Matthew Arnold

The New Sirens

In * the cedar shadow sleeping,  
 Where cool grass and fragrant glooms  
 Oft at noon have lur’d me, creeping  
 From your darken’d palace rooms:  
 I, who in your train at morning           5
 Stroll’d and sang with joyful mind,  
 Heard, at evening, sounds of warning;  
Heard the hoarse boughs labour in the wind.  
 
 Who are they, O pensive Graces,  
 —For I dream’d they wore your forms—           10
 Who on shores and sea-wash’d places  
 Scoop the shelves and fret the storms?  
 Who, when ships are that way tending,  
 Troop across the flushing sands,  
 To all reefs and narrows wending,           15
With blown tresses, and with beckoning hands?  
 
 Yet I see, the howling levels  
 Of the deep are not your lair;  
 And your tragic-vaunted revels  
 Are less lonely than they were.           20
 In a Tyrian galley steering  
 From the golden springs of dawn,  
 Troops, like Eastern kings, appearing,  
Stream all day through your enchanted lawn.  
 
 And we too, from upland valleys,           25
 Where some Muse, with half-curv’d frown,  
 Leans her ear to your mad sallies  
 Which the charm’d winds never drown;  
 By faint music guided, ranging  
 The scar’d glens, we wander’d on:           30
 Left our awful laurels hanging,  
And came heap’d with myrtles to your throne.  
 
 From the dragon-warder’d fountains  
 Where the springs of knowledge are:  
 From the watchers on the mountains,           35
 And the bright and morning star:  
 We are exiles, we are falling,  
 We have lost them at your call.  
 O ye false ones, at your calling  
Seeking ceilèd chambers and a palace hall.           40
 
 Are the accents of your luring  
 More melodious than of yore?  
 Are those frail forms more enduring  
 Than the charms Ulysses bore?  
 That we sought you with rejoicings           45
 Till at evening we descry  
 At a pause of Siren voicings  
These vext branches and this howling sky?  
 
 Oh! your pardon. The uncouthness  
 Of that primal age is gone:           50
 And the skin of dazzling smoothness  
 Screens not now a heart of stone.  
 Love has flush’d those cruel faces;  
 And your slacken’d arms forego  
 The delight of fierce embraces:           55
And those whitening bone-mounds do not grow.  
 
 ‘Come,’ you say; ‘the large appearance  
 Of man’s labour is but vain:  
 And we plead as firm adherence  
 Due to pleasure as to pain.’           60
 Pointing to some world-worn creatures,  
 ‘Come,’ you murmur with a sigh:  
 ‘Ah! we own diviner features,  
Loftier bearing, and a prouder eye.  
 
 ‘Come,’ you say, ‘the hours are dreary:           65
 Life is long, and will not fade:  
 Time is lame, and we grow weary  
 In this slumbrous cedarn shade.  
 Round our hearts, with long caresses,  
 With low sighs hath Silence stole;           70
 And her load of steaming tresses  
Weighs, like Ossa, on the aery soul.  
 
 ‘Come,’ you say, ‘the Soul is fainting  
 Till she search, and learn her own:  
 And the wisdom of man’s painting           75
 Leaves her riddle half unknown.  
 Come,’ you say, ‘the brain is seeking,  
 When the princely heart is dead:  
 Yet this glean’d, when Gods were speaking,  
Rarer secrets than the toiling head.           80
 
 ‘Come,’ you say, ‘opinion trembles,  
 Judgement shifts, convictions go:  
 Life dries up, the heart dissembles:  
 Only, what we feel, we know.  
 Hath your wisdom known emotions?           85
 Will it weep our burning tears?  
 Hath it drunk of our love-potions  
Crowning moments with the weight of years?’  
 
 I am dumb. Alas! too soon, all  
 Man’s grave reasons disappear:           90
 Yet, I think, at God’s tribunal  
 Some large answer you shall hear.  
 But for me, my thoughts are straying  
 Where at sunrise, through the vines,  
 On these lawns I saw you playing,           95
Hanging garlands on the odorous pines.  
 
 When your showering locks enwound you,  
 And your heavenly eyes shone through:  
 When the pine-boughs yielded round you,  
 And your brows were starr’d with dew:           100
 And immortal forms to meet you  
 Down the statued alleys came:  
 And through golden horns, to greet you,  
Blew such music as a God may frame.  
 
 Yes—I muse:—And, if the dawning           105
 Into daylight never grew—  
 If the glistering wings of morning  
 On the dry noon shook their dew—  
 If the fits of joy were longer—  
 Or the day were sooner done—           110
 Or, perhaps, if Hope were stronger—  
No weak nursling of an earthly sun …  
   Pluck, pluck cypress, O pale maidens,  
       Dusk the hall with yew!  
 
 But a bound was set to meetings,           115
 And the sombre day dragg’d on:  
 And the burst of joyful greetings,  
 And the joyful dawn, were gone:  
 For the eye was fill’d with gazing,  
 And on raptures follow calms:—           120
 And those warm locks men were praising  
Droop’d, unbraided, on your listless arms.  
 
 Storms unsmooth’d your folded valleys,  
 And made all your cedars frown;  
 Leaves are whirling in the alleys           125
 Which your lovers wander’d down.  
 —Sitting cheerless in your bowers,  
 The hands propping the sunk head,  
 Do they gall you, the long hours?  
And the hungry thought, that must be fed?           130
 
 Is the pleasure that is tasted  
 Patient of a long review?  
 Will the fire joy hath wasted,  
 Mus’d on, warm the heart anew?  
 —Or, are those old thoughts returning,           135
 Guests the dull sense never knew,  
 Stars, set deep, yet inly burning,  
Germs, your untrimm’d Passion overgrew?  
 
 Once, like me, you took your station  
 Watchers for a purer fire:           140
 But you droop’d in expectation,  
 And you wearied in desire.  
 When the first rose flush was steeping  
 All the frore peak’s awful crown,  
 Shepherds say, they found you sleeping           145
In a windless valley, further down.  
 
 Then you wept, and slowly raising  
 Your doz’d eyelids, sought again,  
 Half in doubt, they say, and gazing  
 Sadly back, the seats of men.           150
 Snatch’d an earthly inspiration  
 From some transient human Sun,  
 And proclaim’d your vain ovation  
For the mimic raptures you had won.  
   Pluck, pluck cypress, O pale maidens,           155
       Dusk the hall with yew!  
 
 With a sad, majestic motion—  
 With a stately, slow surprise—  
 From their earthward-bound devotion  
 Lifting up your languid eyes:           160
 Would you freeze my louder boldness  
 Dumbly smiling as you go?  
 One faint frown of distant coldness  
Flitting fast across each marble brow?  
 
 Do I brighten at your sorrow           165
 O sweet Pleaders? doth my lot  
 Find assurance in to-morrow  
 Of one joy, which you have not?  
 O speak once! and let my sadness,  
 And this sobbing Phrygian strain,           170
 Sham’d and baffled by your gladness,  
Blame the music of your feasts in vain.  
 
 Scent, and song, and light, and flowers—  
 Gust on gust, the hoarse winds blow.  
 Come, bind up those ringlet showers!           175
 Roses for that dreaming brow!  
 Come, once more that ancient lightness,  
 Glancing feet, and eager eyes!  
 Let your broad lamps flash the brightness  
Which the sorrow-stricken day denies!           180
 
 Through black depths of serried shadows,  
 Up cold aisles of buried glade;  
 In the mist of river meadows  
 Where the looming kine are laid;  
 From your dazzled windows streaming,           185
 From the humming festal room,  
 Deep and far, a broken gleaming  
Reels and shivers on the ruffled gloom.  
 
 Where I stand, the grass is glowing:  
 Doubtless, you are passing fair:           190
 But I hear the north wind blowing;  
 And I feel the cold night-air.  
 Can I look on your sweet faces,  
 And your proud heads backward thrown,  
 From this dusk of leaf-strewn places           195
With the dumb woods and the night alone?  
 
 But, indeed, this flux of guesses—  
 Mad delight, and frozen calms—  
 Mirth to-day and vine-bound tresses,  
 And to-morrow—folded palms—           200
 Is this all? this balanc’d measure?  
 Could life run no easier way?  
 Happy at the noon of pleasure,  
Passive, at the midnight of dismay?  
 
 But, indeed, this proud possession—           205
 This far-reaching magic chain,  
 Linking in a mad succession  
 Fits of joy and fits of pain:  
 Have you seen it at the closing?  
 Have you track’d its clouded ways?           210
 Can your eyes, while fools are dozing,  
Drop, with mine, adown life’s latter days?  
 
 When a dreary light is wading  
 Through this waste of sunless greens—  
 When the flashing lights are fading           215
 On the peerless cheek of queens—  
 When the mean shall no more sorrow  
 And the proudest no more smile—  
 While the dawning of the morrow  
Widens slowly westward all that while?           220
 
 Then, when change itself is over,  
 When the slow tide sets one way,  
 Shall you find the radiant lover,  
 Even by moments, of to-day?  
 The eye wanders, faith is failing:           225
 O, loose hands, and let it be!  
 Proudly, like a king bewailing,  
O, let fall one tear, and set us free!  
 
 All true speech and large avowal  
 Which the jealous soul concedes:           230
 All man’s heart—which brooks bestowal:  
 All frank faith—which passion breeds:  
 These we had, and we gave truly:  
 Doubt not, what we had, we gave:  
 False we were not, nor unruly:           235
Lodgers in the forest and the cave.  
 
 Long we wander’d with you, feeding  
 Our sad souls on your replies:  
 In a wistful silence reading  
 All the meaning of your eyes:           240
 By moss-border’d statues sitting,  
 By well-heads, in summer days.  
 But we turn, our eyes are flitting.  
See, the white east, and the morning rays!  
 
 And you too, O weeping Graces,           245
 Sylvan Gods of this fair shade!  
 Is there doubt on divine faces?  
 Are the happy Gods dismay’d?  
 Can men worship the wan features,  
 The sunk eyes, the wailing tone,           250
 Of unspher’d discrowned creatures,  
Souls as little godlike as their own?  
 
 Come, loose hands! The wingèd fleetness  
 Of immortal feet is gone.  
 And your scents have shed their sweetness,           255
 And your flowers are overblown.  
 And your jewell’d gauds surrender  
 Half their glories to the day:  
 Freely did they flash their splendour,  
Freely gave it—but it dies away.           260
 
 In the pines the thrush is waking—  
 Lo, yon orient hill in flames:  
 Scores of true love knots are breaking  
 At divorce which it proclaims.  
 When the lamps are pal’d at morning,           265
 Heart quits heart, and hand quits hand.  
 —Cold in that unlovely dawning,  
Loveless, rayless, joyless you shall stand.  
 
 Strew no more red roses, maidens,  
 Leave the lilies in their dew:           270
 Pluck, pluck cypress, O pale maidens!  
 Dusk, O dusk the hall with yew!  
 —Shall I seek, that I may scorn her,  
 Her I lov’d at eventide?  
 Shall I ask, what faded mourner           275
Stands, at daybreak, weeping by my side?  
   Pluck, pluck cypress, O pale maidens!  
       Dusk the hall with yew!

* In 1869 Arnold writes: ‘Swinburne writes to urge me to reprint the “New Sirens”, but I think that had better wait for a posthumous collection.’ He relented, however, and reprinted the poem in Macmillan’s Magazine for Dec. 1876 with a note giving Swinburne’s repeated requests as the main reason for republication ‘after a disappearance of more than twenty-five years’.

#EnglishWriters

Autres oeuvres par Matthew Arnold...



Haut