TO THE OLYMPIAN HERMES
Now let the formal, folded curtain fall
Over this majesty of mellowed stone.
Let me go forth with eyes alight with joy
From this god-gazing. Let me not pause nor stay
Till by some clear word I have given faith
To doubting minds, how Greeks ennobled form
And carved high meaning in a body’s truth.
Yet, Hermes, fair god, consciously the flower
Of the Greek dream, sculptured so lofty-kind,
Stainlessly physical, superbly true;—
Who is to tell thee that thou hast one fleck
On that pure manliness, and dare to speak
Something against thy calm that seems to say,
“Earth has no greater gift than perfect limbs,
And god-like manhood’s straight significance”?
Forgive me, Hermes, I had thought to take
Thy princely healthiness to ailing worlds;
To meanness and to littleness and lust,
Bidding them gaze upon thee in thy calm,
Telling them: “This is all. This Hermes stands
For Greek expression of a definite truth
Speaking its message to the world of men
And placing beauty as a final goal.”
But then I pondered: What will be the gain
If men say: “Hermes is very kind and fair,
Wholesome and generous and unafraid
And—soulless! Let be! we’ll no longer hope
For strength more than the body—loftier calm
Than this superb control of manly limbs,
Friendly with sun and rock, and sea, and life.
Now yield we up that old, defeated claim
Of soul, the ugly, hunted, harried thing,
And trust us to a pagan manliness,
Stand Hermes-like, unpuzzled, unamazed!”
I knew, oh Hermes! Greek perfection, lit
Like stately lamp with one clear, shining joy,
That of well-being, I knew life ended not
With just the beauty of a human form;
Marble, translated into mystery
Must needs have line to make it fair and right;
And that is all.... Thy unknown sculptor knew
The pagan mind and set thy godhood high,
In an unsullied semblance of a man
Untouched by sorrow, poverty, and shame.
Immortal semblance—then the cleavage comes!
Real men must live (we mortals know the fight),
Hot-blooded, passionate, forlorn, astray;
We know how men determine to be true
To some one Greatness,—struggle to the test
Baffled and crucified;—in bitter shame
Leaving the unsolved meaning of their lives.
And now we know, by those French faces torn
To rags, around the dumbly loyal eyes;
By English soldiers, done to crippled wrecks
And hideous mangling, how men dare to die,
Or live their silent, agonizing days.
And then we know there is a human thing
Transcending any body—called a Soul!
Yea, let the formal, folded curtain fall
O’er all that graciousness of mellowed stone.
The Pagan knew the beauty of the flesh.
We, Modern, view that beauty with resolve
Firm and unswerving that it be outdone,
Firm that all ugly, bruised, and broken things
Shall stand invested with a deathless pride
Before our eyes—that see them beautiful;
Determined that the perfect ones approach
Humbly with sense of some imperfectness,
And kneel in homage to the shattered brave.