of ignorance.
There have been kings called happy, but not one
As I that night. Ah God! to be alone,
Alone, and never more to hear her voice
Calling me back, blest martyr, to my joys!

I sat there grieving in the cold and rain
Until my heart had half forgot its pain,
And when I rose I scarce could guide my feet,
They were so numb, to the unlovely street.
And yet need was my steps should bear me on
To some mad corner of that Babylon;
And I must feed the gnawings of my soul
With broken meat. ``The seven years may roll,''
I said, ``and men may change and she be dead,
Yet the house stands, God knows how tenanted.''

I leaned my head against the colonnade
Which skirts the square. I think I had not prayed
Through all those years, but now I said a prayer,
And hope in spite of reason seemed to wear
Green buds upon its branches. Who shall know
If 'twas a vision sent me in my woe
To prove the power of prayer? But, when I turned
And looked across the square, the candles burned
In the old upper windows, and, before,
A shadow crossed the curtain, and the door
Opened towards me, and a voice there cried
``Come. You are just in time.'' I put out wide
My arms into the darkness, and I fell.

When I awoke, 'twas as one passed from Hell
Who fears and feels no longer. I was tired.
I scarcely cared to know when I inquired
After the house. The girl who held the glass
To my lips (a flower--girl it seemed she was)
Told me that house and square alike were gone
Swept by new boulevards to oblivion.
Why should I grieve? The new was worth the old.
I listened to the story as 'twas told,
And lingered with her all the evening there
Because she pitied me and she was fair,
And held me with her hand upon the latch.
``Seven years,'' I said, ``it is a long night's watch
For any soul alone upon life's way,
And mine is weary at the break of day.''