Poems (Storrie)/A Trois Temps
A Trois Temps.
He—When, lightly leaning on my arm, you glide, Your feet motived to music, and the spell Of these harmonious cadences across Us woven, threadlike, lacing you to me, My human needs are satisfied, no more I ask of Time or Circumstance; the warmth Of Summer at my heart makes every thought A blossom, with the germ of richer life Shut fast within it, and a rosy light Lit by your nearness sets my eager soul To shining like a lamp against the dark Of other, poorer peoples' happiness, And every sense grown keener to demand Its rights, and wise enough to know them, haltsFullfed, and languorously cries "Content!"
She—I, too, have found my home, at last, 'tis here Against your sheltering shoulder. All my world So large, so limitless, so full of every good Lies yet within the circle of your arm. Then, where is Heaven? Wherefore do they seek With lifted eyes afar, when all the time It lies so near, all just within your arm.
He—My love for you is not an alien thing, An after-thought of God's giving to life A rich addendum. You to me are not A flower that I might pluck to glut mine eye With its entrancing beauty, nor a gem To set about with carven gold and wear To wake the envy of a watching world, Upon my breast. You are to me as air, The means whereby I live. My need of you Is just my need of life; it is the cry Of Nature's self, Instinctive as the beat Of heart's blood in my veins. You are my right As power to breathe, and room to stand, and share Of wind and sunshine, and the generous Clear promises of midnight skies are mine, By royal right of human heritage. When you are here I am myself, complete, No more, not added to, but just myself As Nature planned—a finished man; and yet To all the world I am but one among The common throng about you, have no claim, Beyond the empty courtesies of life, Upon your time. To even hold you thus, To tell you what I tell, to need your love Is breaking of the law. Oh! one could laugh At such a travesty—the law! the law!—A gibbering skeleton that men have set Upon an iron pedestal to fright Their phantom consciences.———The law! the law! I am the law unto myself. I claim By right of my humanity, by God's own———
She—Hush, oh, hush! See, I am here. Remember nothing else; it is enough. My hand is in your own. Let that suffice. Oh! see, my hand is in your own, and let The rich entreaty of the music sweep Our spirits to as rhythmical a chord As this our feet have found. Ah! when your arm Is round me, 'tis as though a rampart stood About my soul, and fenced its rapture in. Oh! only think of this.
He—Your voice infects my blood; it is a balm That anodynes that gaping wound—my life; It lulls the sobbing of my passions as The mother-hand that soothes, with magic touch, An infant's crying. I am glad to cry Because it brings the healing of your voice. But—Heaven help us! this we linger in, This paradise of fools———
She—Yet still a paradise———
He—And still a fool's. Why should I bear it? Why? I can endure no more. This one sweet span, This little moment, plucked from out the great Blank desert of my days, this tiny spark Of time that burns so quickly to its dark Effacement, this one happy moment when The fetish law allows me thus to hold You in my arms, and thus to clasp your hand, And thus to draw your slender body close Until I feel the beating of the heart That times my own, and mark the mystery Of half-hid shoulders gleaming amid lace, And little wayward curls blown here and there About the milk-white curving of your throat, This little moment, trembling with the sheer Delight of being—this is all, is all That I may dare to claim from out your life, This momentary dance, when, to the beat. Of low, impassioned music, and the hum Of vapid voices, and the silken sweep Of trailing gowns, I hold you lightly thus And school my face to vacancy, and train My heart's-cry to the level tones required
From bondslaves of the law, then yield you up To other arms, to those that—never more! I shall not give you up. Before them all, This gaping throng, the man whose name you bear, And every other man who walks the earth, I'll claim mine own. When once this waltz is done I'll keep you in my arms—before them all—And kiss you on the lips, and cry aloud—"This woman is my own, is mine, is mine!" And kiss your lips again, and holding you Here close against my breast, defy them all, And bid them come and take you. Ay, and fight Them singly, or together press and drive And strike and slay them with this hand of mine That hath not strength of ten right hands for nought! And then—before them all—I'll bear you off, Out from the grinning throng, the lights, the hum Of vapid voices, out into the dim, Mysterious starlight, clean with solitude And merciful with silence. I am sick—Oh! sick and senseless with this beating down, And hemming in, and choking back of all The sources of my life. Why was I made A giant among men, with strength, and wealth, And every good a sneering Fate could pour From brimming hands, but one—the only one—A slip of womanhood with burnished hair And frightened eyes, and little hands that cling In vain entreaty—yes—in vain, I said. No! No! I am not drunk, save with excess Of abstinence, a pale and fumeless wine! Too long I have been sane, and let my life Ooze out at every moment and enrich The swollen flood of Hades with the drops Of my vicarious anguish. Let me now Be mad for preference. Ay! be mad, and let The savage in me break his chains, and send His war-cry pealing through this feeble din, And fight as savages can fight, and win, For—little trembling one—I'll fight to win Because I fight for you———
She—Oh hush! oh hush! My life is in your hand, Do not destroy it idly. Only think One moment what it means to me who fight Always, alone, unaided. Will you crush My soul to free my body? Lift the gyves From wrist to spirit and endue a grief That time may slay, with immortality? When, years ago, I blindly gave my life Into another's keeping, I withheld No vestige of my honour. It is his Whose name I hear. Condemn me not to stain A life that holds itself so proud and high. Through all the madness of this love of ours Which, like a flood, has whelmed my very soul In dark, unfathomed waters, I have held—As drowning wretches lift above the waves A treasure that they hold more dear than life—Unstained, his honour. 'Tis an empty thing To save for him from out the tide that swept My heart and all its passions to your feet, Yet his, and saved, God knows at what a cost! And would you make, by one mad, reckless word, This dear-bought relic of my shattered joy A byword for the world's base feet to tread And trample into filthiness———
He—Mere sophistry! Since he has never held your love, what use To cherish so its shadow? As we stand We all are fed with shadows, for his share The husks of honour, yours the phantom fruit That duty bears upon its thorny boughs, And mine, the poisoned bread of jealousy; And at this goodly feast we sit, like ghouls, And fatten our despair. But now no more Shall I fold hands and say my humble grace Before such meat. Think not of honour, dear, What is it, weighed beside our love———
She—But you forget that he—he also loves, Unconscious of his loss. He loves me, too, And he at least is happy. Must we then Build up our joy upon the wreck of his? Is this the lore our love reveals to us? Vain dream! We might as surely hope to snatch, With greedy fingers, from the murky cloud, The vaporous beauty of the rainbow arch As pluck our happiness from deeds like this. Besides, oh! dearest, have you never felt That this dear love of ours is as the risen Transfigured soul of our deep-buried selves, And only lives because of Death's release, The death of earthly satisfactions and———
He—I almost could believe you do not know What loving means! Yet, no! Forgive me, dear. Some other time I'll follow you, and feel What you would have me feel, but now my soul, And mind, and spirit are grown sick and numb, And I am nothing but a man, not dead, Nor risen, nor transfigured—just a man Alive and loving you, whose pulses beat Loud drums of revolution, whose hot blood Is surging through his veins like liquid fire, Whose heart is thundering out with every throb The death-knell of delay. In vain you hold His happiness before mine eyes a thing Fenced round and sacred. Let him feel the edge Of this keen tooth that gnaws into my life. Because he loves you is no reason why My hand should stay from smiting, though 'tis true That if he had not loved you well his life Had long ago paid forfeit. I'd have stamped The breath from out his body, as I tread Upon a noxious insect, but that he Has wit to love you as becomes a man. No! do not turn away, nor hide your eyes. I still am I, though roused at last to feel My strength and use———
She—I have a child———
He—His child———
She—My child—a little girl, so small, so sweet, Just four years old, with little, clustering curls The colour of my own, and tiny hands That lie upon my heartstrings. Part of me—The purer part she is. The lovely soul Is stainless; and—at night—I pray—no spot May ever touch her—for her sake I ask, For her—my little child———
****He—The waltz is over! 'Twas a dance of death! I see your husband waiting. Go to him!