The Defeat Of Youth

I. UNDER THE TREES.     There had been phantoms, pale-remembered shapes     Of this and this occasion, sisterly     In their resemblances, each effigy     Crowned with the same bright hair above the nape's     White rounded firmness, and each body alert     With such swift loveliness, that very rest     Seemed a poised movement: ... phantoms that impressed     But a faint influence and could bless or hurt     No more than dreams. And these ghost things were she;     For formless still, without identity,     Not one she seemed, not clear, but many and dim.     One face among the legions of the street,     Indifferent mystery, she was for him     Something still uncreated, incomplete.     II.     Bright windy sunshine and the shadow of cloud     Quicken the heavy summer to new birth     Of life and motion on the drowsing earth;     The huge elms stir, till all the air is loud     With their awakening from the muffled sleep     Of long hot days. And on the wavering line     That marks the alternate ebb of shade and shine,     Under the trees, a little group is deep     In laughing talk. The shadow as it flows     Across them dims the lustre of a rose,     Quenches the bright clear gold of hair, the green     Of a girl's dress, and life seems faint. The light     Swings back, and in the rose a fire is seen,     Gold hair's aflame and green grows emerald bright.     III.     She leans, and there is laughter in the face     She turns towards him; and it seems a door     Suddenly opened on some desolate place     With a burst of light and music. What before     Was hidden shines in loveliness revealed.     Now first he sees her beautiful, and knows     That he must love her; and the doom is sealed     Of all his happiness and all the woes     That shall be born of pregnant years hereafter.     The swift poise of a head, a flutter of laughter--     And love flows in on him, its vastness pent     Within his narrow life: the pain it brings,     Boundless; for love is infinite discontent     With the poor lonely life of transient things.     IV.     Men see their god, an immanence divine,     Smile through the curve of flesh or moulded clay,     In bare ploughed lands that go sloping away     To meet the sky in one clean exquisite line.     Out of the short-seen dawns of ecstasy     They draw new beauty, whence new thoughts are born     And in their turn conceive, as grains of corn     Germ and create new life and endlessly     Shall live creating. Out of earthly seeds     Springs the aerial flower. One spirit proceeds     Through change, the same in body and in soul--     The spirit of life and love that triumphs still     In its slow struggle towards some far-off goal     Through lust and death and the bitterness of will.     V.     One spirit it is that stirs the fathomless deep     Of human minds, that shakes the elms in storm,     That sings in passionate music, or on warm     Still evenings bosoms forth the tufted sleep     Of thistle-seeds that wait a travelling wind.     One spirit shapes the subtle rhythms of thought     And the long thundering seas; the soul is wrought     Of one stuff with the body--matter and mind     Woven together in so close a mesh     That flowers may blossom into a song, that flesh     May strangely teach the loveliest holiest things     To watching spirits. Truth is brought to birth     Not in some vacant heaven: its beauty springs     From the dear bosom of material earth.     VI. IN THE HAY-LOFT.     The darkness in the loft is sweet and warm     With the stored hay ... darkness intensified     By one bright shaft that enters through the wide     Tall doors from under fringes of a storm     Which makes the doomed sun brighter. On the hay,     Perched mountain-high they sit, and silently     Watch the motes dance and look at the dark sky     And mark how heartbreakingly far away     And yet how close and clear the distance seems,     While all at hand is cloud--brightness of dreams     Unrealisable, yet seen so clear,     So only just beyond the dark. They wait,     Scarce knowing what they wait for, half in fear;     Expectance draws the curtain from their fate.     VII.     The silence of the storm weighs heavily     On their strained spirits: sometimes one will say     Some trivial thing as though to ward away     Mysterious powers, that imminently lie     In wait, with the strong exorcising grace     Of everyday's futility. Desire     Becomes upon a sudden a crystal fire,     Defined and hard:--If he could kiss her face,     Could kiss her hair! As if by chance, her hand     Brushes on his ... Ah, can she understand?     Or is she pedestalled above the touch     Of his desire? He wonders: dare he seek     From her that little, that infinitely much?     And suddenly she kissed him on the cheek.     VIII. MOUNTAINS.     A stronger gust catches the cloud and twists     A spindle of rifted darkness through its heart,     A gash in the damp grey, which, thrust apart,     Reveals black depths a moment. Then the mists     Shut down again; a white uneasy sea     Heaves round the climbers and beneath their feet.     He strains on upwards through the wind and sleet,     Poised, or swift moving, or laboriously     Lifting his weight. And if he should let go,     What would he find down there, down there below     The curtain of the mist? What would he find     Beyond the dim and stifling now and here,     Beneath the unsettled turmoil of his mind?     Oh, there were nameless depths: he shrank with fear.     IX.     The hills more glorious in their coat of snow     Rise all around him, in the valleys run     Bright streams, and there are lakes that catch the sun,     And sunlit fields of emerald far below     That seem alive with inward light. In smoke     The far horizons fade; and there is peace     On everything, a sense of blessed release     From wilful strife. Like some prophetic cloak     The spirit of the mountains has descended     On all the world, and its unrest is ended.     Even the sea, glimpsed far away, seems still,     Hushed to a silver peace its storm and strife.     Mountains of vision, calm above fate and will,     You hold the promise of the freer life.     X. IN THE LITTLE ROOM.     London unfurls its incense-coloured dusk     Before the panes, rich but a while ago     With the charred gold and the red ember-glow     Of dying sunset. Houses quit the husk     Of secrecy, which, through the day, returns     A blank to all enquiry: but at nights     The cheerfulness of fire and lamp invites     The darkness inward, curious of what burns     With such a coloured life when all is dead--     The daylight world outside, with overhead     White clouds, and where we walk, the blaze     Of wet and sunlit streets, shops and the stream     Of glittering traffic--all that the nights erase,     Colour and speed, surviving but in dream.     XI.     Outside the dusk, but in the little room     All is alive with light, which brightly glints     On curving cup or the stiff folds of chintz,     Evoking its own whiteness. Shadows loom,     Bulging and black, upon the walls, where hang     Rich coloured plates of beauties that appeal     Less to the sense of sight than to the feel,     So moistly satin are their breasts. A pang,     Almost of pain, runs through him when he sees     Hanging, a homeless marvel, next to these,     The silken breastplate of a mandarin,     Centuries dead, which he had given her.     Exquisite miracle, when men could spin     Jay's wing and belly of the kingfisher!     XII.     In silence and as though expectantly     She crouches at his feet, while he caresses     His light-drawn fingers with the touch of tresses     Sleeked round her head, close-banded lustrously,     Save where at nape and temple the smooth brown     Sleaves out into a pale transparent mist     Of hair and tangled light. So to exist,     Poised 'twixt the deep of thought where spirits drown     Life in a void impalpable nothingness,     And, on the other side, the pain and stress     Of clamorous action and the gnawing fire     Of will, focal upon a point of earth--even thus     To sit, eternally without desire     And yet self-known, were happiness for us.     XIII.     She turns her head and in a flash of laughter     Looks up at him: and helplessly he feels     That life has circled with returning wheels     Back to a starting-point. Before and after     Merge in this instant, momently the same:     For it was thus she leaned and laughing turned     When, manifest, the spirit of beauty burned     In her young body with an inward flame,     And first he knew and loved her. In full tide     Life halts within him, suddenly stupefied.     Sight blackness, lightning-struck; but blindly tender     He draws her up to meet him, and she lies     Close folded by his arms in glad surrender,     Smiling, and with drooped head and half closed eyes.     XIV.     "I give you all; would that I might give more."     He sees the colour dawn across her cheeks     And die again to white; marks as she speaks     The trembling of her lips, as though she bore     Some sudden pain and hardly mastered it.     Within his arms he feels her shuddering,     Piteously trembling like some wild wood-thing     Caught unawares. Compassion infinite     Mounts up within him. Thus to hold and keep     And comfort her distressed, lull her to sleep     And gently kiss her brow and hair and eyes     Seems love perfected--templed high and white     Against the calm of golden autumn skies,     And shining quenchlessly with vestal light.     XV.     But passion ambushed by the aerial shrine     Comes forth to dance, a hoofed obscenity,     His satyr's dance, with laughter in his eye,     And cruelty along the scarlet line     Of his bright smiling mouth. All uncontrolled,     Love's rebel servant, he delights to beat     The maddening quick dry rhythm of goatish feet     Even in the sanctuary, and makes bold     To mime himself the godhead of the place.     He turns in terror from her trance-calmed face,     From the white-lidded languor of her eyes,     From lips that passion never shook before,     But glad in the promise of her sacrifice:     "I give you all; would that I might give more."     XVI.     He is afraid, seeing her lie so still,     So utterly his own; afraid lest she     Should open wide her eyes and let him see     The passionate conquest of her virgin will     Shine there in triumph, starry-bright with tears.     He thrusts her from him: face and hair and breast,     Hands he had touched, lips that his lips had pressed,     Seem things deadly to be desired. He fears     Lest she should body forth in palpable shame     Those dreams and longings that his blood, aflame     Through the hot dark of summer nights, had dreamed     And longed. Must all his love, then, turn to this?     Was lust the end of what so pure had seemed?     He must escape, ah God! her touch, her kiss.     XVII. IN THE PARK.     Laughing, "To-night," I said to him, "the Park     Has turned the garden of a symbolist.     Those old great trees that rise above the mist,     Gold with the light of evening, and the dark     Still water, where the dying sun evokes     An echoed glory--here I recognize     Those ancient gardens mirrored by the eyes     Of poets that hate the world of common folks,     Like you and me and that thin pious crowd,     Which yonder sings its hymns, so humbly proud     Of holiness. The garden of escape     Lies here; a small green world, and still the bride     Of quietness, although an imminent rape     Roars ceaselessly about on every side."     XVIII.     I had forgotten what I had lightly said,     And without speech, without a thought I went,     Steeped in that golden quiet, all content     To drink the transient beauty as it sped     Out of eternal darkness into time     To light and burn and know itself a fire;     Yet doomed--ah, fate of the fulfilled desire!--     To fade, a meteor, paying for the crime     Of living glorious in the denser air     Of our material earth. A strange despair,     An agony, yet strangely, subtly sweet     And tender as an unpassionate caress,     Filled me ... Oh laughter! youth's conceit     Grown almost conscious of youth's feebleness!     XIX.     He spoke abrupt across my dream: "Dear Garden,     A stranger to your magic peace, I stand     Beyond your walls, lost in a fevered land     Of stones and fire. Would that the gods would harden     My soul against its torment, or would blind     Those yearning glimpses of a life at rest     In perfect beauty--glimpses at the best     Through unpassed bars. And here, without, the wind     Of scattering passion blows: and women pass     Glitter-eyed down putrid alleys where the glass     Of some grimed window suddenly parades--     Ah, sickening heart-beat of desire!--the grace     Of bare and milk-warm flesh: the vision fades,     And at the pane shows a blind tortured face."     XX. SELF-TORMENT.     The days pass by, empty of thought and will:     His thought grows stagnant at its very springs,     With every channel on the world of things     Dammed up, and thus, by its long standing still,     Poisons itself and sickens to decay.     All his high love for her, his fair desire,     Loses its light; and a dull rancorous fire,     Burning darkness and bitterness that prey     Upon his heart are left. His spirit burns     Sometimes with hatred, or the hatred turns     To a fierce lust for her, more cruel than hate,     Till he is weary wrestling with its force:     And evermore she haunts him, early and late,     As pitilessly as an old remorse.     XXI.     Streets and the solitude of country places     Were once his friends. But as a man born blind,     Opening his eyes from lovely dreams, might find     The world a desert and men's larval faces     So hateful, he would wish to seek again     The darkness and his old chimeric sight     Of beauties inward--so, that fresh delight,     Vision of bright fields and angelic men,     That love which made him all the world, is gone.     Hating and hated now, he stands alone,     An island-point, measureless gulfs apart     From other lives, from the old happiness     Of being more than self, when heart to heart     Gave all, yet grew the greater, not the less.     XXII. THE QUARRY IN THE WOOD.     Swiftly deliberate, he seeks the place.     A small wind stirs, the copse is bright in the sun:     Like quicksilver the shine and shadow run     Across the leaves. A bramble whips his face,     The tears spring fast, and through the rainbow mist     He sees a world that wavers like the flame     Of a blown candle. Tears of pain and shame,     And lips that once had laughed and sung and kissed     Trembling in the passion of his sobbing breath!     The world a candle shuddering to its death,     And life a darkness, blind and utterly void     Of any love or goodness: all deceit,     This friendship and this God: all shams destroyed,     And truth seen now.                      Earth fails beneath his feet.