WHAT AM I WITHOUT THEE?

What am I without thee, Beloved?
A mere stem, that hath no flower;
A sea forever at storm, without its calms;
A shrine, with the Virgin stolen out;
A cloud void of lightning;
A bleak moor where yearnings moan like the winter winds;
A rock on sea-sand, whence the sea hath retired, and no longer claspeth and loveth it;
A hollow oak with the heart riven thereout, living by the bark alone;
A dark star;
A bird with both wings broken;
A Dryad in a place where no trees are;
A brook that never reacheth the sea;
A mountain without sunrise thereon and without springs therein;
A wave that runneth on forever, to no shore;
A raindrop suspended between Heaven and Earth, arrested in his course;
A bud, that will never open;
A hope that is always dying;
An eye with no sparkle in it;
A tear wept, dropped in the dust, cold;
A bow whereof the string is snapped;
An orchestra, wanting the violin;
A poor poem;
A bent lance;
A play without plot or dénouement;
An arrow, shot with no aim;
Chivalry without his Ladye;
A sound unarticulated;
A water-lily left in a dry lake-bed;
Sleep without a dream and without a waking-time;
A pallid lip;
A grave whereafter cometh neither Heaven nor hell;
A broken javelin fixed in a breastplate;
A heart that liveth, but throbbeth not;
An Aurora of the North, dying upon the ice, in the night;
A blurred picture;
A lonesome, lonesome, lonesome yearning lover!
My birds, my pretty pious buccaneers
That haunt the shores of daybreak and of dusk,
Truly my birds did find to-day
A-strand out yonder on the Balsam hills
A bright bulk, where the night wave left it,
High upon the Balsam peaks.
Then my birds, my sweet, my heavenly [day prickers],
Did open up the day
Like as some castaway bale of flotsam sunlight-stuff
And jetsam of woven Easternry: one loud exclaimed
Upon brocaded silver with more silver voice:
And one, when gold embroideries flamed in golden songs of better broidered tones,
Translated them. And one from out some rare tone-tissue in his soul
Shook fringes of sweet indecisive sound,
And purfled all that ravishment of light with ravishment of music that not left
Heat, or dry longing, or any indictment of God,
Or question.
[Lynn, N. C., August, 1881]
When into reasonable discourse plain
Or russet terms of dealing and old use
I would recast the joy, the tender pain
Of the silver birch, the rhododendron, the brook,
Or, all blest particulars of beauty sum
In one most continent word that means something
To all men, to some men everything,
To one all, but one will cover with satisfaction,
That is love.
Yet I well know this tree is a selfish [saver]-up of drink
Might else have nourished these laurels:
Yea, and they did not hand round the cup
To the grass ere they drank,
Nor the grass inquire if room is here for her and the phlox.
Yet my spirit will have it that Love is the lost meaning
of this Hate, and Peace the end of this Battle.
Why? This is revelation. Here I find God: what
power less than His could fancy such wild inconsequence
and unreason as flies out of this anguish, and
Love out of this Murder.
[Lynn, N. C., August, 1881]
I awoke, and there my Gossip, Midnight, stood
Fast by my head, and there the Balsams sat
Round about, and we talked together.

And "Here is some news," quoth Midnight. "What is this word 'news' whereof we hear?" begged the Balsams: "What mean you by news? what thing is there which is not very old? Two neighbors in a cabin talking yesterday I heard giving and taking news; and one, for news, saith William is dead; and 'tother for news gave that a child is born at Anne's house. But what manner of people be these that call birth and death new? Birth and death were before aught else that we know was."

[Credo; Hymn of the Mountains]
[Lynn, N. C., August, 1881]

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE

  1. Silently corrected simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors.
  2. Retained anachronistic and non-standard spellings as printed.

Transcriber's Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.