James Stephens
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- Mad Patsy said, he said to me,
- That every morning he could see
- An angel walking on the sky;
- Across the sunny skies of morn
- He threw great handfuls far and nigh
- Of poppy seed among the corn;
- And then, he said, the angels run
- To see the poppies in the sun.
- A poppy is a devil weed,
- I said to him -- he disagreed;
- He said the devil had no hand
- In spreading flowers tall and fair
- Through corn and rye and meadow land,
- By garth and barrow everywhere:
- The devil has not any flower,
- But only money in his power.
- And then he stretched out in the sun
- And rolled upon his back for fun:
- He kicked his legs and roared for joy
- Because the sun was shining down,
- He said he was a little boy
- And would not work for any clown:
- He ran and laughed behind a bee,
- And danced for very ecstasy.
- I thought I heard Him calling. Did you hear
- A sound, a little sound? My curious ear
- Is dinned with flying noises, and the tree
- Goes -- whisper, whisper, whisper silently
- Till all its whispers spread into the sound
- Of a dull roar. Lie closer to the ground,
- The shade is deep and He may pass us by.
- We are so very small, and His great eye,
- Customed to starry majesties, may gaze
- Too wide to spy us hiding in the maze;
- Ah, misery! the sun has not yet gone
- And we are naked: He will look upon
- Our crouching shame, may make us stand upright
- Burning in terror -- O that it were night!
- He may not come . . . what! listen, list now --
- He is here! lie closer . . . Adam, where art thou?
- So Eden was deserted, and at eve
- Into the quiet place God came to grieve.
- His face was sad, His hands hung slackly down
- Along his robe; too sorrowful to frown
- He paced along the grassy paths and through
- The silent trees, and where the flowers grew
- Tended by Adam. All the birds had gone
- Out to the world, and singing was not one
- To cheer the lonely God out of His grief --
- The silence broken only when a leaf
- Tapt lightly on a leaf, or when the wind,
- Slow-handed, swayed the bushes to its mind.
- And so along the base of a round hill,
- Rolling in fern, He bent His way until
- He neared the little hut which Adam made,
- And saw its dusky rooftree overlaid
- With greenest leaves. Here Adam and his spouse
- Were wont to nestle in their little house
- Snug at the dew-time: here He, standing sad,
- Sighed with the wind, nor any pleasure had
- In heavenly knowledge, for His darlings twain
- Had gone from Him to learn the feel of pain,
- And what was meant by sorrow and despair, --
- Drear knowledge for a Father to prepare.
- There he looked sadly on the little place;
- A beehive round it was, without a trace
- Of occupant or owner; standing dim
- Among the gloomy trees it seemed to Him
- A final desolation, the last word
- Wherewith the lips of silence had been stirred.
- Chaste and remote, so tiny and so shy,
- So new withal, so lost to any eye,
- So pac't of memories all innocent
- Of days and nights that in it had been spent
- In blithe communion, Adam, Eve, and He,
- Afar from Heaven and its gaudery;
- And now no more! He still must be the God
- But not the friend; a Father with a rod
- Whose voice was fear, whose countenance a threat,
- Whose coming terror, and whose going wet
- With penitential tears; not evermore
- Would they run forth to meet Him as before
- With careless laughter, striving each to be
- First to His hand and dancing in their glee
- To see Him coming -- they would hide instead
- At His approach, or stand and hang the head,
- Speaking in whispers, and would learn to pray
- Instead of asking, 'Father, if we may.'
- Never again to Eden would He haste
- At cool of evening, when the sun had paced
- Back from the tree-tops, slanting from the rim
- Of a low cloud, what time the twilight dim
- Knit tree to tree in shadow, gathering slow
- Till all had met and vanished in the flow
- Of dusky silence, and a brooding star
- Stared at the growing darkness from afar,
- While haply now and then some nested bird
- Would lift upon the air a sleepy word
- Most musical, or swing its airy bed
- To the high moon that drifted overhead.
- 'Twas good to quit at evening His great throne,
- To lay His crown aside, and all alone
- Down through the quiet air to stoop and glide
- Unkenned by angels: silently to hide
- In the green fields, by dappled shades, where brooks
- Through leafy solitudes and quiet nooks
- Flowed far from heavenly majesty and pride,
- From light astounding and the wheeling tide
- Of roaring stars. Thus does it ever seem
- Good to the best to stay aside and dream
- In narrow places, where the hand can feel
- Something beside, and know that it is real.
- His angels! silly creatures who could sing
- And sing again, and delicately fling
- The smoky censer, bow and stand aside
- All mute in adoration: thronging wide,
- Till nowhere could He look but soon He saw
- An angel bending humbly to the law
- Mechanic; knowing nothing more of pain,
- Than when they were forbid to sing again,
- Or swing anew the censer, or bow down
- In humble adoration of His frown.
- This was the thought in Eden as He trod --
- . . . It is a lonely thing to be a God.
- So long! afar through Time He bent His mind,
- For the beginning, which He could not find,
- Through endless centuries and backwards still
- Endless forever, till His 'stonied will
- Halted in circles, dizzied in the swing
- Of mazy nothingness. -- His mind could bring
- Not to subjection, grip or hold the theme
- Whose wide horizon melted like a dream
- To thinnest edges. Infinite behind
- The piling centuries were trodden blind
- In gulfs chaotic -- so He could not see
- When He was not who always had To Be.
- Not even godly fortitude can stare
- Into Eternity, nor easy bear
- The insolent vacuity of Time:
- It is too much, the mind can never climb
- Up to its meaning, for, without an end,
- Without beginning, plan, or scope, or trend
- To point a path, there nothing is to hold
- And steady surmise: so the mind is rolled
- And swayed and drowned in dull Immensity.
- Eternity outfaces even Me
- With its indifference, and the fruitless year
- Would swing as fruitless were I never there.
- And so for ever, day and night the same,
- Years flying swiftly nowhere, like a game
- Played random by a madman, without end
- Or any reasoned object but to spend
- What is unspendable -- Eternal Woe!
- O Weariness of Time that fast or slow
- Goes never further, never has in view
- An ending to the thing it seeks to do,
- And so does nothing: merely ebb and flow,
- From nowhere into nowhere, touching so
- The shores of many stars and passing on,
- Careless of what may come or what has gone.
- O solitude unspeakable! to be
- For ever with oneself! never see
- An equal face, or feel an equal hand,
- To sit in state and issue reprimand,
- Admonishment or glory, and to smile
- Disdaining what has happenèd the while!
- O to be breast to breast against a foe!
- Against a friend! to strive and not to know
- The laboured outcome: love nor be aware
- How much the other loved, and greatly care
- With passion for that happy love or hate,
- Nor know what joy or dole was hid in fate.
- For I have ranged the spacy width and gone
- Swift north and south, striving to look upon
- An ending somewhere. Many days I sped
- Hard to the west, a thousand years I fled
- Eastwards in fury, but I could not find
- The fringes of the Infinite. Behind
- And yet behind, and ever at the end
- Came new beginnings, paths that did not wend
- To anywhere were there: and ever vast
- And vaster spaces opened -- till at last
- Dizzied with distance, thrilling to a pain
- Unnameable, I turned to Heaven again.
- And there My angels were prepared to fling
- The cloudy incense, there prepared to sing
- My praise and glory -- O, in fury I
- Then roared them senseless, then threw down the sky
- And stamped upon it, buffeted a star
- With my great fist, and flung the sun afar:
- Shouted My anger till the mighty sound
- Rung to the width, frighting the furthest bound
- And scope of hearing: tumult vaster still,
- Throning the echo, dinned My ears, until
- I fled in silence, seeking out a place
- To hide Me from the very thought of Space.
- And so, He thought, in Mine own Image I
- Have made a man, remote from Heaven high
- And all its humble angels: I have poured
- My essence in his nostrils: I have cored
- His heart with My own spirit; part of Me,
- His mind with laboured growth unceasingly
- Must strive to equal Mine; must ever grow
- By virtue of My essence till he know
- Both good and evil through the solemn test
- Of sin and retribution, till, with zest,
- He feels his godhead, soars to challenge Me
- In Mine own Heaven for supremacy.
- Through savage beasts and still more savage clay,
- Invincible, I bid him fight a way
- To greater battles, crawling through defeat
- Into defeat again: ordained to meet
- Disaster in disaster; prone to fall,
- I prick him with My memory to call
- Defiance at his victor and arise
- With anguished fury to his greater size
- Through tribulation, terror, and despair.
- Astounded, he must fight to higher air,
- Climb battle into battle till he be
- Confronted with a flaming sword and Me.
- So growing age by age to greater strength,
- To greater beauty, skill and deep intent:
- With wisdom wrung from pain, with energy
- Nourished in sin and sorrow, he will be
- Strong, pure and proud an enemy to meet,
- Tremendous on a battle-field, or sweet
- To walk by as friend with candid mind.
- --Dear enemy or friend so hard to find,
- I yet shall find you, yet shall put My breast
- In enmity or love against your breast:
- Shall smite or clasp with equal ecstasy
- The enemy or friend who grows to Me.
- The topmost blossom of his growing I
- Shall take unto Me, cherish and lift high
- Beside myself upon My holy throne: --
- It is not good for God to be alone.
- The perfect woman of his perfect race
- Shall sit beside Me in the highest place
- And be my Goddess, Queen, Companion, Wife,
- The rounder of My majesty, the life
- Of My ambition. She will smile to see
- Me bending down to worship at her knee
- Who never bent before, and she will say,
- 'Dear God, who was it taught Thee how to pray?"
- And through eternity, adown the slope
- Of never-ending time, compact of hope,
- Of zest and young enjoyment, I and She
- Will walk together, sowing jollity
- Among the raving stars, and laughter through
- The vacancies of Heaven, till the blue
- Vast amplitudes of space lift up a song,
- The echo of our presence, rolled along
- And ever rolling where the planets sing
- The majesty and glory of the King.
- Then conquered, thou, Eternity, shalt lie
- Under My hand as little as a fly.
- I am the Master: I the mighty God
- And you My workshop. Your pavilions trod
- By Me and Mine shall never cease to be,
- For you are but the magnitude of Me,
- The width of My extension, the surround
- Of My dense splendour. Rolling, rolling round,
- To steeped infinity, and out beyond
- My own strong comprehension, you are bond
- And servile to My doings. Let you swing
- More wide and ever wide, you do but fling
- Around the instant Me, and measure still
- The breadth and proportion of My Will.
- Then stooping to the hut -- a beehive round --
- God entered in and saw upon the ground
- The dusty garland, Adam, (learned to weave)
- Had loving placed upon the head of Eve
- Before the terror came, when joyous they
- Could look for God at closing of the day
- Profound and happy. So the Mighty Guest
- Rent, took, and placed the blossoms in His breast.
- 'This,' said He gently, 'I shall show My queen
- When she hath grown to Me in space serene,
- And say "'twas worn by Eve."' So, smiling fair,
- He spread abroad His wings upon the air.
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