The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes - Volume 2, George MacDonald [8 ebook reader TXT] 📗

Snow-white have no speck; No curb, no bit her mouth must feel,
No tightening rein her neck; No saddle-girth drawn with buckle of steel
Shall her mighty breathing check!

Lay on her a cloth of silver sheen,
Bring me a robe of white; Wherever we go we must be seen
By the shining of our light- A glistening splendour in forest green,
A star on the mountain-height.

With jar and shudder the gates unclose;
Out in the sun she leaps! A unit of light and power she goes
Levelling vales and steeps: The wind around her eddies and blows,
Before and behind her sleeps.

Oh joy, oh joy to ride the world
And glad, good tidings bear! A flag of peace on the winds unfurled
Is the mane of my shining mare: To the sound of her hoofs, lo, the dead stars hurled
Quivering adown the air!

Oh, the sun and the wind! Oh, the life and the love!
Where the serpent swung all day The loud dove coos to the silent dove;
Where the web-winged dragon lay In its hole beneath, on the rock above
Merry-tongued children play.

With eyes of light the maidens look up
As they sit in the summer heat Twining green blade with golden cup-
They see, and they rise to their feet; I call aloud, for I must not stop,
"Good tidings, my sisters sweet!"

For mine is a message of holy mirth
To city and land of corn; Of praise for heaviness, plenty for dearth,
For darkness a shining morn: Clap hands, ye billows; be glad, O earth,
For a child, a child is born!

Lo, even the just shall live by faith!
None argue of mine and thine! Old Self shall die an ecstatic death
And be born a thing divine, For God's own being and God's own breath
Shall be its bread and wine.

Ambition shall vanish, and Love be king,
And Pride to his darkness hie; Yea, for very love of a living thing
A man would forget and die, If very love were not the spring
Whence life springs endlessly!

The myrtle shall grow where grew the thorn;
Earth shall be young as heaven; The heart with remorse or anger torn
Shall weep like a summer even; For to us a child, a child is born,
Unto us a son is given!

Lord, with thy message I dare not ride!
I am a fool, a beast! The little ones only from thy side
Go forth to publish thy feast! And I, where but sons and daughters abide,
Would have walked about, a priest!

Take Snow-white back to her glimmering stall;
There let her stand and feed!- I am overweening, ambitious, small,
A creature of pride and greed! Let me wash the hoofs, let me be the thrall,
Jesus, of thy white steed!


THE GOLDEN KEY.

From off the earth the vapours curled,
Went up to meet their joy; The boy awoke, and all the world
Was waiting for the boy!

The sky, the water, the wide earth
Was full of windy play- Shining and fair, alive with mirth,
All for his holiday!

The hill said "Climb me;" and the wood
"Come to my bosom, child; Mine is a merry gamboling brood,
Come, and with them go wild."

The shadows with the sunlight played,
The birds were singing loud; The hill stood up with pines arrayed-
He ran to join the crowd.

But long ere noon, dark grew the skies,
Pale grew the shrinking sun: "How soon," he said, "for clouds to rise
When day was but begun!"

The wind grew rough; a wilful power
It swept o'er tree and town; The boy exulted for an hour,
Then weary sat him down.

And as he sat the rain began,
And rained till all was still: He looked, and saw a rainbow span
The vale from hill to hill.

He dried his tears. "Ah, now," he said,
"The storm was good, I see! Yon pine-dressed hill, upon its head
I'll find the golden key!"

He thrid the copse, he climbed the fence,
At last the top did scale; But, lo, the rainbow, vanished thence,
Was shining in the vale!

"Still, here it stood! yes, here," he said,
"Its very foot was set! I saw this fir-tree through the red,
This through the violet!"

He searched and searched, while down the skies
Went slow the slanting sun. At length he lifted hopeless eyes,
And day was nearly done!

Beyond the vale, above the heath,
High flamed the crimson west; His mother's cottage lay beneath
The sky-bird's rosy breast.

"Oh, joy," he cried, "not all the way
Farther from home we go! The rain will come another day
And bring another bow!"

Long ere he reached his mother's cot,
Still tiring more and more, The red was all one cold gray blot,
And night lay round the door.

But when his mother stroked his head
The night was grim in vain; And when she kissed him in his bed
The rainbow rose again.

Soon, things that are and things that seem
Did mingle merrily; He dreamed, nor was it all a dream,
His mother had the key.


SOMNIUM MYSTICI

A Microcosm In Terza Rima.

I.

Quiet I lay at last, and knew no more
Whether I breathed or not, so worn I lay
With the death-struggle. What was yet before Neither I met, nor turned from it away;
My only conscious being was the rest
Of pain gone dead-dead with the bygone day, And long I could have lingered all but blest
In that half-slumber. But there came a sound
As of a door that opened-in the west Somewhere I thought it. As the hare the hound,
The noise did start my eyelids and they rose.
I turned my eyes and looked. Then straight I found It was my chamber-door that did unclose,
For a tall form up to my bedside drew.
Grand was it, silent, its very walk repose; And when I saw the countenance, I knew
That I was lying in my chamber dead;
For this my brother-brothers such are few- That now to greet me bowed his kingly head,
Had, many years agone, like holy dove
Returning, from his friends and kindred sped, And, leaving memories of mournful love,
Passed vanishing behind the unseen veil;
And though I loved him, all high words above. Not for his loss then did I weep or wail,
Knowing that here we live but in a tent,
And, seeking home, shall find it without fail. Feeble but eager, toward him my hands went-
I too was dead, so might the dead embrace!
Taking me by the shoulders down he bent, And lifted me. I was in sickly case,
But, growing stronger, stood up on the floor,
There turned, and once regarded my dead face With curious eyes: its brow contentment wore,
But I had done with it, and turned away.
I saw my brother by the open door, And followed him out into the night blue-gray.
The houses stood up hard in limpid air,
The moon hung in the heavens in half decay, And all the world to my bare feet lay bare.

II.

Now I had suffered in my life, as they
Must suffer, and by slow years younger grow,
From whom the false fool-self must drop away, Compact of greed and fear, which, gathered slow,
Darkens the angel-self that, evermore,
Where no vain phantom in or out shall go, Moveless beholds the Father-stands before
The throne of revelation, waiting there,
With wings low-drooping on the sapphire-floor, Until it find the Father's ideal fair,
And be itself at last: not one small thorn
Shall needless any pilgrim's garments tear; And but to say I had suffered I would scorn
Save for the marvellous thing that next befell:
Sudden I grew aware I was new-born; All pain had vanished in the absorbent swell
Of some exalting peace that was my own;
As the moon dwelt in heaven did calmness dwell At home in me, essential. The earth's moan
Lay all behind. Had I then lost my part
In human griefs, dear part with them that groan? "'Tis weariness!" I said; but with a start
That set it trembling and yet brake it not,
I found the peace was love. Oh, my rich heart! For, every time I spied a glimmering spot
Of window pane, "There, in that silent room,"
Thought I, "mayhap sleeps human heart whose lot Is therefore dear to mine!" I cared for whom
I saw not, had not seen, and might not see!
After the love crept prone its shadow-gloom, But instant a mightier love arose in me,
As in an ocean a single wave will swell,
And heaved the shadow to the centre: we Had called it prayer, before on sleep I fell.
It sank, and left my sea in holy calm:
I gave each man to God, and all was well. And in my heart stirred soft a sleeping psalm.

III.

No gentlest murmur through the city crept;
Not one lone word my brother to me had spoken;
But when beyond the city-gate we stept I knew the hovering silence would be broken.
A low night wind came whispering: through and through
It did baptize me with the pledge and token Of that soft spirit-wind which blows and blew
And fans the human world since evermore.
The very grass, cool to my feet, I knew To be love also, and with the love I bore
To hold far sympathy, silent and sweet,
As having known the secret from of yore In the eternal heart where all things meet,
Feelings and thinkings, and where still they are bred.
Sudden he stood, and with arrested feet I also. Like a half-sunned orb, his head
Slow turned the bright side: lo, the brother-smile
That ancient human glory on me shed Clothéd in which Jesus came forth to wile
Unto his bosom every labouring soul,
And all dividing passions to beguile To winsome death, and then on them to roll
The blessed stone of the holy sepulchre!
"Thank God," he said, "thou also now