Mazelli, and Other Poems - George W. Sands (great novels TXT) 📗

gay and careless, till the day
Waned past: night came: the heavens grew
Black, dread and threat'ning. Then the storm
Came forth in its devouring wrath;
Before it fled Fear's pallid form;
Destruction followed in its path;
It passed: the morning came: in vain,
I look for that lost bark again.

III.

Far down beneath the deep blue waves,
Within some merman's coral hall,
Her fated crew have found their graves;
Above them, for their burial pall,
The mermaids spread their flowing tresses;
The waters chant their requiem;
From many an eyelid, Pity presses
Her tender, dewy tears for them:
The natives of the ocean weep,
To view them sleeping death's pale sleep.

IV.

Thou, mortal, wast the bark I saw;
The waters, were the sea of life;
And thou, alas! too well dost know,
What storms were imaged in the strife
Of winds and waves. The hopes of youth,
Thou, in that bark's lost crew, may'st see,--
All buried now within that smooth,
Vast, boundless deep,--eternity:--
And I, a spirit though I be,
Can pity still, and weep for thee.

[The cloud settles near the fountain, and, unclosing, discovers
a beautiful form looking steadily at Werner.

WERNER (addressing it).

How beautiful!
If intercourse between all living worlds,
Had not been barr'd by Him who gave them life,
I should believe thou wert the guardian spirit,
Of that which men have named the Queen of Night.
Like her, thou art majestic, pale and sad,
And of a tender beauty: those bright curls
That press thy brow, and cling about thy neck,
Seem made of sunbeams, caught upon their way
To earth, by some creative hand, and woven
Into a fairy web, of light and life,
Conscious of its high source, and proud to be
A part of aught so beautiful as thou.
I have seen many full, bright mortal eyes,
That were a labyrinth of witching charms,
In which the heart of him who looked was lost;
But none like thine; their light is not of earth;
Their loveliness not like what man calls lovely.
Beside the smoothness of thy brow and cheek,
The lily's lip were rough; each of thy limbs,
Is, in itself, a being and a beauty.
If that the orb thou didst inhabit, ere
Thou wert a portion of eternity,
Was worthy of such dwellers, oh! how fair
And glorious, must have been its fields and bow'rs!
How clear its streams! how pure and fresh its airs!
How mellow were its fruits! how bright its flow'rs!
How strong and brave the beings, fit to share
It with thee! 'Tis most strange that He, whose hand
Fashions such wondrous things, should take delight
In striking them to nothingness again!
Perchance the author of all evil had
Invaded it, and made it quite unfit
To be a part of God's great universe.
And yet thou lookest as if thou wert beyond
The power of temptation to assail.
Hast thou too sinned?

Spirit.

I have lived as thou livest, died as thou
Wilt have to die, and am what thou shalt be.

Werner

I have not questioned thee of life or death,
Nor of the state which shall succeed them both;
I care not for the first, nor fear the second;
The last I leave to Him who gave to man
Eternity for his inheritance.
But I would know if the unceasing war,
Which good and evil wage upon the earth,
Has reached beyond, its confines.

Spirit.

Have I not answered thee?
The Begetter of worlds, stars, suns, and systems!
The Father of Creation! the Bridegroom
Of the Spirit! hath He not written that
Death has dominion only over sin?
And thou would'st know if other worlds have felt
The curse that fell upon, and blighted thine.
Poor simple child of clay! no doubt thou know'st
The story of the Eden of thy sire,
And think'st that there, in its fresh, stainless breast,
The baleful seeds of evil first were sown,
Which since have spread so fearfully abroad,--
When the sad doom, that came on him and his,
Was but the spray, cast from the wave of fate,
Which just then reached thy newly finished orb.
Where it first started--whither tends its course--
Where it shall stop--how many wrecks of worlds--
Once fairer far than thine was at its birth--
Shall strew its desolate way,--is not for things
Brought forth from dust to know.
What wouldst thou of me?

Werner.

The sole remaining good, if good it be,
That yet is mine to share. I have tried all
That earthly hope holds out to satisfy
The longings of man's nature. I have loved,
And made an idol of the thing I loved,
And worshipped it with all my soul's intensity;
And, for awhile, the frenzy of my dream
Shut out all other thoughts. But it was short;
Death plucked my lovely flower from my grasp,
And then, the icy chill of desolation
Came, like a snowy avalanche, upon
My heart, and froze the fountains of its feeling.
I was ambitious. I have striven for,
And worn, the gaudiest wreath of fame, and when
I would have placed it on my brow, it grew
A mountain in its weight. I courted much
The notice of the world, and when men praised,
The very breath that bore their praise to me,
Seemed clogged with pestilence.

Wealth, too, I coveted,
And heaped its shining dust in hoards around me,
And yet it was but dust, as barren of
Enjoyment as the ground we tread upon.
I clad myself in purple--heaped my board
With all the fairest, sweetest fruits of earth,
And filled my golden goblets with bright juice,
Pressed from the goodliest grapes, and made my couch
Of down, and yet, I was most wretched still.
My garments were but cumbersome; my couch
Could give no rest, and e'en my generous wines
Could not remove the crushing weight that sat,
Nightmare-like, on my heart, until it grew
A palpable and keenly aching pang.
There is, one path which yet remains untrod;
To be my guide in it, I called thee hither,--
'Tis that of knowledge.

Spirit.

The same
In which the mother of thy race was lost,
With e'en a wiser, mightier guide than I.
She thirsted, too, for knowledge, and she gave
Her innocence--her home in Paradise--
The happiness of him--who shared her lot--
To know--what? That her wn rebellious hand
Had raised the flood-gates of a sea of crime,
Which would for ever pour its bitter waves
Upon the helpless unprotected race,
Which her rash deed had ruined.
Think of the sighs--the groans--the floods of tears--
The woes--too deep for these--which have no end,
Save but in heart-breaks! Think upon the toil--
The sweat--the pain--the strife--the crime--the blood--
The myriads of souls with which this one
Sad lesson was obtained! whose price is yet
Not fully paid, nor shall be so, until
The last poor son of earth mingles with dust!
Dost thou not fear to tread a path like this?

Werner.

I have no fear;
It is so long since I have felt its thrill
That 'twere a pleasure now to feel it.

Spirit.

What wouldst thou know?
Thou art familiar with all earthly lore.
More: Thou hast gained, and wield'st a power, to which
The rulers of the elements do bow;
The hurricane, at thy command goes forth,
Walking where'er thou bid'st it, and the storm
Ceases to howl when thou hast said,--"Be still!"
Thine anger stirs the ocean, and thy wrath
Finds out the deep foundations of the mountains,
And shakes them with its strength; the subtle fire,
That lights the tempest on its gloomy way,
Starts from its cloud-rocked slumber, at thy call,
To be thy messenger.
Canst thou not be content when thou art feared
By those who rule a world? What is there yet
Which thy insatiate mind desires to know?
Would'st learn immortal mysteries? Reflect
Thou art but mortal.

Werner.

Spirit, why dost thou
Taunt me with my mortality? "Weak things,
Brought forth from earth,"--"Poor simple child of clay,"--
These are thy words, when well thou knows't that I,
Though bound to earth by bonds made of its mire,
Am mightier than thou. Were it not so,
Thou would'st not now be face to face with one
Of mortal birth. Thou, too, canst feel revenge,
And knowest how to wreak it; but, take heed,--
The power which brought thee hither, can, and may
Deal harshly with thee. If thou knowest aught
Worthy of an immortal mind to know,
To which I have not pierced, reveal thy knowledge.

Spirit.

We may not tell the secrets of eternity;
But I can show thee things thou hast not seen,
And they may profit thee, although 'twill shake
Even thy proud heart to look upon them.
Would'st see them?

Werner.

It is my wish.

Spirit.

Come then.

Werner.

Lead on;
Although thy path be through hell's gloomy gate,
I too will pass its portals at thy back.
Thou canst not enter where I dare not pass.

[The cloud closes around them, and moves away, and a voice sings
as it disappears.

To the region of shadow,
The region of death,
Where dust is a stranger,
And life has no breath;
Where darkness and silence
Their dim shrouds have cast
Round the phantoms of worlds
That belong to the past;
Spirits who sit on
The thrones of the air,
Guide ye our chariot,
Waft ye us there.

[Exeunt.


Act II.

The verge of Creation. Enter Werner and Spirit.

Werner.

We have outtravelled light and sound:
The harmonies that pealed around us, as
Through yon array of dim and distant worlds
We winged our flight, have wholly died away,
Or come to us so faintly echoed, that
Our ears must watch and wait to catch them.
Those stars are now like watch-fires, which though seen
Blazing afar, send not their light to make
The path of the benighted wanderer
More plain and cheerful.
Before us stretches one vast field of gloom,
So dense as to appear impenetrable:--
Darkness, that has a body and a form,
Both palpable to touch and sight, across
Our path a barrier rears that seems to bar
Our farther progress. If there be, beyond
This wall of blackness, aught of mystery,
What power shall guide us to it?

Spirit.

Thy mind
Which, from the influence of matter, free
As it is now and shall be till again
Though art returned unto thy native orb,
Is its own master, and its will is now
Its only needed guide.
Strange things are hidden by that ebon veil,
To which a single wish of thine may bear us.

Werner.

Then let us on:
Since we our search for knowledge have begun,
Wherever there is aught that Power has made,
Which Time has ruined, or which Fate has damned,
There let us go, that we may look on it,
And learn its history. What intense glooms
We now are passing through! I feel them part
Before, and close behind us, as we fly,
As plainly as the swimmer feels the waves
That lave his gliding limbs. This sure must be
The home of Death--no voice, no sound, no sigh,
Not ev'n so much of breath as would suffice
To make a lily tremble!

Spirt.

Though say'st true,
This is indeed the realm of Death,--at least
It has no more of life than what though hast
Brought here with thee,--I speak of mortal life:
We now are near the Hades of past worlds,
Whose spirits have a life which cannot die.
You laugh! and show the haughty arrogance
Which in your mortal