Merlin (Robinson)/Canto 4
IV
The tortured King—seeing Merlin wholly meshedIn his defection, even to indifference,And all the while attended and exaltedBy some unfathomable obscurityOf divination, where the Grail, unseen,Broke yet the darkness where a king saw nothing—Feared now the lady Vivian more than Fate;For now he knew that Modred, Lancelot,The Queen, the King, the Kingdom, and the World,Were less to Merlin, who had made him King, Than one small woman in Broceliande.Whereas the lady Vivian, seeing MerlinAcclaimed and tempted and allured againTo service in his old magnificence,Feared now King Arthur more than storms and robbers;For Merlin, though he knew himself immuneTo no least whispered little wish of hersThat might afflict his ear with ecstasy,Had yet sufficient of his old commandOf all around him to invest an eyeWith quiet lightning, and a spoken wordWith easy thunder, so accomplishingA profit and a pastime for himself—And for the lady Vivian, when her guileOutlived at intervals her graciousness;And this equipment of uncertainty, Which now had gone away with him to BritainWith Dagonet, so plagued her memoryThat soon a phantom brood of goblin doubtsInhabited his absence, which had elseBeen empty waiting and a few brave fears,And a few more, she knew, that were not brave,Or long to be disowned, or manageable.She thought of him as he had looked at herWhen first he had acquainted her alarmAt sight of the King's letter with its import;And she remembered now his very words:"The King believes today as in his boyhoodThat I am Fate," he said; and when they partedShe had not even asked him not to go;She might as well, she thought, have bid the windThrow no more clouds across a lonely skyBetween her and the moon,—so great he seemed In his oppressed solemnity, and she,In her excess of wrong imagining,So trivial in an hour, and, after allA creature of a smaller consequenceThan kings to Merlin, who made kings and kingdomsAnd had them as a father; and so she fearedKing Arthur more than robbers while she waitedFor Merlin's promise to fulfil itself,And for the rest that was to follow after:"He said he would come back, and so he will.He will because he must, and he is Merlin,The master of the world—or so he was;And he is coming back again to meBecause he must and I am Vivian.It's all as easy as two added numbers:Some day I'll hear him ringing at the gate,As he rang on that morning in the spring, Ten years ago; and I shall have him thenFor ever. He shall never go awayThough kings come walking on their hands and kneesTo take him on their backs." When Merlin came,She told him that, and laughed; and he said strangely:"Be glad or sorry, but no kings are coming.Not Arthur, surely; for now Arthur knowsThat I am less than Fate."
Ten years agoThe King had heard, with unbelieving earsAt first, what Merlin said would be the lastReiteration of his going downTo find a living grave in Brittany:"Buried alive I told you I should be,By love made little and by woman shorn,Like Samson, of my glory; and the time Is now at hand. I follow in the morningWhere I am led. I see behind me nowThe last of crossways, and I see before meA straight and final highway to the endOf all my divination. You are King,And in your kingdom I am what I was.Wherever I have warned you, see as farAs I have seen; for I have shown the worstThere is to see. Require no more of me,For I can be no more than what I was."So, on the morrow, the King said farewell;And he was never more to Merlin's eyeThe King than at that hour; for Merlin knewHow much was going out of Arthur's lifeWith him, as he went southward to the sea.
Over the waves and into Brittany Went Merlin, to Broceliande. Gay birdsWere singing high to greet him all alongA broad and sanded woodland avenueThat led him on forever, so he thought,Until at last there was an end of it;And at the end there was a gate of iron,Wrought heavily and invidiously barred.He pulled a cord that rang somewhere a bellOf many echoes, and sat down to rest,Outside the keeper's house, upon a benchOf carven stone that might for centuriesHave waited there in silence to receive him.The birds were singing still; leaves flashed and swungBefore him in the sunlight; a soft breezeMade intermittent whisperings around himOf love and fate and danger, and faint wavesOf many sweetly-stinging fragile odors Broke lightly as they touched him; cherry-boughsAbove him snowed white petals down upon him,And under their slow falling Merlin smiledContentedly, as one who contemplatesNo longer fear, confusion, or regret,May smile at ruin or at revelation.
A stately fellow with a forest airNow hailed him from within, with searching wordsAnd curious looks, till Merlin's glowing eyeTransfixed him and he flinched: "My complimentsAnd homage to the lady Vivian.Say Merlin from King Arthur's Court is here,A pilgrim and a stranger in appearance,Though in effect her friend and humble servant.Convey to her my speech as I have said it,Without abbreviation or delay, And so deserve my gratitude forever.""But Merlin?" the man stammered; "Merlin? Merlin?"—"One Merlin is enough. I know no other.Now go you to the lady VivianAnd bring to me her word, for I am weary.'Still smiling at the cherry-blossoms fallingDown on him and around him in the sunlight,He waited, never moving, never glancingThis way or that, until his messengerCame jingling into vision, weighed with keys,And inly shaken with much wonderingAt this great wizard's coming unannouncedAnd unattended. When the way was openThe stately messenger, now bowing lowIn reverence and awe, bade Merlin enter;And Merlin, having entered, heard the gate Clang back behind him; and he swore no gateLike that had ever clanged in Camelot,Or any other place if not in hell."I may be dead; and this good fellow here,With all his keys," he thought, "may be the Devil,—Though I were loath to say so, for the keysWould make him rather more akin to Peter;And that's fair reasoning for this fair weather."
"The lady Vivian says you are most welcome,"Said now the stately-favored servitor,"And are to follow me. She said, 'Say Merlin—A pilgrim and a stranger in appearance,Though in effect my friend and humble servant—Is welcome for himself, and for the soundOf his great name that echoes everywhere.'"—"I like you and I like your memory," Said Merlin, curiously, "but not your gate.Why forge for this elysian wildernessA thing so vicious with unholy noise?"—"There's a way out of every wildernessFor those who dare or care enough to find it,"The guide said: and they moved along together,Down shaded ways, through open ways with hedgerows.And into shade again more deep than ever,But edged anon with rays of broken sunshineIn which a fountain, raining crystal music,Made faery magic of it through green leafage,Till Merlin's eyes were dim with preparationFor sight now of the lady Vivian.He saw at first a bit of living greenThat might have been a part of all the greenAround the tinkling fountain where she gazedUpon the circling pool as if her thoughts Were not so much on Merlin—whose advanceBetrayed through his enormity of hairThe cheeks and eyes of youth—as on the fishes.But soon she turned and found him, now alone,And held him while her beauty and her graceMade passing trash of empires, and his eyesTold hers of what a splendid emptinessHer tedious world had been without him in itWhose love and service were to be her school,Her triumph, and her history: "This is Merlin,"She thought; "and I shall dream of him no more.And he has come, he thinks, to frighten meWith beards and robes and his immortal fame;Or is it I who think so? I know not.I'm frightened, sure enough, but if I show it,I'll be no more the Vivian for whose loveHe tossed away his glory, or the Vivian Who saw no man alive to make her love himTill she saw Merlin once in Camelot,And seeing him, saw no other. In an ageThat has no plan for me that I can readWithout him, shall he tell me what I am,And why I am, I wonder?" While she thought,And feared the man whom her perverse negationMust overcome somehow to soothe her fancy,She smiled and welcomed him; and so they stood,Each finding in the other's eyes a gleamOf what eternity had hidden there.
"Are you always all in green, as you are now?"Said Merlin, more employed with her complexion,Where blood and olive made wild harmonyWith eyes and wayward hair that were too darkFor peace if they were not subordinated; "If so you are, then so you make yourselfA danger in a world of many dangers.If I were young, God knows if I were safeConcerning you in green, like a slim cedar,As you are now, to say my life was mine:Were you to say to me that I should end it,Longevity for me were jeopardized.Have you your green on always and all over?"
"Come here, and I will tell you about that,"Said Vivian, leading Merlin with a laughTo an arbored seat where they made opposites:"If you are Merlin—and I know you are,For I remember you in Camelot,—You know that I am Vivian, as I am;And if I go in green, why, let me go so,And say at once why you have come to me Cloaked over like a monk, and with a beardAs long as Jeremiah's. I don't like it.I'll never like a man with hair like thatWhile I can feed a carp with little frogs.I'm rather sure to hate you if you keep it,And when I hate a man I poison him."
"You've never fed a carp with little frogs,"Said Merlin; "I can see it in your eyes."—"I might then, if I haven't," said the lady;"For I'm a savage, and I love no manAs I have seen him yet. I'm here alone,With some three hundred others, all of whomAre ready, I dare say, to die for me;I'm cruel and I'm cold, and I like snakes;And some have said my mother was a fairy,Though I believe it not."
"Why not believe it?"Said Merlin; "I believe it. I believeAlso that you divine, as I had wished,In my surviving ornament of officeA needless imposition on your wits,If not yet on the scope of your regard.Even so, you cannot say how old I am,Or yet how young. I'm willing cheerfullyTo fight, left-handed, Hell's three headed houndIf you but whistle him up from where he lives;I'm cheerful and I'm fierce, and I've made kings;And some have said my father was the Devil,Though I believe it not. Whatever I am,I have not lived in Time until to-day."A moment's worth of wisdom there escaped him,But Vivian seized it, and it was not lost. Embroidering doom with many levities,Till now the fountain's crystal silver, fading,Became a splash and a mere chilliness,They mocked their fate with easy pleasantriesThat were too false and small to be forgotten,And with ingenious insinceritiesThat had no repetition or revival.At last the lady Vivian arose,And with a crying of how late it wasTook Merlin's hand and led him like a childAlong a dusky way between tall conesOf tight green cedars: "Am I like one of these?You said I was, though I deny it wholly."—"Very," said Merlin, to his bearded lipsUplifting her small fingers.—"O, that hair!"She moaned, as if in sorrow: "Must it be?Must every prophet and important wizard Be clouded so that nothing but his noseAnd eyes, and intimations of his ears,Are there to make us know him when we see him?Praise heaven I'm not a prophet! Are you glad?"—
He did not say that he was glad or sorry;For suddenly came flashing into visionA thing that was a manor and a palace,With walls and roofs that had a flaming skyBehind them, like a sky that he remembered,And one that had from his rock-sheltered hauntAbove the roofs of his forsaken cityMade flame as if all Camelot were on fire.The glow brought with it a brief memoryOf Arthur as he left him, and the painThat fought in Arthur's eyes for losing him,And must have overflowed when he had vanished. But now the eyes that looked hard into hisWere Vivian's, not the King's; and he could see,Or so he thought, a shade of sorrow in them.She took his two hands: "You are sad," she said.—He smiled: "Your western lights bring memoriesOf Camelot. We all have memories—Prophets, and women who are like slim cedars;But you are wrong to say that I am sad."—"Would you go back to Camelot?" she asked,Her fingers tightening. Merlin shook his head."Then listen while I tell you that I'm glad,"She purred, as if assured that he would listen:"At your first warning, much too long ago,Of this quaint pilgrimage of yours to see'The fairest and most orgulous of ladies'—No language for a prophet, I am sure—Said I, 'When this great Merlin comes to me, My task and avocation for some timeWill be to make him willing, if I can,To teach and feed me with an ounce of wisdom.'For I have eaten to an empty shell,After a weary feast of observationAmong the glories of a tinsel worldThat had for me no glory till you came,A life that is no life. Would you go backTo Camelot?"—Merlin shook his head again,And the two smiled together in the sunset.
They moved along in silence to the door,Where Merlin said: "Of your three hundred hereThere is but one I know, and him I favor;I mean the stately one who shakes the keysOf that most evil sounding gate of yours,Which has a clang as if it shut forever."— "If there be need, I'll shut the gate myself,"She said. "And you like Blaise? Then you shall have him.He was not born to serve, but serve he must,It seems, and be enamoured of my shadow.He cherishes the taint of some high follyThat haunts him with a name he cannot know,And I could fear his wits are paying for it.Forgive his tongue, and humor it a little."—"I knew another one whose name was Blaise,"He said; and she said lightly, "Well, what of it?"—"And he was nigh the learnedest of hermits;His home was far away from everywhere,And he was all alone there when he died."—"Now be a pleasant Merlin," Vivian said,Patting his arm, "and have no more of that;For I'll not hear of dead men far away, Or dead men anywhere this afternoon.There'll be a trifle in the way of supperThis evening, but the dead shall not have any.Blaise and this man will tell you all there isFor you to know. Then you'll know everything."She laughed, and vanished like a humming-bird.