O Love, O Wife, thine eyes are they, -- My springs from out whose shining gray Issue the sweet celestial streams That feed my life's bright Lake of Dreams.
Oval and large and passion-pure And gray and wise and honor-sure;Soft as a dying violet-breath Yet calmly unafraid of death;Thronged, like two dove-cotes of gray doves, [41]
With wife's and mother's and poor-folk's loves, And home-loves and high glory-loves And science-loves and story-loves,And loves for all that God and man In art and nature make or plan, And lady-loves for spidery lace And broideries and supple graceAnd diamonds and the whole sweet round Of littles that large life compound, And loves for God and God's bare truth,[51]
And loves for Magdalen and Ruth,Dear eyes, dear eyes and rare complete --Being heavenly-sweet and earthly-sweet, -- I marvel that God made you mine, For when He frowns, 'tis then ye shine!
____
Baltimore, 1874.
Notes: My Springs For my appreciation of this tribute to the poet's wife see `Introduction', p.xxxv [Part III].Mr.Lanier's estimate is given in a letter of March, 1874, quoted in Mrs.Lanier's introductory note:
"Of course, since I have written it to print I cannot make it such as _I_ desire in artistic design: for the forms of to-day require a certain trim smugness and clean-shaven propriety in the face and dress of a poem, and I must win a hearing by conforming in some degree to these tyrannies, with a view to overturning them in the future.Written so, it is not nearly so beautiful as I would have it; and I therefore have another still in my heart, which I will some day write for myself."Other tributes to his wife are: `In Absence', `Acknowledgment', `Laus Mariae', `Special Pleading', `Evening Song', `Thou and I', `One in Two', and `Two in One'; while she is referred to in `The Hard Times in Elfland' and `June Dreams in January'.
It will be interesting to compare `My Springs' with other poems on the eyes.
Among the most noteworthy may be cited Shakespeare's"And those eyes, the break of day, Lights that do mislead the morn;"Lodge's"Her eyes are sapphires set in snow, Resembling heaven by every wink;The Gods do fear whenas they glow, And I do tremble when I think, Heigh ho, would she were mine!"Jonson's"Drink to me only with thine eyes And I will pledge with mine," etc.;Herrick's"Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes Which starlike sparkle in their skies;"Thomas Stanley's"Oh turn away those cruel eyes, The stars of my undoing;Or death in such a bright disguise May tempt a second wooing;"Byron's"She walks in beauty, like the night, Of cloudless climes and starry skies;And all that's best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes;Thus mellowed to that tender light Which heaven to gaudy day denies;"H.Coleridge's"She is not fair to outward view, As many maidens be;Her loveliness I never knew Until she smiled on me.
O then I saw her eye was bright, A well of love, a spring of light.
"But now her looks are coy and cold, To mine they ne'er reply, And yet I cease not to behold The love-light in her eye:
Her very frowns are fairer far Than smiles of other maidens are;"and Wordsworth's"Her eyes are stars of twilight fair."These may be found either in Gosse's `English Lyrics' (D.Appleton & Co., New York) or in Palgrave's `Golden Treasury of Songs and Lyrics'
(Macmillan & Co., New York).
49-50.See `Introduction', p.xlv [Part IV].
52.There is in early English literature a most interesting play entitled `Mary Magdalene': see Pollard's `English Miracle Plays' (New York), where extracts are given.
55-56.See `Introduction', p.xlvi [Part IV].
The Symphony"O Trade! O Trade! would thou wert dead![1]
The Time needs heart -- 'tis tired of head:
We're all for love," the violins said.
"Of what avail the rigorous tale Of bill for coin and box for bale?
Grant thee, O Trade! thine uttermost hope:
Level red gold with blue sky-slope, And base it deep as devils grope:
When all's done, what hast thou won Of the only sweet that's under the sun?
Ay, canst thou buy a single sigh [11]
Of true love's least, least ecstasy?"
Then, with a bridegroom's heart-beats trembling, All the mightier strings assembling Ranged them on the violins' side As when the bridegroom leads the bride, And, heart in voice, together cried:
"Yea, what avail the endless tale Of gain by cunning and plus by sale?
Look up the land, look down the land, The poor, the poor, the poor, they stand [21]
Wedged by the pressing of Trade's hand Against an inward-opening door That pressure tightens evermore:
They sigh a monstrous foul-air sigh For the outside leagues of liberty, Where Art, sweet lark, translates the sky Into a heavenly melody.
`Each day, all day' (these poor folks say), `In the same old year-long, drear-long way, We weave in the mills and heave in the kilns, [31]
We sieve mine-meshes under the hills, And thieve much gold from the Devil's bank tills, To relieve, O God, what manner of ills? --The beasts, they hunger, and eat, and die;And so do we, and the world's a sty;
Hush, fellow-swine: why nuzzle and cry?
"Swinehood hath no remedy"
Say many men, and hasten by, Clamping the nose and blinking the eye.
But who said once, in the lordly tone, [41]
"Man shall not live by bread alone But all that cometh from the Throne?"Hath God said so?
But Trade saith "No":
And the kilns and the curt-tongued mills say "Go:
There's plenty that can, if you can't: we know.
Move out, if you think you're underpaid.
The poor are prolific; we're not afraid;
Trade is trade."'"
Thereat this passionate protesting [51]
Meekly changed, and softened till It sank to sad requesting And suggesting sadder still:
"And oh, if men might some time see How piteous-false the poor decree That trade no more than trade must be!
Does business mean, "Die, you -- live, I"?
Then `Trade is trade' but sings a lie:
'Tis only war grown miserly.
If business is battle, name it so: [61]
War-crimes less will shame it so, And widows less will blame it so.
