Poems (Jones)/Morta

by Amanda Theodosia Jones

MORTA.

ITHER some conquering magnet brings
 My soul, from shadowed haunts of Time:
 Up through an empty space I climb—
I soar, and yet I wear no wings.

I pause, yet feel no earth beneath;
 I see nor sun nor moon nor star;
 I hear no murmurous seas afar;
I breathe no zephyr's perfumed breath.

Yet now a humming in my ears,—
 A woful, wailing, wild refrain;
 As if the Night, aware of wane,
Lamenting, woke the silent spheres.

And lo! a radiance intense
 Spreads far and wide; so very white,
 It seems the spirit of a light
Divorced by spirit-law from sense.

By spirit-law is given to me
 The excellence of spirit-sight:
 Ensphered by this undazzling light,
A silent, smileless group I see.

Two white-garbed spinners at a wheel
 Whence constant, mad complainings flow;
 And One, whose task I may not know,
Nor its significance unseal.

An ebon crown, of regal mold,
 Circles the grandeur of her head;
 The whiteness of her robe is dread;
And she is wan and very old.

No wind is in her silver hair;
 No breath from her pale mouth exhales:
 Yet, toward me, while she slowly sails,
My soul her answering speech will dare.

O woman of the shrouded eye,
 Of frigid mien and ashen brow,
 Speak: wherefore, whence, and who art thou?
Resolve this threefold mystery.

"By this calm brow—most dreary calm!
 By this white cheek—most deathly white!
 By this closed eye that knows no sight,
Sister, thou readest all I am.

"From Time's dark fleece grave Nona's hand
 Draws out the slender thread of life;
 Whirling the humming wheel of strife,
Decima winds the tortured strand.

"But I am Morta,—she who rends,
 With instant touch its length in twain;
 And there is no more bliss nor pain
Forever, when the spinning ends.

"Who hears my solemn words, must rise
 And follow, follow where I lead:
 A captive, never to be freed,
With voiceless throat and sightless eyes."

And art thou Morta? O most rare,
 Most piercing melody of voice!
 As if the heart had sung, "Rejoice!"
Even while the lips had wailed "Despair!"

Nona, arise; put by the fleece,—
 Life fails with torture overmuch;
 Stay, Decima, thy guiding touch,
And let the troublous spinning cease:

Morta, I hear—I follow thee;
 I hold thee by thy robe of snow:
 Yet go where thou canst never go,
And see what thou canst never see.

A fleece of shining white unrolled;
 A wheel whose turning has no end;
 A joinèd thread thou canst not rend,
And One the gleaming strand doth hold.

Softly the singing wheel revolves;
 Softly my heart sings evermore:
 While, learned in Life's seraphic lore,
Death's threefold mystery it solves.