Poems (Sackville)/Witchcraft
WITCHCRAFT
To Effie
In clinging samite, poppy—lithe and red;With poppy garlands twined and interwed,She passed before the court. Her languid head Seemed, underneath a falling cloud of hair,Like a pale shadow born at close of day;Also her eyes were as the eyes of May, When the last Winter's frosts are mirrored there.
And every knight and lord who served the kingFelt round his soul a woven net-work cling,As though enchanted by some evil thing Deadly yet sweet. E'en Arthur almost fell To love an alien woman, for a spaceHe gazed upon the beauty of her face, Nor saw therein the loveliness of Hell.
Through bower and court a silence reigned the dayWhereon she entered. August fever layOn Summer splendour. 'Neath his fiery sway All war-like jousts and tournaments, God wot,Gave little joy. She passed within the hall;Great marvel filled the knights assembled all. 'Whence come ye?' cried the king. She answered not.
Most strange it was to see her stand aloneVoiceless. The silence now oppressive grownSeemed pregnant with an evil, yet unknown, Fatal to life. Her lips were more intenseWith secrecy than speech, she seemed to be Delicious slumber, cloying every sense, Which men despise and crave for equally.
Then Arthur's voice rang clear and audible,As though to break the presence of that spellWhich held their souls with power invisible. 'Damsel,' he cried, 'whence comest thou?' The wordsDied on his lips, but echoed hushed and low,As waters spellbound in their overflow, Or muffed calls of Winter-famished birds.
Unanswering still, across her face a smilePlayed like an Autumn twilight, all the guileOf tempest hid therein. She breathed the while A keen quick sigh that startled every sense.And those who gazed within her eyes beheld How strangely there the drowsy silence swelled, Full of swift meaning, instant and intense.
And many yielded to that smile and leaptEntrancéd to their feet. Her red robe creptIn clinging folds around her; on she swept Along the mystic streets of Camelot.Famed knights were they who followed:—Pelleas,Gareth, and more (as phantom armies pass, So moved they), Tristram, Gawain, Lancelot.
Then cried the king, 'Alas! my knights no moreHonour the vows they made, as heretofore,They learn a newer life, a newer lore!' Sir Galahad and pure Sir Percivale, With other knights of more enduring mouldStayed still within the hall, though day waxed old, And mournful shadows brooded thin and pale,
'Alas!' the king made moan, 'how little isRemained to me of former might and blissSave fallen hopes and out-worn memories; 'And all my dreams, and every battle wonOver the heathen, and the holy love,Wherewith to fill each knightly heart I strove Oblivion soon shall claim in Avalon.'
Two days had fallen lifeless, little heardWas Glory's voice the while, but, ere the thirdLanguished towards night, resounding armour stirred The mournful streets; with weary steps they came, But how or where their yielding feet she led,They nothing told, nor whence the damsel sped, Nor what the honour won nor what the shame.
Yet, natheless, though again in fealtyEach knight bowed head before the king's decree,And exercised all wonted chivalry, Such vice which in those breasts had taken holdBecame accelerated, Lancelot's sinWith Guinevere grew much enhanced therein, Gawain and Ettarre, Tristram and Isolde.
None knew from whence she came nor what her heartContained of evil; when she drove apartKing Arthur's Hall by soft and hidden art No token left she when she passed away, Only a stillness subtle, infinite,Was lifted as the trailing wing of night Lifts, spreads and fades at quivered plumes of day.
But:—Once towards the Court a woman spedIn trailing robes of clinging poppy-red,And poppy garlands twined and interwed, Deep-eyed and sorrowful with sombre hairSweeping her shoulders like a living thing;And for a moment's folly, even the king Felt Love's forbidden breath; she was so fair.