songs of travel-第4章
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Shall mourn their Kaiulani gone;
And I; in her dear banyan shade;
Look vainly for my little maid。
But our Scots islands far away
Shall glitter with unwonted day;
And cast for once their tempests by
To smile in Kaiulani's eye。
Honolulu。
XXXI … TO MOTHER MARYANNE
To see the infinite pity of this place;
The mangled limb; the devastated face;
The innocent sufferer smiling at the rod …
A fool were tempted to deny his God。
He sees; he shrinks。 But if he gaze again;
Lo; beauty springing from the breast of pain!
He marks the sisters on the mournful shores;
And even a fool is silent and adores。
Guest House; Kalawao; Molokai。
XXXII … IN MEMORIAM E。 H。
I KNEW a silver head was bright beyond compare;
I knew a queen of toil with a crown of silver hair。
Garland of valour and sorrow; of beauty and renown;
Life; that honours the brave; crowned her himself with the crown。
The beauties of youth are frail; but this was a jewel of age。
Life; that delights in the brave; gave it himself for a gage。
Fair was the crown to behold; and beauty its poorest part …
At once the scar of the wound and the order pinned on the heart。
The beauties of man are frail; and the silver lies in the dust;
And the queen that we call to mind sleeps with the brave and the just;
Sleeps with the weary at length; but; honoured and ever fair;
Shines in the eye of the mind the crown of the silver hair。
Honolulu。
XXXIII … TO MY WIFE (A Fragment)
LONG must elapse ere you behold again
Green forest frame the entry of the lane …
The wild lane with the bramble and the brier;
The year…old cart…tracks perfect in the mire;
The wayside smoke; perchance; the dwarfish huts;
And ramblers' donkey drinking from the ruts: …
Long ere you trace how deviously it leads;
Back from man's chimneys and the bleating meads
To the woodland shadow; to the sylvan hush;
When but the brooklet chuckles in the brush …
Back from the sun and bustle of the vale
To where the great voice of the nightingale
Fills all the forest like a single room;
And all the banks smell of the golden broom;
So wander on until the eve descends。
And back returning to your firelit friends;
You see the rosy sun; despoiled of light;
Hung; caught in thickets; like a schoolboy's kite。
Here from the sea the unfruitful sun shall rise;
Bathe the bare deck and blind the unshielded eyes;
The allotted hours aloft shall wheel in vain
And in the unpregnant ocean plunge again。
Assault of squalls that mock the watchful guard;
And pluck the bursting canvas from the yard;
And senseless clamour of the calm; at night
Must mar your slumbers。 By the plunging light;
In beetle…haunted; most unwomanly bower
Of the wild…swerving cabin; hour by hour 。 。 。
Schooner 'Equator。'
XXXIV … TO MY OLD FAMILIARS
DO you remember … can we e'er forget? …
How; in the coiled…perplexities of youth;
In our wild climate; in our scowling town;
We gloomed and shivered; sorrowed; sobbed and feared?
The belching winter wind; the missile rain;
The rare and welcome silence of the snows;
The laggard morn; the haggard day; the night;
The grimy spell of the nocturnal town;
Do you remember? … Ah; could one forget!
As when the fevered sick that all night long
Listed the wind intone; and hear at last
The ever…welcome voice of chanticleer
Sing in the bitter hour before the dawn; …
With sudden ardour; these desire the day:
So sang in the gloom of youth the bird of hope;
So we; exulting; hearkened and desired。
For lo! as in the palace porch of life
We huddled with chimeras; from within …
How sweet to hear! … the music swelled and fell;
And through the breach of the revolving doors
What dreams of splendour blinded us and fled!
I have since then contended and rejoiced;
Amid the glories of the house of life
Profoundly entered; and the shrine beheld:
Yet when the lamp from my expiring eyes
Shall dwindle and recede; the voice of love
Fall insignificant on my closing ears;
What sound shall come but the old cry of the wind
In our inclement city? what return
But the image of the emptiness of youth;
Filled with the sound of footsteps and that voice
Of discontent and rapture and despair?
So; as in darkness; from the magic lamp;
The momentary pictures gleam and fade
And perish; and the night resurges … these
Shall I remember; and then all forget。
Apemama。
XXXV
THE tropics vanish; and meseems that I;
From Halkerside; from topmost Allermuir;
Or steep Caerketton; dreaming gaze again。
Far set in fields and woods; the town I see
Spring gallant from the shallows of her smoke;
Cragged; spired; and turreted; her virgin fort
Beflagged。 About; on seaward…drooping hills;
New folds of city glitter。 Last; the Forth
Wheels ample waters set with sacred isles;
And populous Fife smokes with a score of towns。
There; on the sunny frontage of a hill;
Hard by the house of kings; repose the dead;
My dead; the ready and the strong of word。
Their works; the salt…encrusted; still survive;
The sea bombards their founded towers; the night
Thrills pierced with their strong lamps。 The artificers;
One after one; here in this grated cell;
Where the rain erases; and the rust consumes;
Fell upon lasting silence。 Continents
And continental oceans intervene;
A sea uncharted; on a lampless isle;
Environs and confines their wandering child
In vain。 The voice of generations dead
Summons me; sitting distant; to arise;
My numerous footsteps nimbly to retrace;
And; all mutation over; stretch me down
In that denoted city of the dead。
Apemama。
XXXVI … TO S。 C。
I HEARD the pulse of the besieging sea
Throb far away all night。 I heard the wind
Fly crying and convulse tumultuous palms。
I rose and strolled。 The isle was all bright sand;
And flailing fans and shadows of the palm;
The heaven all moon and wind and the blind vault;
The keenest planet slain; for Venus slept。
The king; my neighbour; with his host of wives;
Slept in the precinct of the palisade;
Where single; in the wind; under the moon;
Among the slumbering cabins; blazed a fire;
Sole street…lamp and the only sentinel。
To other lands and nights my fancy turned …
To London first; and chiefly to your house;
The many…pillared and the well…beloved。
There yearning fancy lighted; there again
In the upper room I lay; and heard far off
The unsleeping city murmur like a shell;
The muffled tramp of the Museum guard
Once more went by me; I beheld again
Lamps vainly brighten the dispeopled street;
Again I longed for the returning morn;
The awaking traffic; the bestirring birds;
The consentaneous trill of tiny song
That weaves round monumental cornices
A passing charm of beauty。 Most of all;
For your light foot I wearied; and your knock
That was the glad reveille of my day。
Lo; now; when to your task in the great house
At morning through the portico you pass;
One moment glance; where by the pillared wall
Far…voyaging island gods; begrimed with smoke;
Sit now unworshipped; the rude monument
Of faiths forgot and races undivined:
Sit now disconsolate; remembering well
The priest; the victim; and the songful crowd;
The blaze of the blue noon; and that huge voice;
Incessant; of the breakers on the shore。
As far as these from their ancestral shrine;
So far; so foreign; your divided friends
Wander; estranged in body; not in mind。
Apemama。
XXXVII … THE HOUSE OF TEMBINOKA
'At my departure from the island of Apemama; for which you will
look in vain in most atlases; the King and I agreed; since we both
set up to be in the poetical way; that we should celebrate our
separation in verse。 Whether or not his Majesty has been true to his
bargain; the laggard posts of the Pacific may p