Kitabı oku: «The Germ: Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art», sayfa 7

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“Meäly glen, the heart of Lochiel's fair forest,
Where Scotch firs are darkest and amplest, and intermingle
Grandly with rowan and ash;—in Mar you have no ashes;
There the pine is alone or relieved by birch and alder.”—p. 22.
 

In the next mere sound and the names go far towards the entire effect; but not so far as to induce any negligence in essential details:

 
“As, at return of tide, the total weight of ocean,
Drawn by moon and sun from Labrador and Greenland,
Sets in amain in the open space betwixt Mull and Scarfa,
Heaving, swelling, spreading, the might of the mighty Atlantic;
There into cranny and slit of the rocky cavernous bottom
Settles down; and with dimples huge the smooth sea-surface
Eddies, coils, and whirls, and dangerous Corryvreckan.”—p. 52.
 

Two more passages, and they must suffice as examples. Here the isolation is perfect; but it is the isolation, not of the place and the actors only; it is, as it were, almost our own in an equal degree;

 
“Ourselves too seeming
Not as spectators, accepted into it, immingled, as truly
Part of it as are the kine of the field lying there by the birches.”
“There, across the great rocky wharves a wooden bridge goes,
Carrying a path to the forest; below,—three hundred yards, say,—
Lower in level some twenty-five feet, thro' flats of shingle,
Stepping-stones and a cart-track cross in the open valley.
But, in the interval here, the boiling pent-up water
Frees itself by a final descent, attaining a bason
Ten feet wide and eighteen long, with whiteness and fury
Occupied partly, but mostly pellucid, pure, a mirror;
Beautiful there for the color derived from green rocks under;
Beautiful most of all where beads of foam uprising
Mingle their clouds of white with the delicate hue of the stillness.
Cliff over cliff for its sides, with rowan and pendent birch-boughs,
Here it lies, unthought of above at the bridge and pathway,
Still more concealed from below by wood and rocky projection.
You are shut in, left alone with yourself and perfection of water,
Hid on all sides, left alone with yourself and the goddess of bathing.”—
 
 
“So they bathed, they read, they roamed in glen and forest;
Far amid blackest pines to the waterfall they shadow,
Far up the long long glen to the loch, and the loch beyond it
Deep under huge red cliffs, a secret.”
 

In many of the images of this poem, as also in the volume “Ambarvalia,” the joint production of Clough and Thomas Burbidge, there is a peculiar moderness, a reference distinctly to the means and habits of society in these days, a recognition of every-day fact, and a willingness to believe it as capable of poetry as that which, but for having once been fact, would not now be tradition. There is a certain special character in passages like the following, the familiarity of the matter blending with the remoteness of the form of metre, such as should not be overlooked in attempting to estimate the author's mind and views of art:

 
“Still, as before (and as now), balls, dances, and evening parties,....
Seemed like a sort of unnatural up-in-the-air balloon work,....
As mere gratuitous trifling in presence of business and duty
As does the turning aside of the tourist to look at a landscape
Seem in the steamer or coach to the merchant in haste for the city.”—p. 12.
 
 
“I was as one that sleeps on the railway; one who, dreaming,
Hears thro' his dream the name of his home shouted out,—hears and hears not,
Faint, and louder again, and less loud, dying in distance,—
Dimly conscious, with something of inward debate and choice, and
Sense of [present] claim and reality present; relapses,
Nevertheless, and continues the dream and fancy, while forward,
Swiftly, remorseless, the car presses on, he knows not whither.”—p.38.
 

Indeed, the general adaptation of the style to the immediate matter, the alternation of the poetic and the familiar, with a certain mixture even of classical phrase and allusion, is highly appropriate, and may almost be termed constant, except in occasional instances where more poetry, and especially more conception and working out of images, is introduced than squares with a strict observance of nature. Thus the lines quoted where Elspie applies to herself the incident of “the high new bridge” and “the great key-stone in the middle” are succeeded by others (omitted in our extract) where the idea is followed into its details; and there is another passage in which, through no less than seventeen lines, she compares herself to an inland stream disturbed and hurried on by the mingling with it of the sea's tide. Thus also one of the most elaborate descriptions in the poem,—an episode in itself of the extremest beauty and finish, but, as we think, clearly misplaced,—is a picture of the dawn over a great city, introduced into a letter of Philip's, and that, too, simply as an image of his own mental condition. There are but few poets for whom it would be superfluous to reflect whether pieces of such-like mere poetry might not more properly form part of the descriptive groundwork, and be altogether banished from discourse and conversation, where the greater amount of their intrinsic care and excellence becomes, by its position, a proportionally increasing load of disregard for truthfulness.

For a specimen of a peculiarly noble spirit which pervades the whole work, we would refer the reader to the character of Arthur Audley, unnecessary to the story, but most important to the sentiment; for a comprehensive instance of minute feeling for individuality, to the narrative of Lindsay and the corrections of Arthur on returning from their tour.

 
“He to the great might have been upsoaring, sublime and ideal;
He to the merest it was restricting, diminishing, dwarfing;”
 

For pleasant ingenuity, involving, too, a point of character, to the final letter of Hobbes to Philip, wherein, in a manner made up of playful subtlety and real poetical feeling, he proves how “this Rachel and Leah is marriage.”

“The Bothie of Toper-na-fuosich” will not, it is to be feared, be extensively read; its length combined with the metre in which it is written, or indeed a first hasty glance at the contents, does not allure the majority even of poetical readers; but it will not be left or forgotten by such as fairly enter upon it. This is a poem essentially thought and studied, if not while in the act of writing, at least as the result of a condition of mind; and the author owes it to the appreciations of all into whose hands it shall come, and who are willing to judge for themselves, to call it, should a second edition appear, by its true name;—not a trifle, but a work.

That public attention should have been so little engaged by this poem is a fact in one respect somewhat remarkable, as contrasting with the notice which the “Ambarvalia” has received. Nevertheless, independently of the greater importance of “the Bothie” in length and development, it must, we think, be admitted to be written on sounder and more matured principles of taste,—the style being sufficiently characterized and distinctive without special prominence, whereas not a few of the poems in the other volume are examples rather of style than of thought, and might be held in recollection on account of the former quality alone.

Her First Season

 
He gazed her over, from her eyebrows down
Even to her feet: he gazed so with the good
Undoubting faith of fools, much as who should
Accost God for a comrade. In the brown
Of all her curls he seemed to think the town
Would make an acquisition; but her hood
Was not the newest fashion, and his brood
Of lady-friends might scarce approve her gown.
If I did smile, 'twas faintly; for my cheeks
Burned, thinking she'd be shown up to be sold,
And cried about, in the thick jostling run
Of the loud world, till all the weary weeks
Should bring her back to herself and to the old
Familiar face of nature and the sun.
 

A Sketch From Nature

 
The air blows pure, for twenty miles,
Over this vast countrié:
Over hill and wood and vale, it goeth,
Over steeple, and stack, and tree:
And there's not a bird on the wind but knoweth
How sweet these meadows be.
 
 
The swallows are flying beside the wood,
And the corbies are hoarsely crying;
And the sun at the end of the earth hath stood,
And, thorough the hedge and over the road,
On the grassy slope is lying:
And the sheep are taking their supper-food
While yet the rays are dying.
 
 
Sleepy shadows are filling the furrows,
And giant-long shadows the trees are making;
And velvet soft are the woodland tufts,
And misty-gray the low-down crofts;
But the aspens there have gold-green tops,
And the gold-green tops are shaking:
The spires are white in the sun's last light;—
And yet a moment ere he drops,
Gazes the sun on the golden slopes.
 
 
Two sheep, afar from fold,
Are on the hill-side straying,
With backs all silver, breasts all gold:
The merle is something saying,
Something very very sweet:—
‘The day—the day—the day is done:’
There answereth a single bleat—
The air is cold, the sky is dimming,
And clouds are long like fishes swimming.
 
Sydenham Wood, 1849.

An End

 
Love, strong as death, is dead.
Come, let us make his bed
Among the dying flowers:
A green turf at his head;
And a stone at his feet,
Whereon we may sit
In the quiet evening hours.
 
 
He was born in the spring,
And died before the harvesting.
On the last warm summer day
He left us;—he would not stay
For autumn twilight cold and grey
Sit we by his grave and sing
He is gone away.
 
 
To few chords, and sad, and low,
Sing we so.
Be our eyes fixed on the grass,
Shadow-veiled, as the years pass,
While we think of all that was
In the long ago.
 

Published Monthly, price 1s.

This Periodical will consist of original Poems, Stories to develope thought and principle, Essays concerning Art and other subjects, and analytic Reviews of current Literature—particularly of Poetry. Each number will also contain an Etching; the subject to be taken from the opening article of the month.

An attempt will be made, both intrinsically and by review, to claim for Poetry that place to which its present development in the literature of this country so emphatically entitles it.

The endeavour held in view throughout the writings on Art will be to encourage and enforce an entire adherence to the simplicity of nature; and also to direct attention, as an auxiliary medium, to the comparatively few works which Art has yet produced in this spirit. It need scarcely be added that the chief object of the etched designs will be to illustrate this aim practically, as far as the method of execution will permit; in which purpose they will be produced with the utmost care and completeness.

The Germ: Thoughts towards Nature In Poetry, Literature, and Art.
No. 2. February, 1850

With an Etching by JAMES COLLINSON
 
When whoso merely hath a little thought
Will plainly think the thought which is in him,—
Not imaging another's bright or dim,
Not mangling with new words what others taught;
When whoso speaks, from having either sought
Or only found,—will speak, not just to skim
A shallow surface with words made and trim,
But in that very speech the matter brought:
Be not too keen to cry—“So this is all!—
A thing I might myself have thought as well,
But would not say it, for it was not worth!”
Ask: “Is this truth?” For is it still to tell
That, be the theme a point or the whole earth,
Truth is a circle, perfect, great or small?
 

The Child Jesus

“O all ye that pass by the way, attend and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow.”—

Lamentations i.12.

I. The Agony in the Garden

 
Joseph, a carpenter of Nazareth,
And his wife Mary had an only child,
Jesus: One holy from his mother's womb.
Both parents loved him: Mary's heart alone
Beat with his blood, and, by her love and his,
She knew that God was with her, and she strove
Meekly to do the work appointed her;
To cherish him with undivided care
Who deigned to call her mother, and who loved
From her the name of son. And Mary gave
Her heart to him, and feared not; yet she seemed
To hold as sacred that he said or did;
And, unlike other women, never spake
His words of innocence again; but all
Were humbly treasured in her memory
With the first secret of his birth. So strong
Grew her affection, as the child increased
In wisdom and in stature with his years,
That many mothers wondered, saying: “These
Our little ones claim in our hearts a place
The next to God; but Mary's tenderness
Grows almost into reverence for her child.
Is he not of herself? I' the temple when
Kneeling to pray, on him she bends her eyes,
As though God only heard her prayer through him.
Is he to be a prophet? Nay, we know
That out of Galilee no prophet comes.”
 
 
But all their children made the boy their friend.
 
 
Three cottages that overlooked the sea
Stood side by side eastward of Nazareth.
Behind them rose a sheltering range of cliffs,
Purple and yellow, verdure-spotted, red,
Layer upon layer built up against the sky.
In front a row of sloping meadows lay,
Parted by narrow streams, that rose above,
Leaped from the rocks, and cut the sands below
Into deep channels widening to the sea.
 
 
Within the humblest of these three abodes
Dwelt Joseph, his wife Mary, and their child.
A honeysuckle and a moss-rose grew,
With many blossoms, on their cottage front;
And o'er the gable warmed by the South
A sunny grape vine broadened shady leaves
Which gave its tendrils shelter, as they hung
Trembling upon the bloom of purple fruit.
And, like the wreathed shadows and deep glows
Which the sun spreads from some old oriel
Upon the marble Altar and the gold
Of God's own Tabernacle, where he dwells
For ever, so the blossoms and the vine,
On Jesus' home climbing above the roof,
Traced intricate their windings all about
The yellow thatch, and part concealed the nests
Whence noisy close-housed sparrows peeped unseen.
And Joseph had a little dove-cote placed
Between the gable-window and the eaves,
Where two white turtle doves (a gift of love
From Mary's kinsman Zachary to her child)
Cooed pleasantly; and broke upon the ear
The ever dying sound of falling waves.
 
 
And so it came to pass, one Summer morn,
The mother dove first brought her fledgeling out
To see the sun. It was her only one,
And she had breasted it through three long weeks
With patient instinct till it broke the shell;
And she had nursed it with all tender care,
Another three, and watched the white down grow
Into full feather, till it left her nest.
And now it stood outside its narrow home,
With tremulous wings let loose and blinking eyes;
While, hovering near, the old dove often tried
By many lures to tempt it to the ground,
That they might feed from Jesus' hand, who stood
Watching them from below. The timid bird
At last took heart, and, stretching out its wings,
Brushed the light vine-leaves as it fluttered down.
Just then a hawk rose from a tree, and thrice
Wheeled in the air, and poised his aim to drop
On the young dove, whose quivering plumage swelled
About the sunken talons as it died.
Then the hawk fixed his round eye on the child,
Shook from his beak the stained down, screamed, and flapped
His broad arched wings, and, darting to a cleft
I' the rocks, there sullenly devoured his prey.
And Jesus heard the mother's anguished cry,
Weak like the distant sob of some lost child,
Who in his terror runs from path to path,
Doubtful alike of all; so did the dove,
As though death-stricken, beat about the air;
Till, settling on the vine, she drooped her head
Deep in her ruffled feathers. She sat there,
Brooding upon her loss, and did not move
All through that day.
 
 
And, sitting by her, covered up his face:
Until a cloud, alone between the earth
And sun, passed with its shadow over him.
Then Jesus for a moment looked above;
And a few drops of rain fell on his brow,
Sad, as with broken hints of a lost dream,
Or dim foreboding of some future ill.
 
 
Now, from a garden near, a fair-haired girl
Came, carrying a handful of choice flowers,
Which in her lap she sorted orderly,
As little children do at Easter-time
To have all seemly when their Lord shall rise.
Then Jesus' covered face she gently raised,
Placed in his hand the flowers, and kissed his cheek
And tried with soothing words to comfort him;
He from his eyes spoke thanks.
 
 
Fast trickling down his face, drop upon drop,
Fell to the ground. That sad look left him not
Till night brought sleep, and sleep closed o'er his woe.
 

II. The Scourging

 
Again there came a day when Mary sat
Within the latticed doorway's fretted shade,
Working in bright and many colored threads
A girdle for her child, who at her feet
Lay with his gentle face upon her lap.
Both little hands were crossed and tightly clasped
Around her knee. On them the gleams of light
Which broke through overhanging blossoms warm,
And cool transparent leaves, seemed like the gems
Which deck Our Lady's shrine when incense-smoke
Ascends before her, like them, dimly seen
Behind the stream of white and slanting rays
Which came from heaven, as a veil of light,
Across the darkened porch, and glanced upon
The threshold-stone; and here a moth, just born
To new existence, stopped upon her flight,
To bask her blue-eyed scarlet wings spread out
Broad to the sun on Jesus' naked foot,
Advancing its warm glow to where the grass,
Trimmed neatly, grew around the cottage door.
 
 
And the child, looking in his mother's face,
Would join in converse upon holy things
With her, or, lost in thought, would seem to watch
The orange-belted wild bees when they stilled
Their hum, to press with honey-searching trunk
The juicy grape; or drag their waxed legs
Half buried in some leafy cool recess
Found in a rose; or else swing heavily
Upon the bending woodbine's fragrant mouth,
And rob the flower of sweets to feed the rock,
Where, in a hazel-covered crag aloft
Parting two streams that fell in mist below,
The wild bees ranged their waxen vaulted cells.
 
 
As the time passed, an ass's yearling colt,
Bearing a heavy load, came down the lane
That wound from Nazareth by Joseph's house,
Sloping down to the sands. And two young men,
The owners of the colt, with many blows
From lash and goad wearied its patient sides;
Urging it past its strength, so they might win
Unto the beach before a ship should sail.
Passing the door, the ass turned round its head,
And looked on Jesus: and he knew the look;
And, knowing it, knew too the strange dark cross
Laying upon its shoulders and its back.
It was a foal of that same ass which bare
The infant and the mother, when they fled
To Egypt from the edge of Herod's sword.
And Jesus watched them, till they reached the sands.
Then, by his mother sitting down once more,
Once more there came that shadow of deep grief
Upon his brow when Mary looked at him:
And she remembered it in days that came.
 

III. The Crowning with Thorns

 
And the time passed.
The child sat by himself upon the beach,
While Joseph's barge freighted with heavy wood,
Bound homewards, slowly labored thro' the calm.
And, as he watched the long waves swell and break,
Run glistening to his feet, and sink again,
Three children, and then two, with each an arm
Around the other, throwing up their songs,
Such happy songs as only children know,
Came by the place where Jesus sat alone.
But, when they saw his thoughtful face, they ceased,
And, looking at each other, drew near him;
While one who had upon his head a wreath
Of hawthorn flowers, and in his hand a reed,
Put these both from him, saying, “Here is one
Whom you shall all prefer instead of me
To be our king;” and then he placed the wreath
On Jesus' brow, who meekly bowed his head.
And, when he took the reed, the children knelt,
And cast their simple offerings at his feet:
And, almost wondering why they loved him so,
Kissed him with reverence, promising to yield
Grave fealty. And Jesus did return
Their childish salutations; and they passed
Singing another song, whose music chimed
With the sea's murmur, like a low sweet chant
Chanted in some wide church to Jesus Christ.
And Jesus listened till their voices sank
Behind the jutting rocks, and died away:
Then the wave broke, and Jesus felt alone.
Who being alone, on his fair countenance
And saddened beauty all unlike a child's
The sun of innocence did light no smile,
As on the group of happy faces gone.
 

IV. Jesus Carrying his Cross

 
And, when the barge arrived, and Joseph bare
The wood upon his shoulders, piece by piece,
Up to his shed, Jesus ran by his side,
Yearning for strength to help the aged man
Who tired himself with work all day for him.
But Joseph said: “My child, it is God's will
That I should work for thee until thou art
Of age to help thyself.—Bide thou his time
Which cometh—when thou wilt be strong enough,
And on thy shoulders bear a tree like this.”
So, while he spake, he took the last one up,
Settling it with heaved back, fetching his breath.
Then Jesus lifted deep prophetic eyes
Full in the old man's face, but nothing said,
Running still on to open first the door.
 
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