Selections from the American poets / by William Cullen Bryant [electronic text]

ROBERT C. SANDS.

SLEEP OF PAPANTZIN.

'TWAS then, one eve, when o'er the imperial lake And all its cities, glittering in their pomp, The lord of glory threw his parting smiles, In Tlatelolco's palace, in her bower, Papantzin lay reclined; sister of him At whose name monarchs trembled. Yielding there To musings various, o'er her senses crept Or sleep or kindred death.

It seemed she stood In an illimitable plain, that stretched Its desert continuity around, Upon the o'erwearied sight; in contrast strange With that rich vale, where only she had dwelt, Whose everlasting mountains, girdling it, As in a chalice held a kingdom's wealth; Their summits freezing, where the eagle tired, But found no resting-place. Papantzin looked On endless barrenness, and walked perplexed Through the dull haze, along the boundless heath,

Like some lone ghost in Mictlan's cheerless gloom Debarred from light and glory.

Wandering thus, She came where a great sullen river poured Its turbid waters with a rushing sound Of painful moans; as if the inky waves Were hastening still on their complaining course To escape the horrid solitudes. Beyond What seemed a highway ran, with branching paths Innumerous. This to gain, she sought to plunge Straight in the troubled stream. For well she knew To shun with agile limbs the current's force, Nor feared the noise of waters. She had played From infancy in her fair native lake, Amid the gay plumed creatures floating round, Wheeling for diving, with their changeful hues, As fearless and as innocent as they.

A vision stayed her purpose. By her side Stood a bright youth; and startling, as she gazed On his effulgence, every sense was bound In pleasing awe and in fond reverence. For not Tezcatlipoca, as he shone Upon her priest-led fancy, when from heaven By filmy thread sustained he came to earth, In his resplendent mail reflecting allIts images, with dazzling portraiture, Was, in his radiance and immortal youth, A peer to this new god. His stature was Like that of men; but matched with his, the port Of kings tall dreaded was the crouching mien Of suppliants at their feet. Serene the light That floated round him, as the lineaments It cased with its mild glory. Gravely sweet The impression of his features, which to scan Their lofty loveliness forbade: his eyes She felt, but saw not: only, on his brow—From over which, encircled by what seemed

A ring of liquid diamond, in pure light Revolving ever, backward flowed his locks In buoyant, waving clusters—on his brow She marked a CROSS described; and lowly bent, She knew not wherefore, to the sacred sign. From either shoulder mantled o'er his front Wings dropping feathery silver; and his robe Snow-white in the still air was motionless, As that of chiselled god, or the pale shroud Of some fear-conjured ghost.

Her hand he took, And led her passive o'er the naked banks Of that black stream, still murmuring angrily. But, as he spoke, she heard its moans no more; His voice seemed sweeter than the hymnings raised By brave and gentle souls in Paradise, To celebrate the outgoing of the sun On his majestic progress over heaven. "Stay, princess," thus he spoke, "thou mayst not yet O'erpass these waters. Though thou knowest it not Nor Him, God loves thee." So he led her on, Unfainting, amid hideous sights and sounds; For now, o'er scattered sculls and grisly bones They walked; while underneath, before, behind, Rise dolorous wails and groans protracted long, Sobs of deep anguish, screams of agony, And melancholy sighs, and the fierce yell Of hopeless and intolerable pain.

Shuddering, as, in the gloomy whirlwind's pause Through the malign, distempered atmosphere, The second circle's purple blackness, passed The pitying Florentine, who saw the shades Of poor Francesca and her paramour; The princess o'er the ghastly relics stepped, Listening the frightful clamour; till a gleam, Whose sickly and phosphoric lustre seemed Kindled from these decaying bones, lit up

The sable river. Then a pageant came Over its obscure tides, of stately barks, Gigantic, with their prows of quaint device, Tall masts, and ghostly canvass, huge and high, Hung in the unnatural light and lifeless air. Grim bearded men, with stern and angry looks, Strange robes, and uncouth armour, stood behind Their galleries and bulwarks. One ship bore A broad sheet pendant, where, inwrought with gold, She marked the symbol that adorned the brow Of her mysterious guide. Down the dark stream Swept on the spectral fleet, in the false light Flickering and fading. Louder then uprose The roar of voices from the accursed strand.

WAKING OF PAPANTZIN IN THE SEPULCHRE.

She woke in darkness and in solitude. Slow passed her lethargy away, and long To her half-dreaming eye that brilliant sign Distinct appeared. Then damp and close she felt The air around, and knew the poignant smell Of spicy herbs collected and confined. As those awakening from some troubled trance Are wont, she would have learned by touch if yet The spirit to the body was allied. Strange hindrances prevented. O'er her face A mask thick-plated lay—and round her swathed Was many a costly and encumbering robe, Such as she wore on some high festival, O'erspread with precious gems, rayless and cold, That now pressed hard and sharp against her touch. The cumbrous collar round her slender neck, Of gold thick studded with each valued stone Earth and the sea-depths yield for human pride—The bracelets and the many-twisted rings That girt her taper limbs, coil upon coil— What were they in this dungeon's solitude?

The plumy coronal that would have sprung Light from her fillet in the purer air, Waving in mockery of the rainbow tints, Now drooping low, and steeped in clogging dews, Oppressive hung. Groping in dubious search, She found the household goods, the spindle, broom, Gicalli quaintly sculptured, and the jar That held the useless beverage for the dead. By these, and by the jewel to her lip Attached, the emerald symbol of the soul,In its green life immortal, soon she knew Her dwelling was a sepulchre.

She loosed The mask, and from her feathery bier uprose, Casting away the robe, which like long alb Wrapped her; and with it many an aloe leaf, Inscribed with Azteck characters and signs, To guide the spirit where the serpent hissed, Hills towered, and deserts spread, and keen winds blew, And many a "flower of death;" though their frail leaves Were yet unwithered. For the living warmth Which in her dwelt, their freshness had preserved; Else, if corruption had begun its work, The emblems of quick change would have survived Her beauty's semblance. What is beauty worth, If the cropp'd flower retains its tender bloom When foul decay has stolen the latest lines Of loveliness in death? Yet even now Papantzin knew that her exuberant locks— Which, unconfined, had round her flowed to earth, Like a stream rushing down some rocky steep, Threaded ten thousand channels—had been shorn Of half their waving length, and liked it not.

But through a crevice soon she marked a gleam Of rays uncertain; and, with staggering steps, But strong in reckless dreaminess, while still

Presided o'er the chaos of her thoughts The revelation that upon her soul Dwelt with its power, she gained the cavern's throat, And pushed the quarried stone aside, and stood In the free air, and in her own domain.

But now obscurely o'er her vision swam The beauteous landscape, with its thousand tints And changeful views; long alleys of bright trees Bending beneath their fruits; espaliers gay With tropic flowers and shrubs that filled the breeze With odorous incense, basins vast, where birds With shining plumage sported, smooth canals Leading the glassy wave, or towering grove Of forest veterans. On a rising bank, Her seat accustomed, near a well hewn out From ancient rocks into which waters gushed From living springs, where she was wont to bathe, She threw herself to muse. Dim on her sight The imperial city and its causeways rose, With the broad lake and all its floating isles And glancing shallops, and the gilded pomp Of princely barges, canopied with plumes Spread fanlike, or with tufted pageantry Waving magnificent. Unmarked around The frequent huitzilin, with murmuring hum Of ever-restless wing, and shrill sweet note, Shot twinkling, with the ruby star that glowed Over his tiny bosom, and all hues That loveliest seem in heaven, with ceaseless change, Flashing from his fine films. And all in vain Untiring, from the rustling branches near, Poured the Centzontli all his hundred strains Of imitative melody. Not now She heeded them. Yet pleasant was the shade Of palms and cedars; and through twining boughs And fluttering leaves, the subtle god of air, The serpent armed with plumes, most welcome crept, And fanned her cheek with kindest ministry.

A dull and dismal sound came booming on; A solemn, wild, and melancholy noise, Shaking the tranquil air; and afterward A clash and jangling, barbarously prolonged, Torturing the unwilling car, rang dissonant. Again the unnatural thunder rolled along, Again the crash and clamour followed it. Shuddering she heard, who knew that every peal From the dread gong, announced a victim's heart Torn from his breast, and each triumphant clang, A mangled corse down the great temple's stairs Hurled headlong; and she knew, as lately taught, How vengeance was ordained for cruelty; How pride would end; and uncouth soldiers tread Through bloody furrows o'er her pleasant groves And gardens; and would make themselves a road Over the dead, choking the silver lake, And cast the battered idols down the steps That climbed their execrable towers, and raze Sheer from the ground Ahuitzol's mighty pile.

GOOD-NIGHT.

GOOD-night to all the world! there's none, Beneath the "over-going" sun, To whom I feel, or hate, or spite, And so to all a fair good-night.

Would I could say good-night to pain, Good-night to conscience and her train, To cheerless poverty, and shame That I am yet unknown to fame!

Would I could say good-night to dreams That haunt me with delusive gleams, That through the sable future's veil Like meteors glimmer, but to fail.

Would I could say a long good-night To halting between wrong and right, And, like a giant with new force, Awake prepared to run my course!

But time o'er good and ill sweeps on, And when few years have come and gone, The past will be to me as naught, Whether remembered or forgot.

Yet let me hope one faithful friend O'er my last couch in tears shall bend; And, though no day for me was bright, Shall bid me then a long good-night.

THE DEAD OF 1832.

OH Time and Death! with certain pace, Though still unequal, hurrying on, O'erturning in your awful race, The cot, the palace, and the throne!

Not always in the storm of war, Nor by the pestilence that sweeps From the plague-smitten realms afar, Beyond the old and solemn deeps:

In crowds the good and mighty go,And to those vast dim chambers hie: Where, mingled with the high and low, Dead Cæsars and dead Shakspeares lie!

Dread ministers of God! sometimes Ye smite at once to do his will, In all earth's ocean-severed climes, Those—whose renown ye cannot kill!

When all the brightest stars that burn At once are banished from their spheres, Men sadly ask, when shall return Such lustre to the coming years?

For where is he3 1.1—who lived so long— Who raised the modern Titan's ghost, And showed his fate in powerful song, Whose soul for learning's sake was lost?

Where he—who backward to the birth Of Time itself, adventurous trod, And in the mingled mass of earth Found out the handiwork of God?4 1.2

Where he—who in the mortal head,5 1.3 Ordained to gaze on heaven, could trace The soul's vast features, that shall tread The stars, when earth is nothingness?

Where he—who struck old Albyn's lyre,6 1.4 Till round the world its echoes roll, And swept, with all a prophet's fire, The diapason of the soul?

Where he—who read the mystic lore,7 1.5Buried, where buried Pharaohs sleep; And dared presumptuous to explore Secrets four thousand years could keep?

Where he—who, with a poet's eye8 1.6 Of truth, on lowly nature gazed, And made even sordid Poverty Classic, when in HIS numbers glazed?

Where—that old sage so hale and staid,9 1.7 The "greatest good" who sought to find, Who in his garden mused, and made All forms of rule for all mankind?

And thou—whom millions far removed10 1.8 Revered—the hierarch meek and wise, Thy ashes sleep, adored, beloved, Near where thy Wesley's coffin lies.

He too—the heir of glory—where11 1.9 Hath great Napoleon's scion fled? Ah! glory goes not to an heir! Take him, ye noble, vulgar dead!

But hark! a nation sighs! for he,12 1.10 Last of the brave who perilled all To make an infant empire free, Obeys the inevitable call!

They go—and with them is a crowd, For human rights who THOUGHT and DID, We rear to them no temples proud, Each hath his mental pyramid.

All earth is now their sepulchre, The MIND, their monument sublime— Young in eternal fame they are— Such are YOUR triumphs, Death and Time.

Notes

• 3 1.1

  Goethe and his Faust.
• 4 1.2

  Cuvier.
• 5 1.3

  Spurzheim.
• 6 1.4

  Scott.
• 7 1.5

  Champollion.
• 8 1.6

  Crabbe.
• 9 1.7

  Jeremy Bentham.
• 10 1.8

  Adam Clarke.
• 11 1.9

  The Duke of Reichstadt.
• 12 1.10

  Charles Carroll.