Poems (Whitney)/Camille

by Anne Whitney

CAMILLE.

I bore my mystic chalice unto earth,
 With vintage which no lips of hers might name:
Only in token of its alien birth,
 Love crowned it with his soft, immortal flame;
   And 'mid the world's wide sound,
 Sacred reserves and -silences breathed round
 A spell, to keep it pure from low acclaim.

With joy that dulled-me to the touch of scorn,
 I served: not knowing that of all life's deeds,
Service was first—nor that high powers are born
 In humble uses;—fragrance-folding seeds
   Must so through flowers expand,
 Then die:—God witness that I blest the Hand
 Which laid upon my heart such golden needs!

And yet I felt through all the blind, sweet ways
 Of life, for some clear shape its dreams to blend;
Some thread of holy art to knit the days
 Each unto each, and all to some fair end,
   Which through unmarked removes,
 Should draw me upward, even as it behooves
 One whose deep spring-tides from His heart descend.

To swell some vast refrain beyond the sun,
 The very weed breathed music from its sod:
And Night and Day in ceaseless antiphon,
 Rolled off through windless arches in the broad
   Abyss.—Thou saw'st I too
 Would in my place have blent accord as true,
 And justified this great enshrining, God!

Dreams!—Stain it on the bending amethyst,
 That one who came with visions of the Prime
For guide, somehow her radiant pathway missed,
 And wandered in the darkest gulf of Time!
   No deed divine, thenceforth,
 Stood royal in its far-related worth—
 No God, in truth, might heal the wounded chime.

O how? I darkly ask.—And if I dare
 Take up a thought from this tumultuous street
To the forgotten Silence, soaring there
 Above the hiving roofs, its calm depths meet
   My glance with no reply.
 Might I go back and spell this mystery
 In that new stillness at my mother's feet!

I would recall with importunings long
 Her so sad soul, once pierced as with a knife;
And cry, Forgive! O think, youth's tide was strong,
 And the full torrent, shut from brain and life,
   Plunged through the heart, until
 It rocked to madness, and the o'erstrained will
 Grew wild, then weak, in the despairing strife.

And ever I think, What warning voice should call,
 Or show me bane from food, with tedious art,
When love, the perfect instinct, flower of all
 Divinest potencies of choice, whose part
   Was set 'mid stars and flame,
 To keep the inner place of God, became
 A blind and ravening fever of the heart!

I laugh with scorn that men should think them praised
 In women's love;—chance-flung in weary hours,
By sickly fire to bloated worship raised!
 O dream long-lost, so sweet of vernal flowers!—
   Wherein I stood, it seemed,
 And gave a gift of queenly mark;—I dreamed
 Of passion's joy aglow in rounded powers.

I dreamed! The roar, the tramp, the burthened air
 Pour round their sharp and subtle mockery.
Here go the eager-footed men—and there
 The costly beggars of the world float by,
   Lilies that toil nor spin—
 How should they know so well the weft of sin,
 And hide me from them with such sudden eye?

But all the roaring crowd begins to make
 A whirl of humming shade:—for since the day
Is done, and there's no lower step to take,
 Life drops me here. Some rough, kind hand I pray,
   Thrust the sad wreck aside:,
 And shut the door on it! a little pride,
 That I may not offend who pass this way!

And this is all! O, thou wilt yet give heed!
 No soul but trusts some late, redeeming care—
But walks the narrow plank with bitter speed,
 And, straining through the sweeping mist of air,
   In the great tempest-call,
 And greater silence deep'ning through it all,
 Refuses still, refuses to despair.

Some further end—whence thou refitt'st with aim
 Bewildered souls perhaps—? Some breath in me,
By thee, the purest, found devoid of blame,
 Fit for large teaching—? Look, I cannot see,
   I can but feel!—Far off,
 Life seethes and frets, and from its shame and scoff,
 I take my broken crystal up to Thee.