THE SHIMMER OF EVIL

 

III. "THE SHIMMER OF EVIL" (Louise Bogan)

(a) The weather wept, and all the trees bent down; Bent down their limbs: The light waves took the waves; Each single substance glittered to the stare; Each vision purely, purely was its own; —There was no light; there was no light at all.

(b) Far from the mirrors all the bushes rang With their hard snow; least on the lonely eye Cold evil — wrinkled lighter than a string, a fire Hung down: and was only a —There was no light; there was no light at all.

(c) Each cushion found itself a field of pins, Prickling pure wishes with confusion's ire; Hope's holy wrists: the little burning boy Cried out their lives an instant and were free. —There was no light; there was no light at all.

II. THE CHUMS (Smart, John Clare, and the likes of Blake)

(a) Some are in prison; some are dead; And none has read my books, And yet my thought turns back to them, And I remember looks.

(b) Their sisters gave me, once or twice, But when I slowed my feet, They taught me not to be too nice The way I tipped my hat.

(c) And when I slipped upon the ice They saw that I fell more than twice I'm grateful for that.

II. INTERLUDE (Song Out of Sorrow)

1. SPIRIT'S HOUSE

(a) From naked stones and agony I will build a house for me; With a mason all alone I will raise it, stone by stone, And every stone where I have bled Will show a sign of dusky red. For I have good of all my pain; My spirit’s quiet house will be Built of naked stones I trod On roads where I lost sight of God.

2. MASTERY

(a) I would not have God come in To shield me suddenly from sin, And set my house of life to rights; Nor angels with bright burning wings Ordering my earthly thoughts and things; Rather my own frail gathering lights Wind blown and nearly beaten out; Rather the terror of the nights And long, sick groping after doubt; Rather be lost than let my soul Slip vaguely from my own control — Of my own spirit let me be In sole though feeble mastery.

3. LESSONS

(a) Unless I learn to ask no help From any other soul but mine, To seek no strength in waving reeds Nor shade beneath a straggling pine; Unless I learn to look at Grief Unshrinking from her tear-blind eyes, And take from pleasure fearlessly Whatever gifts will make me wise — Unless I learn these things on earth, Why was I ever given birth?

5. SPRING RAIN

(a) I thought I had forgotten, But it all came back again To-night with the first spring thunder In a rush of rain.

(b) I remember a darken doorway Where we stood while the storm swept by, Thunder gripping the earth And lightning scrawled in the sky.

(c) The passing motor buses swayed, For the street was a river of rain, Lashed into little golden waves In the lamp light's stain.

(d) With the wild spring rain and thunder My heart was wild and gay; Your eyes said more to me that night Than your lips would ever say —

(e) I thought I had forgotten, But it all came back again To-night with the first spring thunder In a rush of rain.

6. JEWELS

(a) If I should see your eyes again, I know how far their look would go — Back to a morning in the park With the sapphire shadows on the snow.

(b) Or back to oak trees in the spring When you unloosed my hair and kissed The lead that lay against your knees In the leaf shadow's amethyst.

(c) And still another shining place We would remember — how the dim Wild mountain held us on its breast One diamond morning white with sun.

(d) But I will turn my eyes from you As women turn to put away The jewels they have worn at night And cannot wear in sober day.

20. IN THE TRAIN

(a) Fields beneath a quilt of snow From which the rooks and stubble peep, And in the west a shy white star That shivers as it wakes from sleep.

(b) The restless rumble of the train, The drowsy people in the car, Steel blue twilight in the world, And in my heart a timid star.

21. TO ONE AWAY

(a) I heard a cry in the night, A thousand miles it came, Sharp as a flash of light, My name, my name!

(b) It was your voice I heard, You waked and loved me so — I send you back this word, I know, I know!

22. SONG

(a) Love me with your whole heart Or give no love to me, Half-love is a poor thing, Neither bond nor free.

(b) You must love me gladly, Soul and body too, Or else find a new love, And good-bye to you.

23. "DEEP IN THE NIGHT"

(a) Deep in the night the cry of a swallow, Under the stars he flew, Keen as pain was his call to follow Over the world to you.

(b) Love in my heart is a cry forever Lost as the swallow's flight, Seeking for you and never, never Stilled by the stars at night.

24. THE INDIA WHARF

(a) Here in the velvet stillness The wide sown fields fall to the faint horizons, Sleeping in starlight — —

(b) A year ago we walked in the jangling city Together — — forgetful And came through the tense crowd Through the tense crowd We went aloof, ecstatic, walking in wonder, Unconscious of our motion.

(c) Forever the foreign people with dark, deep-seeing eyes Passed us and passed. Lights and foreign words and foreign faces, I forgot them all; I only felt alive, defiant of all death and sorrow, Sure and elated.

(d) That was the gift you gave me.

(e) The streets grew still more tangled, And led at last to water black and glassy, Flecked here and there with lights, faint and far off. There was a sign on a shabby building "The India Wharf" — and we turned back.

(f) I always bet we could have taken ship And crossed the bright green seas To dreaming cities set on sacred streams And places Of ivory and scarlet.

25. I SHALL NOT CARE

(a) When I am dead and over me bright April Shakes out her rain-drenched hair, Tho' you should lean above me broken-hearted, I shall not care.

(b) I shall have peace, as leafy trees are peaceful When rain bends down the boughs, And I shall be more silent and cold-hearted Than you are now.

26. DESERT POOLS

(a) I love too much; I am a river Surging with spring that seeks the sea, I am too generous a giver, Love will not stay to drink of me.

(b) His feet will turn to desert places Shadowless, reft of rain and dew, He will stoop down in his desire To slake the thirst grown knot all searing In stagnant water keen and fire.

27. LONGING

(a) I am not sorry for my soul That it must go unsatisfied, For it can live a thousand times, Eternity is deep and wide.

(b) I am not sorry for my soul, But oh, my body that must go Back to a little drift of dust Without the joy it longed to know.

28. PITY

(a) They never saw my lover's face, They only know our love was brief, Wearing awhile a windy grace And parting like an autumn leaf.

(b) They wonder why I do not weep, They think it strange that I can sing, They say, "Her love was scarcely deep Since it has left so slight a sting."

(c) They never saw my love, nor knew That in my heart's most secret place I pity them as angels do Men who have never seen God's face.

29. AFTER PARTING

(a) Oh I have sown my love so wide That he will find it everywhere; It will awake him in the night, It will enfold him in the air.

(b) I set my shadow in his sight And I have winged it with desire, That it may be a cloud by day And in the night a shaft of fire.

30. ENOUGH

(a) It is enough for me by day To walk the same bright earth with him; Enough that over us by night The same great roof of stars is dim.

31. ALCHEMY

(a) I left my heart as spring lifts up A yellow daisy after rain; My heart will be a lovely cup Altho' it holds but pain.

(b) For I shall learn from flower and leaf That color every drop they hold, To change the lifeless wine of grief To living gold.

32. FEBRUARY

(a) They spoke of him I love With cruel words and gay; My lips kept silent guard On all I could not say.

(b) I heard, and down the street The lonely trees in the square Stood in the winter wind Patient and bare.

(c) I heard — oh voiceless trees Under the wind, I know The eager terrible spring Hidden in you.

33. DUSK IN JUNE

(a) Evening, and all the birds In chorus of shimmering sound Are easing their hearts of joy For miles around.

(b) The air is blue and sweet, The few first stars are white, — Oh, let me like the birds Sing before night.

34. SUMMER NIGHT, RIVERSIDE

(a) In the wild soft summer darkness How many and many a night we two together Sat in the park and watched the Hudson Wearing her lights like golden spangles Glinting on black satin. The rail along the curving pathway Was low in a happy place to let us cross, And down the hill a tree that dripped with bloom Sheltered us, While your kisses and the flowers, Falling, falling, Tangled my hair...

(b) The frail white stars moved slowly over the sky.

(c) And now, far off In the fragrant darkness The tree is tremulous again with bloom For June comes back.

(d) To-night what girl Dreamily before her mirror shakes from her hair This year's blossoms, clinging in its coils?

35. IN A SUBWAY STATION

(a) After a year I came again to the place; The tireless lights and the reverberation, The angry thunder of trains that burrow the ground, The hurried, hurrying people were still the same — But oh, another man beside me and not you! Another voice and other eyes in mine! And suddenly I turned and saw again The gleaming curve of tracks, the bridge above — They were burned deep into my heart before, The night I watched them to avoid your eyes, When you were saying, "Oh, look up at me!" When you were saying, "Will you never love me?" And when I answered with a lie — Oh then You dropped your eyes. I felt your utter pain. I would have died to say the truth to you.

(b) After a year I came again to the place — The hurried hurrying people were still the same...

36. AFTER LOVE

(a) There is no magic any more, We meet as other people do, You work no miracle for me Nor I for you.

(b) You were the wind and I the sea — There is no splendor any more, I have grown listless as the pool Beside the shore.

(c) But tho' the pool is safe from storm And from the tide has found surcease, It grows more bitter than the sea For all its peace.

37. DOORYARD ROSES

(a) I have come the selfsame path To the selfsame door, Years have left the roses there Burning as before.

(b) While I watch them in wind Quick the hot tears start — Strong so frail a flame outlasts Fire in the heart.

38. A PRAYER

(a) Until I lose my soul and lie Blind to the beauty of the earth, Deaf though a shouting wind goes by, Dumb in a storm of mirth;

(b) Until my heart is quenched at length And I have left the land of men, Oh, let me love with all my strength Careless if I am loved again.

39. INDIAN SUMMER

(a) Lyric night of the lingering Indian summer, Shadowy fields that are silent but full of singing, Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects, Ceaseless, insistent —

(b) The grasshopper's horn, and far off, high in the maples The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence, Under a moon waning and worn and broken, Tired with summer.

(c) Let me remember you, voices of little insects, Weeds in the moonlight, fields that are tangled with asters, Let me remember you, soon will the winter be on us, Snow-hushed and heartless.

(d) Over my soul murmur your mute benediction While I gaze, oh fields that rest after harvest, As those who part look long in the eyes they lean to, Lest they forget them.

2. THE SEA WIND

(a) I am a pool in a peaceful place, I greet the great sky face to face, I know the stars and the stately moon And the wind that runs with rippling shoon — But why does it always bring to me The far-off, beautiful sound of the sea?

The wind comes waking me out of sleep — Why does it always bring to me The far-off, terrible call of the sea?

3. THE CLOUD

(a) I am a cloud in the heaven's height, The stars are lit for my delight, Tireless and changeful, swift and free, I cast my shadow on hill and sea — But why do the pines on the mountain's crest Call to me always, "Rest, rest"?

(b) I throw my mantle over the moon And I blind the sun on his throne at noon, Nothing can tame me, nothing can bind, I am a child of the heartless wind — But oh, the pines on the mountain's crest Whispering always, "Rest, rest."

4. THE POORHOUSE

(a) Hope went by and Peace went by And would not enter in; Youth went by and Health went by And Love that is their kin.

(b) Those within the house shed tears On their bitter bread; Some were old and some were mad, And some were sick a-bed.

(c) Gray Death saw the wretched house And even he passed by — "They have never lived," he said, "They can wait to die."

5. DOCTORS

(a) Every night I lie awake And every day I lie abed And hear the doctors, Pain and Death, Conferring at my head.

(b) They speak in scientific tones, Professional and low — One argues for a speedy cure, The other, sure and slow.

(c) To one so humble as myself It should be matter for some pride

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