Poems (Blagden)/The studio

by Isa Blagden

THE STUDIO.

Float on, thou stately pageant, proud and fair,
 Float on, in choral beauty, joyous Hours;
While to your God the immortal steeds ye bear
 With festal step and song, and votive wreaths of flowers!

Revealed in marble, all the wondrous past,
 Shines here in mythic beauty and no more,
To work-day toil and sordid care bound fast—
 We dream (fond idle dreams!) beside the Elysian shore.

Beauty and courage, ardour tamed by grace,
 Strength ruled by sweetness; fiercest energies
Divinely curbed, yet guided on their race,—
 These are not dreams, they emblem great realities!

Oh fair primeval age! so nigh thy birth,
 God's awful Presence brooded ever near,
Winged forms angelical still trod the earth,
 Yet musical each star in its harmonious sphere.

And therefore, heart, and soul, and ear, and eye,
 From godlike influence drew life divine,
And truth, religion, high philosophy,
 Made manifest, through sensuous forms, their faith benign.

Not wholly dim the rapture, fled the dream;
 We all might speak of visions delicate,
Impalpable, o'er which soft haloes gleam
 To poesy and antique fable dedicate.

And there live some, who, 'mid the pomp and strife
 Which men forlorn miscall felicity,
Fulfil the mission of a nobler life,
 And give to mortal yearnings immortality.

Ay, come with me, yon fountain murmurs clear
 Beneath its veil of fern; and round it bloom,
Lavish of beauty, prodigally fair,
 Wild flowers, whose purple mocks the o'er-arching skies of Rome.

No pause, but enter, welcome meet is given,
 The pale still Gods look on us grand and calm;
It is the threshold of the Grecian heaven,
 And odorous all the air with asphodel and balm.

There shine the Hours, serenely sweet, upborne
 On wingèd speed to hail the lord of light;
Here, grave Aurora, pouring from her urn
 The soft and fresh'ning dews which part the day and night.

And thou, young Charioteer with looks of fire,
 What quenchless ardour burns within thine eye,
Forgetful in the rush of hot desire,
 "Patient is Genius," patient God's eternity!

Thy headlong steeds disdain a rule like thine,
 Their fiery nostrils scent the sun afar;
Woe to the hand that would their speed confine,
 And, mortal, guide through flaming seas the immortal car!

And lo! where sighing 'neath her Maker's hand
 The roseate life, slow stealing through her form
Her forfeit Godhood 'mid the Olympian band,
 Discrowned Cythera mourns, with mortal blushes warm.

And holiest of these revelations blest,
 Which have sublimed this visioned solitude,
Yon legend of the soul and love, expressed
 As if fair Psyche's joy the marble's self imbued.

A life's whole utterance, fully and entire
 Is here—majestic thoughts which calmly breathe
Through Phidian forms—a mind whose subtle fire
 Imperishably glows triumphant over Death!

Death sways not, where creative art bestows
 An infinite success to high endeavour,
Harmoniously the circle ebbs and flows,
 In the created the Creator lives for ever.

But how to win success? by steadfast will,
 And no vain dalliance with a lofty aim,
Patient and strong, relentless to fulfil
 Purpose invincible, thus earned the palm of Fame!

Each day a pearl upon a costly shrine,
 That shrine a consecrated life, all vowed
A sacrifice elect to art divine,
 And worshipped through art's glorious priesthood to its God!