Light : a narrative poem / by Joaquin Miller [electronic text]

CANTO II

I

FROM out the surge of Sutro's steep, Beyond the Gate a rock uprears, So sudden, savage, unawares The very billows start and leap, As frightened at its lifted face, So shoreless, sealess, out of place: A sea-washed, surge-locked isle, as lone As lorn Napoleon on his throne — His Saint Helena throne, where still The dazed world in dumb wonder turns To his high throned, imperious will And incense burns and ever burns. Here huge sea-lions climb and cling, Despite of surge and sethe and shock,

The topmost limit of the rock, And one is named Napoleon, king. Behold him lord the land, the sea,. In lone, unquestioned majesty!

II

She saw, she raised alert her head With eager face and cheery said: "What lusty, upheaved, bull-built neck! What lungs to lift above the roar! What captain on his quarter-deck To mock the sea and scorn the shore! I like that scar across his breast, I like his ardent, lover's zest!"

III

The huge sea-beast uprose, uprose, As if to surely topple down; He reached his black and bearded nose Above his harem, gray, black, brown, Sleek, shining, wet or steaming dry, And mouthed and mouthed against the sky.

IV

What eloquence, what hot love pain! What land but this, what love but his? What isle of bliss but this and this To roar and love and roar again?

What land, what love but this his own, Loud thundered from his slippery throne; Loud thundered in his Sappho's ear, As if she could not, would not hear.

V

At last her heart was moved and she Raised two bright eyes to his black beard, Then sudden turned, as if she feared, And threw her headlong in the sea, Another Sappho, all for love. While Phaon towered still above— An instant only; yet once more That upheaved head, that great bull neck, That sea-born, bossed, bull-throated roar— A poise, a plunge, a flash, a fleck, And far down, caverned in the deep, Where sea-green curtains swing and sweep And varicolored carpets creep, Soft emerald or amethyst, Two lion lovers kept sweet tryst.

VI

She looked, looked long, then smiled, then sighed, A proud, pure soul unsatisfied, Then sat dense grasses suddenly And thrust a foot above the sea. She threw her backward, arms wide out,

And up the poppy-spangled steep O'er grass-set cushions sown in gold, As she would sleep yet would not sleep. She reached her wide hands fast about And grasses, gold and manifold, Of lowly blossoms, pink and blue, She gathered in and laughing threw, With bare-armed, heedless, happy grace— Threw fragrant handfuls in his face. And then as if to sleep she lay, A babe nursed at the breast of May — Lay back with wide eyes to the skies And clouds of wondrous butterflies; Such Mariposa blooms in air! Such bloomy, golden, poppy hair! And which were hers or poppy's gold Without close care none could have told; And which were butterflies or bloom, To guess there was not guessing room, The while, in quest of sweets or rest, They fanned her face, they kissed her breast.

VII

That face like to a lilt of song— A face of sea-shell tint, with tide Of springtime flowing fast and strong And fearless in its maiden pride—

Such rich rose ambushed in such hair Of heedless, wind-kissed, poppy gold, Blown here, blown there, blown anywhere, Soft-lifting, falling fold on fold, As made gold poppies where she lay Turn envious, turn green as May! What wise face yet what wilful face A face that would not be denied No more than gipsy winds that race The sea bank in their saucy pride; A form that knew yet only knew The natural, the human, true.

VIII

Those two round mounds of Nineveh, What treasures of the past they knew! But these two round mounds here to-day Hold treasures richer far than they, And prophecies more truly true. Old Nineveh's twin mounds are dust; They only know the ghostly past; But these two new mounds hold in trust The awful future, hold the vastUnbounded empire, land or sea, Henceforth, for all eternity. Let pass dead pasts; far wiser turn And delve the future; love and learn.

IX

It seems she dreamed. She slept, we know, A happy, quiet little space, Then thrust a round limb far below And half-way turned aside her face, And then she threw her arms wide out In sleep, and so reached blind about, As if for something she might find From fortune-telling, gipsy wind.

X

The soft, warm winds from far away Were weary, and they crept so near They lay against her willing ear As if they had so much to say. And she, she seemed so glad to hear The while she loving, sleeping lay And dreamed of love nor dreamed of doubt, But laughing thrust her form far out And down the fragrant poppy steep In playful, restless, happy sleep. She sighed, she heaved her hilly breast, As one who would but could not rest.

XI

How natural, how free, how fair, The while the happy winds on wing,

As larger butterflies, laid bare A rippled, braided rim of white And outstretched ankles exquisite. What arms to hold a babe at breast — Such breast as prudist never guessed! What shapely limbs, what everything That makes great woman great and good— That makes for proud, pure motherhood!

XII

Such thews as mount the steeps of morn, Such limbs as love, not lust shall share, Such legs as God has shaped to bear The weight of ages, worlds unborn; Such limbs as Lesbian shrines revealed When comely, longing mothers kneeled; Such thews as Phidias loved to hew, Such limbs as Leighton loved to draw When painting tall, Greek girls at play; Such legs as blind old Homer saw, As Marlowe knew but yesterday, When Helen climbed in dreams for him Her cloud-topped towers of Ilium.