Poems of Paul Verlaine

     I've seen again the One child: verily,
     I felt the last wound open in my breast,
     The last, whose perfect torture doth attest
     That on some happy day I too shall die!

     Good icy arrow, piercing thoroughly!
     Most timely came it from their dreams to wrest
     The sluggish scruples laid too long to rest,—
     And all my Christian blood hymned fervently.

     I still hear, still I see! O worshipped rule
     Of God! I know at last how comfortful
     To hear and see! I see, I hear alway!

     O innocence, O hope! Lowly and mild,
     How I shall love you, sweet hands of my child,
     Whose task shall be to close our eyes one day!

  "SON, THOU MUST LOVE ME! SEE—" MY SAVIOUR SAID

     "Son, thou must love me! See—" my Saviour said,
     "My heart that glows and bleeds, my wounded side,
     My hurt feet that the Magdalene, wet-eyed,
     Clasps kneeling, and my tortured arms outspread

     "To bear thy sins. Look on the cross, stained red!
     The nails, the sponge, that, all, thy soul shall guide
     To love on earth where flesh thrones in its pride,
     My Body and Blood alone, thy Wine and Bread.

     "Have I not loved thee even unto death,
     O brother mine, son in the Holy Ghost?
     Have I not suffered, as was writ I must,

     "And with thine agony sobbed out my breath?
     Hath not thy nightly sweat bedewed my brow,
     O lamentable friend that seek'st me now?"

  HOPE SHINES—AS IN A STABLE A WISP OF STRAW

     Hope shines—as in a stable a wisp of straw.
     Fear not the wasp drunk with his crazy flight!
     Through some chink always, see, the moted light!
     Propped on your hand, you dozed—But let me draw

     Cool water from the well for you, at least,
     Poor soul! There, drink! Then sleep. See, I remain,
     And I will sing a slumberous refrain,
     And you shall murmur like a child appeased.

     Noon strikes. Approach not, Madam, pray, or call....
     He sleeps. Strange how a woman's light footfall
     Re-echoes through the brains of grief-worn men!

     Noon strikes. I bade them sprinkle in the room.
     Sleep on! Hope shines—a pebble in the gloom.
     —When shall the Autumn rose re-blossom,—when?

     Sleep, darksome, deep,
        Doth on me fall:
     Vain hopes all, sleep,
        Sleep, yearnings all!

     Lo, I grow blind!
        Lo, right and wrong
     Fade to my mind....
        O sorry song!

     A cradle, I,
        Rocked in a grave:
     Speak low, pass by,
        Silence I crave!

     The sky-blue smiles above the roof
            Its tenderest;
     A green tree rears above the roof
            Its waving crest.

     The church-bell in the windless sky
            Peaceably rings,
     A skylark soaring in the sky
            Endlessly sings.

     My God, my God, all life is there,
            Simple and sweet;
     The soothing bee-hive murmur there
            Comes from the street!

     What have you done, O you that weep
            In the glad sun,—
     Say, with your youth, you man that weep,
            What have you done?

  IT IS YOU

     It is you, it is you, poor better thoughts!
     The needful hope, shame for the ancient blots,
     Heart's gentleness with mind's severity,
     And vigilance, and calm, and constancy,
     And all!—But slow as yet, though well awake;
     Though sturdy, shy; scarce able yet to break
     The spell of stifling night and heavy dreams.
     One comes after the other, and each seems
     Uncouther, and all fear the moonlight cold.
     "Thus, sheep when first they issue from the fold,
     Come,—one, then two, then three. The rest delay,
     With lowered heads, in stupid, wondering way,
     Waiting to do as does the one that leads.
     He stops, they stop in turn, and lay their heads
     Across his back, simply, not knowing why."*
     Your shepherd, O my fair flock, is not I,—
     It is a better, better far, who knows
     The reasons, He that so long kept you close,
     But timely with His own hand set you free.
     Him follow,—light His staff. And I shall be,
     Beneath his voice still raised to comfort you,
     I shall be, I, His faithful dog, and true.

                * Dante, Purgatorio.

  'TIS THE FEAST OF CORN

     'Tis the feast of corn, 'tis the feast of bread,
        On the dear scene returned to, witnessed again!
     So white is the light o'er the reapers shed
        Their shadows fall pink on the level grain.

     The stalked gold drops to the whistling flight
        Of the scythes, whose lightning dives deep, leaps clear;
     The plain, labor-strewn to the confines of sight,
        Changes face at each instant, gay and severe.

     All pants, all is effort and toil 'neath the sun,
        The stolid old sun, tranquil ripener of wheat,
     Who works o'er our haste imperturbably on
        To swell the green grape yon, turning it sweet.

     Work on, faithful sun, for the bread and the wine,
        Feed man with the milk of the earth, and bestow
     The frank glass wherein unconcern laughs divine,—
        Ye harvesters, vintagers, work on, aglow!

     For from the flour's fairest, and from the vine's best,
        Fruit of man's strength spread to earth's uttermost,
     God gathers and reaps, to His purposes blest,
        The Flesh and the Blood for the chalice and host!

     Off, be off, now, graceless pack:
     Get you gone, lost children mine:
     Your release is earned in fine:
     The Chimaera lends her back.

     Huddling on her, go, God-sped,
     As a dream-horde crowds and cowers
     Mid the shadowy curtain-flowers
     Round a sick man's haunted bed.

     Hold! My hand, unfit before,
     Feeble still, but feverless,
     And which palpitates no more
     Save with a desire to bless,

     Blesses you, O little flies
     Of my black suns and white nights.
     Spread your rustling wings, arise,
     Little griefs, little delights,

     Hopes, despairs, dreams foul and fair,
     All!—renounced since yesterday
     By my heart that quests elsewhere....
     Ite, aegri somnia!

     I am the Empire in the last of its decline,
     That sees the tall, fair-haired Barbarians pass,—the while
     Composing indolent acrostics, in a style
     Of gold, with languid sunshine dancing in each line.

     The solitary soul is heart-sick with a vile
     Ennui. Down yon, they say, War's torches bloody shine.
     Alas, to be so faint of will, one must resign
     The chance of brave adventure in the splendid file,—

     Of death, perchance! Alas, so lagging in desire!
     Ah, all is drunk! Bathyllus, hast done laughing, pray?
     Ah, all is drunk,—all eaten! Nothing more to say!

     Alone, a vapid verse one tosses in the fire;
     Alone, a somewhat thievish slave neglecting one;
     Alone, a vague disgust of all beneath the sun!

     Glimm'ring twilight things are these,
     Visions of the end of night.
     Truth, thou lightest them, I wis,
     Only with a distant light,

     Whitening through the hated shade
     In such grudging dim degrees,
     One must doubt if they be made
     By the moon among the trees,

     Or if these uncertain ghosts
     Shall take body bye and bye,
     And uniting with the hosts
     Tented by the azure sky,

     Framed by Nature's setting meet,—
     Offer up in one accord
     From the heart's ecstatic heat,
     Incense to the living Lord!

     Dame mouse patters
     Black against the shadow grey;
          Dame mouse patters
          Grey against the black.

          Hear the bed-time bell!
     Sleep forthwith, good prisoners;
          Hear the bed-time bell!
          You must go to sleep.

          No disturbing dream!
     Think of nothing but your loves:
          No disturbing dream,
          Of the fair ones think!

          Moonlight clear and bright!
     Some one of the neighbors snores;
          Moonlight clear and bright—
          He is troublesome.

          Comes a pitchy cloud
     Creeping o'er the faded moon;
          Comes a pitchy cloud—
          See the grey dawn creep!

          Dame mouse patters
     Pink across an azure ray;
          Dame mouse patters....
          Sluggards, up! 'tis day!

     The Sages of old time, well worth our own,
     Believed—and it has been disproved by none—
     That destinies in Heaven written are,
     And every soul depends upon a star.
     (Many have mocked, without remembering
     That laughter oft is a misguiding thing,
     This explanation of night's mystery.)
     Now all that born beneath Saturnus be,—
     Red planet, to the necromancer dear,—
     Inherit, ancient magic-books make clear,
     Good share of spleen, good share of wretchedness.
     Imagination, wakeful, vigorless,
     In them makes the resolves of reason vain.
     The blood within them, subtle as a bane,
     Burning as lava, scarce, flows ever fraught
     With sad ideals that ever come to naught.
     Such must Saturnians suffer, such must die,—
     If so that death destruction doth imply,—
     Their lives being ordered in this dismal sense
     By logic of a malign Influence.

     Remembrance, what wilt thou with me? The year
     Declined; in the still air the thrush piped clear,
     The languid sunshine did incurious peer
     Among the thinned leaves of the forest sere.

     We were alone, and pensively we strolled,
     With straying locks and fancies, when, behold
     Her turn to let her thrilling gaze enfold,
     And ask me in her voice of living gold,

     Her fresh young voice, "What was thy happiest day?"
     I smiled discreetly for all answer, and
     Devotedly I kissed her fair white hand.

     —Ah, me! The earliest flowers, how sweet are they!
     And in how exquisite a whisper slips
     The earliest "Yes" from well-beloved lips!

  APRÈS TROIS ANS

     When I had pushed the narrow garden-door,
     Once more I stood within the green retreat;
     Softly the morning sunshine lighted it,
     And every flow'r a humid spangle wore.

     Nothing is changed. I see it all once more:
     The vine-clad arbor with its rustic seat....
     The waterjet still plashes silver sweet,
     The ancient aspen rustles as of yore.

     The roses throb as in a bygone day,
     As they were wont, the tall proud lilies sway.
     Each bird that lights and twitters is a friend.

     I even found the Flora standing yet,
     Whose plaster crumbles at the alley's end,
     —Slim, 'mid the foolish scent of mignonette.

  MON RÊVE FAMILIER

     Oft do I dream this strange and penetrating dream:
     An unknown woman, whom I love, who loves me well,
     Who does not every time quite change, nor yet quite dwell
     The same,—and loves me well, and knows me as I am.

     For she knows me! My heart, clear as a crystal beam
     To her alone, ceases to be inscrutable
     To her alone, and she alone knows to dispel
     My grief, cooling my brow with her tears' gentle stream.

     Is she of favor dark or fair?—I do not know.
     Her name? All I remember is that it doth flow
     Softly, as do the names of them we loved and lost.

     Her eyes are like the statues',—mild and grave and wide;
     And for her voice she has as if it were the ghost
     Of other voices,—well-loved voices that have died.

  A UNE FEMME

     To you these lines for the consoling grace
     Of your great eyes wherein a soft dream shines,
     For your pure soul, all-kind!—to you these lines
     From the black deeps of mine unmatched distress.

     'Tis that the hideous dream that doth oppress
     My soul, alas! its sad prey ne'er resigns,
     But like a pack of wolves down mad inclines
     Goes gathering heat upon my reddened trace!

     I suffer, oh, I suffer cruelly!
     So that the first man's cry at Eden lost
     Was but an eclogue surely to my cry!

     And that the sorrows, Dear, that may have crossed
     Your life, are but as swallows light that fly
     —Dear!—in a golden warm September sky.

     Leaf-strewing gales
     Utter low wails
          Like violins,—
     Till on my soul
     Their creeping dole
          Stealthily wins....

     Days long gone by!
     In such hour, I,
          Choking and pale,
     Call you to mind,—
     Then like the wind
          Weep I and wail.

     And, as by wind
     Harsh and unkind,
          Driven by grief,
     Go I, here, there,
     Recking not where,
          Like the dead leaf.

  LE ROSSIGNOL

     Like to a swarm of birds, with jarring cries
     Descend on me my swarming memories;
     Light mid the yellow leaves, that shake and sigh,
     Of the bowed alder—that is even I!—
     Brooding its shadow in the violet
     Unprofitable river of Regret.
     They settle screaming—Then the evil sound,
     By the moist wind's impatient hushing drowned,
     Dies by degrees, till nothing more is heard
     Save the lone singing of a single bird,
     Save the clear voice—O singer, sweetly done!—
     Warbling the praises of the Absent One....
     And in the silence of a summer night
     Sultry and splendid, by a late moon's light
     That sad and sallow peers above the hill,
     The humid hushing wind that ranges still
     Rocks to a whispered sleepsong languidly
     The bird lamenting and the shivering tree.

  Caprices

     Kiss! Hollyhock in Love's luxuriant close!
        Brisk music played on pearly little keys,
        In tempo with the witching melodies
     Love in the ardent heart repeating goes.

     Sonorous, graceful Kiss, hail! Kiss divine!
        Unequalled boon, unutterable bliss!
        Man, bent o'er thine enthralling chalice, Kiss,
     Grows drunken with a rapture only thine!

     Thou comfortest as music does, and wine,
        And grief dies smothered in thy purple fold.
        Let one greater than I, Kiss, and more bold,
     Rear thee a classic, monumental line.

     Humble Parisian bard, this infantile
        Bouquet of rhymes I tender half in fear....
        Be gracious, and in guerdon, on the dear
     Red lips of One I know, alight and smile!

                         I
     The sun, less hot, looks from a sky more clear;
     The roses in their sleepy loveliness
     Nod to the cradling wind. The atmosphere
     Enfolds us with a sister's tenderness.

     For once hath Nature left the splendid throne
     Of her indifference, and through the mild
     Sun-gilded air of Autumn, clement grown,
     Descends to man, her proud, revolted child.

     She takes, to wipe the tears upon our face,
     Her azure mantle sown with many a star;
     And her eternal soul, her deathless grace,
     Strengthen and calm the weak heart that we are.

     The waving of the boughs, the lengthened line
     Of the horizon, full of dreamy hues
     And scattered songs, all,—sing it, sail, or shine!—
     To-day consoles, delivers!—Let us muse.

                    II
     So, then this book is closed. Dear Fancies mine,
     That streaked my grey sky with your wings of light,
     And passing fanned my burning brow, benign,—
     Return, return to your blue Infinite!

     Thou, ringing Rhyme, thou, Verse that smooth didst glide,
     Ye, throbbing Rhythms, ye, musical Refrains,
     And Memories, and Dreams, and ye beside
     Fair Figures called to life with anxious pains,

     We needs must part. Until the happier day
     When Art, our Lord, his thralls shall re-unite,
     Companions sweet, Farewell and Wellaway,
     Fly home, ye may, to your blue Infinite!

     And true it is, we spared not breath or force,
     And our good pleasure, like foaming steed
     Blind with the madness of his earliest course,
     Of rest within the quiet shade hath need.

     —For always have we held thee, Poesy,
     To be our Goddess, mighty and august,
     Our only passion,—Mother calling thee,
     And holding Inspiration in mistrust.

                      III
     Ah, Inspiration, splendid, dominant,
     Egeria with the lightsome eyes profound,
     Sudden Erato, Genius quick to grant,
     Old picture Angel of the gilt background,

     Muse,—ay, whose voice is powerful indeed,
     Since in the first come brain it makes to grow
     Thick as some dusty yellow roadside weed,
     A gardenful of poems none did sow,—

     Dove, Holy Ghost, Delirium, Sacred Fire,
     Transporting Passion,—seasonable queen!—
     Gabriel and lute, Latona's son and lyre,—
     Ah, Inspiration, summoned at sixteen!

     What we have need of, we, the Poets True,
     That not believe in Gods, and yet revere,
     That have no halo, hold no golden clue,
     For whom no Beatrix leaves her radiant sphere,

     We, that do chisel words like chalices,
     And moving verses shape with unmoved mind,
     Whom wandering in groups by evening seas,
     In musical converse ye scarce shall find,—

     What we need is, in midnight hours dim-lit,
     Sleep daunted, knowledge earned,—more knowledge still!
     Is Faust's brow, of the wood-cuts, sternly knit,
     Is stubborn Perseverance, and is Will!

     Is Will eternal, holy, absolute,
     That grasps—as doth a noble bird of prey
     The steaming flanks of the foredoomed brute,—
     Its project, and with it,—skyward, away!

     What we need, we, is fixedness intense,
     Unequalled effort, strife that shall not cease,
     Is night, the bitter night of labor, whence
     Arises, sun-like, slow, the Master-piece!

     Let our Inspired, hearts by an eye-shot tined,
     Sway with the birch-tree to all winds that blow,
     Poor things! Art knows not the divided mind—
     Speak, Milo's Venus, is she stone or no?

     We therefore, carve we with the chisel Thought
     The pure block of the Beautiful, and gain
     From out the marble cold where it was not,
     Some starry-chitoned statue without stain,

     That one far day, Posterity, new Morn,
     Enkindling with a golden-rosy flame
     Our Work, new Memnon, shall to ears unborn
     Make quiver in the singing air our name!