classes ::: verb,
children :::
branches ::: topple

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object:topple
word class:verb

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now begins generated list of local instances, definitions, quotes, instances in chapters, wordnet info if available and instances among weblinks


OBJECT INSTANCES [0] - TOPICS - AUTHORS - BOOKS - CHAPTERS - CLASSES - SEE ALSO - SIMILAR TITLES

TOPICS
SEE ALSO


AUTH

BOOKS
Life_without_Death

IN CHAPTERS TITLE

IN CHAPTERS CLASSNAME

IN CHAPTERS TEXT
0_1963-06-15
0_1963-10-19
0_1963-12-31
0_1964-08-22
0_1966-05-22
0_1967-04-12
0_1969-12-20
0_1971-12-11
0_1971-12-15
02.03_-_The_Shakespearean_Word
02.12_-_The_Ideals_of_Human_Unity
07.04_-_The_Triple_Soul-Forces
1.02_-_Substance_Is_Eternal
1.038_-_Impediments_in_Concentration_and_Meditation
1.03_-_To_Layman_Ishii
1.05_-_Solitude
1.06_-_The_Breaking_of_the_Limits
1.078_-_Kumbhaka_and_Concentration_of_Mind
1.10_-_Harmony
1.12_-_The_Sociology_of_Superman
1.15_-_The_Transformed_Being
19.11_-_Old_Age
1f.lovecraft_-_At_the_Mountains_of_Madness
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Challenge_from_Beyond
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Dream-Quest_of_Unknown_Kadath
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Haunter_of_the_Dark
1f.lovecraft_-_The_Man_of_Stone
1.lovecraft_-_Psychopompos-_A_Tale_in_Rhyme
1.pbs_-_A_Vision_Of_The_Sea
1.pbs_-_Lines_Written_Among_The_Euganean_Hills
1.pbs_-_Oedipus_Tyrannus_or_Swellfoot_The_Tyrant
1.wby_-_The_Hour_Before_Dawn
1.wby_-_To_A_Young_Beauty
1.whitman_-_Song_of_Myself
1.whitman_-_Song_Of_Myself-_XXXIII
2.14_-_The_Unpacking_of_God
3.03_-_The_Soul_Is_Mortal
4.03_-_The_Senses_And_Mental_Pictures
5.02_-_Against_Teleological_Concept
6.02_-_Great_Meteorological_Phenomena,_Etc
6.04_-_The_Plague_Athens
Aeneid
Sayings_of_Sri_Ramakrishna_(text)
The_Act_of_Creation_text

PRIMARY CLASS

SIMILAR TITLES
topple

DEFINITIONS


TERMS STARTING WITH

toppled ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Topple

topple ::: to overthrow as from a position of authority.

topple ::: v. i. --> To fall forward; to pitch or tumble down. ::: v. t. --> To throw down; to overturn.


TERMS ANYWHERE

break ::: v. 1. To destroy by or as if by shattering or crushing. 2. To force or make a way through (a barrier, etc.). 3. To vary or disrupt the uniformity or continuity of. 4. To overcome or put an end to. 5. To destroy or interrupt a regularity, uniformity, continuity, or arrangement of; interrupt. 6. To intrude upon; interrupt a conversation, etc. 7. To discontinue or sever an association, an agreement, or a relationship. **8. To overcome or wear down the spirit, strength, or resistance of. 9. (usually followed by in, into or out). 10. To filter or penetrate as sunlight into a room. 11. To come forth suddenly. 12. To utter suddenly; to express or start to express an emotion, mood, etc. 13. Said of waves, etc. when they dash against an obstacle, or topple over and become surf or broken water in the shallows. 14. To part the surface of water, as a ship or a jumping fish. breaks, broke, broken, breaking.* *n. 15.** An interruption or a disruption in continuity or regularity.

toppled ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Topple

topple ::: to overthrow as from a position of authority.

topple ::: v. i. --> To fall forward; to pitch or tumble down. ::: v. t. --> To throw down; to overturn.

Czech Deal ::: Egypt’s arm deal with Czechoslovakia in 1955 that initiated the involvement of the Soviet Union in Middle Eastern politics as well as its pro-Arab stance. This marked the largest military transaction in the world during its time. The ensuing Israeli anxiety and desire to topple Nasser before he could a military threat led to the Suez War.

plugging ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Plug ::: n. --> The act of stopping with a plug.
The material of which a plug or stopple is made.


plug ::: n. --> Any piece of wood, metal, or other substance used to stop or fill a hole; a stopple.
A flat oblong cake of pressed tobacco.
A high, tapering silk hat.
A worthless horse.
A block of wood let into a wall, to afford a hold for nails. ::: v. t.


stoppled ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Stopple

stopple ::: v. t. --> That which stops or closes the mouth of a vessel; a stopper; as, a glass stopple; a cork stopple.
To close the mouth of anything with a stopple, or as with a stopple.


stoppling ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Stopple

toppling ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Topple

totly ::: v. i. --> To walk in a wavering, unsteady manner; to toddle; to topple.

unstop ::: v. t. --> To take the stopple or stopper from; as, to unstop a bottle or a cask.
To free from any obstruction; to open.


Yggdrasil is not immortal. Its lifetime is coeval with the hierarchy the tree is used to represent. Its leaves are constantly being eaten by four stags, its bark is nibbled by two goats, and its roots are gnawed by the serpent Nidhogg which, in due course, will topple the “noble ash tree.” During the first half of its life, the tree is named Mjotvidr (measure increasing); during the latter half Mjotudr (measure diminishing). When in due course the tree dies, its indwelling consciousnesses (Life and Lifthrasir), the human race, will be secreted in the “memory hoard of the sun” until their next emergence into a new existence.



QUOTES [4 / 4 - 198 / 198]


KEYS (10k)

   1 Hakuin Ekaku
   1 Étienne de La Boétie
   1 Sri Aurobindo
   1 Nichiren

NEW FULL DB (2.4M)

   7 Blake Crouch
   4 Rick Riordan
   4 Rand Paul
   3 Ted Cruz
   3 Ron Chernow
   3 Kelley Armstrong
   3 John Steinbeck
   3 Frank Herbert
   3 Anonymous
   2 Robert D Kaplan
   2 Nichiren
   2 M T Anderson
   2 Jay Kristoff
   2 Haruki Murakami
   2 Daniel Silva
   2 Bella Forrest
   2 Arianna Huffington
   2 Amor Towles

1:When a tree has been transplanted, though fierce winds may blow, it will not topple if it has a firm stake to hold it up. But even a tree that has grown up in place may fall over if its roots are weak. ~ Nichiren,
2:My ear is leaned to the cry of the oppressed,
I topple down the thrones of tyrant kings. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, 07.04 - The Triple Soul-Forces,
3:Resolve to serve no more, and you are at once freed. I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break in pieces. ~ Étienne de La Boétie,
4:It's like chopping down a huge tree of immense girth. You won't accomplish it with one swing of your axe. If you keep chopping away at it, though, and do not let up, eventually, whether it wants to or not, it will suddenly topple down. When that time comes, you could round up everyone you could find and pay them to hold the tree up, but they wouldn't be able to do it. It would still come crashing to the ground. . . . But if the woodcutter stopped after one or two strokes of his axe to ask the third son of Mr. Chang, Why doesn't this tree fall? And after three or four more strokes stopped again to ask the fourth son of Mr. Li, Why doesn't this tree fall? he would never succeed in felling the tree. It is no different for someone who is practicing the Way.
   ~ Hakuin Ekaku,

*** WISDOM TROVE ***

1:The lies we tell about our duty and our purposes, the meaningless words of science and philosophy, are walls that topple before a bewildered little why'. ~ john-steinbeck, @wisdomtrove
2:dive for dreams or a slogan may topple you (trees are their roots and wind is wind) trust your heart if the seas catch fire (and live by love though the stars walk backward) honour the past but welcome the future (and dance your death away at this wedding) never mind a world with its villains or heroes (for god likes girls and tomorrow and the earth) ~ e-e-cummings, @wisdomtrove
3:Anarchy wears two faces, both Creator and Destroyer. Thus Destroyers topple empires; make a canvas of clean rubble where creators can then build a better world. Rubble, once achieved makes further ruins' means irrelevant. Away with our explosives, then! Away with our Destroyers! They have no place within our better world. But let us raise a toast to all our bombers, all our bastards, most unlovely and most unforgivable, let's drink their health, then meet with them no more. ~ alan-moore, @wisdomtrove
4:Elvis Presley's talent brightened millions of lives. He widened the horizons of my world certainly. The first record I ever owned was a 78 rpm of "Hound Dog" backed by "Don't Be Cruel" and when I listened to those tunes I felt about ten feet tall and I grinned so hard that I felt like the corners of my mouth would meet in the back and the tip of my head would simply topple off. All I know about Rock and Roll is that it makes people feel good. Elvis Presley more than made me feel good, he enriched my life and made it better. ~ stephen-king, @wisdomtrove

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:A finger’s touch had been known to topple civilizations. ~ Frank Herbert,
2:But it's all a diversion. A card-house waiting to topple. ~ Rick Remender,
3:Without expectations, what can topple the surprising wonder of the moment? ~ Ann Voskamp,
4:Our assignment was to topple this prudish, judgmental civilization. And it worked. ~ Timothy Leary,
5:Any medium powerful enough to extend man's reach is powerful enough to topple his world. ~ Alan Kay,
6:I'd better get back to work. I have empires to topple, people to fire, lives to ruin... ~ Whitney Gaskell,
7:It’s at times like this I hate the brain. It always builds more barriers than it can topple. ~ Richard Matheson,
8:When one thing, the right thing, is set in motion, it can topple many things. And that’s not all. ~ Gary Keller,
9:We thought, they have come to crush belief, because belief leads to hope, and hope can topple monsters. ~ Greg Rucka,
10:Maybe a bookshelf will topple over and that's how I go out -- painful, but there are worse ways to die. ~ Adam Silvera,
11:Nothing is harder to topple than a fact that supports a deeply held prejudice denied by its holder. ~ Russell L Ackoff,
12:Did you see the statue topple? Bill Clinton got nostalgic seeing something that big in a beret go down. ~ Craig Kilborn,
13:Like a chair tilted on two legs, I was never sure if I was going to topple over or land on solid ground. ~ P T Michelle,
14:But now I realize that lies, even small, well-meaning ones, just pile up until they eventually topple over. ~ Liz Fenton,
15:Sometimes it could be the smallest thing that could topple over a whole life, and, in the end, destroy it. ~ Nova Ren Suma,
16:Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world. ~ Denis Diderot,
17:The prophecy is clear, Your Highness. The Messiah shall topple all the kingdoms of the world. Even yours. ~ Seth Grahame Smith,
18:If you edge towards a cliff slowly enough, you should be able to catch yourself before you topple over. Saturday ~ Ayisha Malik,
19:The favorites of fortune or of fame topple from their pedestals before our eyes without diverting us from ambition. ~ Luc de Clapiers,
20:If we topple [Bashar] Assad, the result will be ISIS will take over Syria, and it will worsen U.S. national security interests. ~ Ted Cruz,
21:My ear is leaned to the cry of the oppressed,
I topple down the thrones of tyrant kings. ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, The Triple Soul-Forces,
22:Your smile would bring a lesser man to his knees. But if you wore your glasses and smiled at me like that, it would topple me. ~ Sawyer Bennett,
23:Only two towers remained standing, one of which was so crooked and damaged it looked ready to topple at a cough from a butterfly. ~ Brandon Mull,
24:We won when we toppled Saddam. That was the only clear goal of this war, to topple the Iraqi government. It took about 10 minutes. ~ Howard Dean,
25:All too often when we topple something hateful, rather than breaking it and starting afresh, we raise ourselves up in its place. ~ Joe Abercrombie,
26:Maybe sometimes you have to topple a secret empire that’s been around for centuries in order to save one that’s been around forever. ~ Gina Damico,
27:Everything is a different shape in the dark. Sharp edges are sharper, walls farther away, fragile items more prone to topple. ~ Charlie Jane Anders,
28:One thing she knows about lies - once they start to stack up, they can topple over, crushing you under the weight of them. ~ Marybeth Mayhew Whalen,
29:It is vain to trust in wrong; it is like erecting a building upon a frail foundation, and which will directly be sure to topple over. ~ Hosea Ballou,
30:Say you're doing a headstand. The moment you think to yourself, "Wow, I'm doing this pose!" is usually the moment you'll topple out of it. ~ Tara Stiles,
31:Money and power by themselves are a two-legged stool. You can balance on them for a while, but eventually you're going to topple over. ~ Arianna Huffington,
32:The workers of America have power enough to topple the structure of capitalism at home and to lift the whole world with them when they rise. ~ James P Cannon,
33:Then she sighed. Just the faintest, softest release of breath. The sound swept through his chest like a hurricane, with the force to topple trees. ~ Tessa Dare,
34:The greatest human ideal is the great cause of bringing together the thoughts of Europe and Asia; the great soul of India will topple our world. ~ Romain Rolland,
35:The lies we tell about our duty and our purposes, the meaningless words of science and philosophy, are walls that topple before a bewildered little "why. ~ John Steinbeck,
36:Every believer is an anarchist at heart. True believers would rather see governments topple and history rewritten than scuff the cover of their faith. ~ Jeanette Winterson,
37:The lies we tell about our duty and our purposes, the meaningless words of science and philosophy, are walls that topple before a bewildered little ‘why’. ~ John Steinbeck,
38:There are still people - the majority on the stage, they want to topple [Bashar] Assad. And then there will be chaos, and I think ISIS will then be in charge of Syria. ~ Rand Paul,
39:I had been so focused on using the turntable to create an amazing storage space that I had failed to really see what I was storing—bottles that slide and topple easily. ~ Marie Kond,
40:I went with him to the Opera Orchestra, even though the programs were so boring and dragged on so long that I feared I might actually black out and topple into the aisle. ~ Anonymous,
41:If men like [Ken] Starr and his allies could ignore the Constitution and abuse power for ideological and malicious ends to topple a President, I feared for my country. ~ Hillary Clinton,
42:Amazing how he’d found a way to topple the wall around her heart. Not in a crazy dynamite-like explosion or with the force of a wrecking ball, but in a slow brick-by-brick dismantling. ~ Melissa Tagg,
43:Then let me ask you”—here it comes, the verbal aikido that will use my words to topple my beliefs—“is it possible to live your authentic life if you have inauthentic people around you? ~ Neil Strauss,
44:Artemis Fowl had devised a plan to restore his family’s fortune. A plan that could topple civilizations and plunge the planet into a cross-species war. He was twelve years old at the time… ~ Eoin Colfer,
45:He tried not to topple the tray as he hurried down the hallway to his small room. Kyle was all his for a few more hours. He let the happiness come from his feet to the top of his head. ~ Debra Anastasia,
46:I do not accept evil. Man is perfect. The soul does not topple. Progress exists. Good is irreducible. Antichrists, accusing angels, eternal sufferings, religions are the product of doubt. ~ Comte de Lautr amont,
47:When a tree has been transplanted, though fierce winds may blow, it will not topple if it has a firm stake to hold it up. But even a tree that has grown up in place may fall over if its roots are weak. ~ Nichiren,
48:When a tree has been transplanted, though fierce winds may blow, it will not topple if it has a firm stake to hold it up. But even a tree that has grown up in place may fall over if its roots are weak. ~ Nichiren,
49:We need anarchy! It’s time to revolt. Yes, anarchy! Not political anarchy, but inner anarchy, in which we topple, dethrone, defrock, kick out, and cast aside the current ruling ideas that are programmed inside us. ~ Jim Palmer,
50:It's being made out that the whole point of the war was to topple the Taliban regime and liberate Afghan women from their burqas, we are being asked to believe that the U.S. marines are actually on a feminist mission. ~ Arundhati Roy,
51:Heaven and Earth are meeting in a storm that, when it's over, will leave the air purer and the leaves fertile, but before that happens, houses will be destroyed, centuries- old trees will topple, paradises will be flooded. ~ Paulo Coelho,
52:The idea of foreign policy realism, I think, fits more neatly with President Trump. And with John McCain, the neoconservative label of let's make the world safe for democracy and we're going to topple every regime hasn't worked. ~ Rand Paul,
53:A giant inverted steel pyramid is perfectly balanced on its point. Any movement of the pyramid will cause it to topple over. Underneath the pyramid is a $100 bill. How do you remove the bill without disturbing the pyramid? ~ Malcolm Gladwell,
54:Diamond Sutra says, 'Make no formed conceptions about the realness of existence nor about the unrealness of existence," or words like that. Handcuffs will get soft and billy clubs will topple over, let's go on being free anyhow. ~ Jack Kerouac,
55:The American president had allowed the old order to topple without a viable alternative in place, a reckless act with no precedent in modern statecraft. And for some reason he had chosen this moment in time to throw Israel to the wolves. ~ Daniel Silva,
56:The plant began to topple and I found myself feeling guiltier about killing it than I had about gutting the rabbits. The whole of life, I thought, is doing harm, we live by killing, as if there were any being of which that is not the case. ~ Sarah Moss,
57:There is something more powerful than any army. Something strong enough to topple kings, and even Darklings. Do you know what that thing is?”
I shook my head, inching away from him.
“Faith,” he breathed, his black eyes wild. “Faith. ~ Leigh Bardugo,
58:Many have built their careers buttressing the status quo, reinforcing what theyve already accomplished, and resisting the radical thinking that can topple their legacy - not exactly the attitude you want when trying to drive innovation forward. ~ Peter Diamandis,
59:I know the pieces fit 'cause I watched them tumble down
No fault, none to blame, it doesn't mean I don't desire to
Point the finger, blame the other, watch the temple topple over
To bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication. ~ Maynard James Keenan,
60:Our role in the world is not to roam the globe looking for new dictators to topple. Our role in the world is to make ourselves a beacon of hope. Make ourselves stronger at home, but also our role in the world, yes, is also to confront evil when it rises. ~ Martin O Malley,
61:the United States helps topple the dictator Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday, then what will it do on Thursday, when it finds that it has helped midwife to power a Sunni jihadist regime, or on Friday, when ethnic cleansing of the Shia-trending Alawites commences? ~ Robert D Kaplan,
62:If the United States helps topple the dictator Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday, then what will it do on Thursday, when it finds that it has helped midwife to power a Sunni jihadist regime, or on Friday, when ethnic cleansing of the Shia-trending Alawites commences? ~ Robert D Kaplan,
63:There is one day that has brought me unspeakable pain, & the effects of that day continue to cover & erode my world like rust. I suspect that someday the rust will eat through the joists & posts of my life & I will topple, literally as well as figuratively. ~ Richard Paul Evans,
64:All grandeur, all power, and all subordination to authority rests on the executioner: he is the horror and the bond of human association. Remove this incomprehensible agent from the world and at that very moment order gives way to chaos, thrones topple and society disappears. ~ Joseph de Maistre,
65:I was merely thinking that it may have been a very grave mistake to introduce you to Lady C. If the pair of you ever put your minds to it, you could probably topple governments together.” I smiled as I pocketed the weapon. “One thing at a time, dear Stoker. One thing at a time. ~ Deanna Raybourn,
66:You look around and it occurs to you that this isn’t real, this is only a memory, that you could let go and topple into that great windy nothing and it wouldn’t matter. What frightens you is that for a couple of seconds you can’t remember where the present is and how to get back there. ~ Mark Haddon,
67:Smallness is subversive, because smallness can creep into smaller places and wreak transformation at the most vulnerable, cellular level. In a time when largeness is threatening to topple us, I wish to remember and praise the beauty of smallness, in order to banish the Goliath of loneliness. ~ Sarah Ruhl,
68:You are the only person who can build emotional barriers, but you're also the only person who can topple them. Other people can't knock down the walls you've built, no matter how much they love you. You have to tear them down yourself because there's something worth seeing on the other side. ~ Emery Lord,
69:I'll do anything to try to prevent John Bolton from getting any position, because I think his world view is naive. He believes we're going to spread democracy. We're going to topple governments everywhere and they're going to elect Thomas Jefferson. That's not the way it works in the Middle East. ~ Rand Paul,
70:Plato claimed that we were all joined to someone else once, we were humans with four arms and four legs, and a head of two faces, but we were so powerful we threatened to topple the Gods. So they split us from our sole mates down the middle, and doomed us to live forever without our counterparts ~ Sarah Crossan,
71:Picture a girl with her arms full of small packages, too many to hold all at once. When they topple and fall all around her, she stoops down and scoops them all back up, literally re-collecting all the gifts that are already hers. To set your mind is to recollect truth that already belongs to you. ~ Emily P Freeman,
72:Resolve to serve no more, and you are at once freed. I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break into pieces. ~ Etienne de La Boetie,
73:You have won the Cold War. ... [Your] underappreciated valor [helped] topple the Berlin Wall, and bring down dictators the world over. ... For the past four decades the world behind the Iron Curtain ... looked to Americans for hope, and America looked to you to get the job done. Today, the free world says thank you. ~ Bob Dole,
74:You take enough blasting gelatin and wrap the foundation columns of anything, you can topple any building in the world. You have to tamp it good and tight with sandbags so the blast goes against the column and not out into the parking garage around the column.

This how-to stuff isn't in any history book. ~ Chuck Palahniuk,
75:A large magnolia tree stood in the side yeard, its thick roots pushing up the earth in all directions and sprouting offshoots that had long since merged with the original tree. Annabelle suspected that by now the smaller trees actually supported the main, ancient trunk, that without them the entire tree would topple. ~ Patti Callahan Henry,
76:A culture that denies death is a barrier to achieving a good death. Overcoming our fears and wild misconceptions about death will be no small task, but we shouldn't forget how quickly other cultural prejudices--racism, sexism, homophobia--have begun to topple in the recent past. It is high time death had its own moment of truth. ~ Caitlin Doughty,
77:Mother Teresas detractors have accused her of overemphasizing Calcuttans destitution and of coercing conversion from the defenseless. In the context of lost causes, Mother Teresa took on battles she knew she could win. Taken together, it seems to me, the criticisms of her work do not undermine or topple her overall achievement. ~ Bharati Mukherjee,
78:In my opinion, we've spent $4 trillion trying to topple various people [on the Middle East] that frankly, if they were there and if we could've spent that $4 trillion in the United States to fix our roads, our bridges, and all of the other problems; our airports and all of the other problems we've had, we would've been a lot better off. ~ Donald Trump,
79:Our churches, known the world over for their idiosyncratic beauty, for their brightly colored spires and improbable cupolas, we raze one by one. We topple the statues of old heroes and strip their names from the streets, as if they had been figments of our imagination. Our poets we either silence, or wait patiently for them to silence themselves ~ Amor Towles,
80:he saw in Populism the first glimmerings of some of the great intellectual upheavals of the twentieth century—naturalism, muckraking, and hard-hitting social satire—which would eventually topple the genteel tradition of the nineteenth century. In a peculiar way, Parrington seemed to think, Kansas was one of the birthplaces of literary modernism. ~ Thomas Frank,
81:Our churches, known the world over for their idiosyncratic beauty, for their brightly colored spires and improbable cupolas, we raze one by one. We topple the statues of old heroes and strip their names from the streets, as if they had been figments of our imagination. Our poets we either silence, or wait patiently for them to silence themselves. ~ Amor Towles,
82:But there are times when a tree can no longer withstand the pain inflicted on it, and the wind will take pity on that tree and topple it over in a mighty storm. All the other trees who witnessed the evil look down upon the fallen tree with envy. They pray for the day when a wind will end their suffering. I pray for the day when God will end mine. ~ Julius Lester,
83:We need to learn from history. These same leaders - [Barack] Obama, [Hillary] Clinton, and far too many Republicans - want to topple [Bashar] Assad. Assad is a bad man. Gadhafi was a bad man. Mubarak had a terrible human rights record. But they were assisting us - at least [Muammar] Gadhafi and [Hosni] Mubarak - in fighting radical Islamic terrorists. ~ Ted Cruz,
84:dive for dreams or a slogan may topple you (trees are their roots and wind is wind) trust your heart if the seas catch fire (and live by love though the stars walk backward) honour the past but welcome the future (and dance your death away at this wedding) never mind a world with its villains or heroes (for god likes girls and tomorrow and the earth) ~ e e cummings,
85:Now it is you who everyone presumes is so fragile. Wounded. Scarred. Maybe they’re right. Perhaps you are. A nursery rhyme comes into your head, and, like an egg, you allow yourself to topple onto your side, your legs still pulled hard against your torso. You lie like that a long while, watching the chrome shell of the tape measure sparkle until the sun moves. ~ Chris Bohjalian,
86:An icy gust of air rose from the open doors. Blackness. I cannot be locked in blackness. I cannot!
And finally he screamed. He couldn't hold it back any longer. He screamed, the terrible cry begun before he was pushed forward, before he felt himself topple from the threshold, before he realized he was plunging down and down into the blackness, into the nothingness... ~ Anne Rice,
87:From the time the Joshua tree was a tiny sapling, it had been so beaten down by the whipping wind that, rather than trying to grow skyward, it had grown in the direction that the wind pushed it. It existed now in a permanent state of windblowness, leaning over so far that it seemed ready to topple, although, in fact, its roots held it firmly in place.

pg. 35 ~ Jeannette Walls,
88:The flowers were opulent, full-blown, topple shower petals at a touch. He thought that she might topple that way, falling all at once into his hand, a soft drift of blossom between his fingers. The roses bowed their extravagant heads, nodding, but she was all stiff prim and black, back in her bonnet, so that he could not see her face unless she looked directly at him. ~ Laura Kinsale,
89:It was one thing to talk of using technology to topple the authority of the aristocracy and the Church, but who or what would replace them? Diderot and the French revolutionaries had assumed it would be “the people.” But as the nineteenth-century French historian Jules Michelet once wryly observed, “The people, in its highest ideal, is difficult to find in the people.” As ~ Mark Kurlansky,
90:I'm very proud of the fact that Israel is the one country in a very broad radius that - in which Arabs have free and fair elections. That's sacrosanct. That will never change. I wasn't trying to suppress a vote. I was trying to get something to counter a foreign-funded effort to get votes that are intended to topple my party. And I was calling on our voters to come out. ~ Benjamin Netanyahu,
91:Success for me is going beyond money and power, and measuring success based on a third metric - one founded on well-being, wisdom, our ability to wonder and to give back. Money and power by themselves are a two-legged stool. You can balance on them for a while, but eventually you're going to topple over. Basically, success the way we've defined it is no longer sustainable. ~ Arianna Huffington,
92:For many years a tree might wage a slow and silent warfare against an encumbering wall, without making any visible progress. One day the wall would topple--not because the tree had suddenly laid hold upon some supernormal energy, but because its patient work of self-defense and self release had reached fulfillment. The long-imprisoned tree had freed itself. Nature had had her way. ~ Lloyd C Douglas,
93:We are learning to support girls as they 'lean in' educationally and professionally, yet in this most personal of realms, we allow them to topple.
It's almost as if parents believe that if they don't tell their daughters that sex should feel good, they won't find out. And perhaps that's correct, they don't. Not easily anyway. But the outcome is hardly what adults could've hoped. ~ Peggy Orenstein,
94:Usama bin Laden feels like Iraq is a part of this War on Terror. He has made it clear that he would like for us to leave before Iraq can defend itself or govern itself and sustain itself, so that he could have a safe haven from which to launch further attacks, a safe haven from which to topple modern governments, a safe haven from which to, you know, be able to get a hold of oil resources. ~ George W Bush,
95:It was the poem containing the lines:
Not wasteland, but a great inverted forest
with all foliage underground.
As though it might be best to look immediately for shelter, Corinne had to put the book down. At any moment the apartment building seemed liable to lose its balance and topple across Fifth Avenue into Central Park. She waited. Gradually the deluge of truth and beauty abated. ~ J D Salinger,
96:After all, words are what remain when all the deeds have been done. Words can shatter faith; start a war; change the course of history. A story can make your heart beat faster; topple walls; scale mountains - hey, a story can even raise the dead. And that's why the King of Stories ended up being the King of the gods; because writing history and making history are only the breadth of a page apart. ~ Joanne Harris,
97:I considered that the world, and especially the cinema, was burdened with false gods. My task was to overthrow them. Sword in hand, I was ready to consecrate my life to the task. But the false gods are still there. My perseverance during a half-century of cinema has perhaps helped to topple a few of them. It has likewise helped me to discover that some of the gods were real, and had no need to be toppled. ~ Jean Renoir,
98:dive for dreams
or a slogan may topple you
(trees are their roots
and wind is wind)

trust your heart
if the seas catch fire
(and live by love
though the stars walk backward)

honour the past
but welcome the future
(and dance your death
away at this wedding)

never mind a world
with its villains or heroes
(for god likes girls
and tomorrow and the earth) ~ E E Cummings,
99:With no chance to take off, I had to play my role, searching for the rendezvous spot, which gave me the excuse to look for an escape opportunity. Maybe a hole in the wall too small for Tori’s mom to follow me through or a precarious stack of boxes I could topple onto her head or an abandoned hammer I could brain her with. I’d never “brained” anyone in my life, but with Tori’s mom, I was willing to try. ~ Kelley Armstrong,
100:The roofed passageway to the stables was empty, and smelled comfortably of clean hay and horses. The stables were dark, lit by a single lantern at the near end. They were asleep, the horses, most of them, including her Small. He stood as he dozed, plain and quiet, leaning sideways, like a building about to topple. It might have worried her, except that he often slept like that, leaning one way or the other. ~ Kristin Cashore,
101:Talk loud enough about human rights and it gives the impression of democracy at work, justice at work. There was a time when the United States waged war to topple democracies, because back then democracy was a threat to the Free Market. Countries were nationalising their resources, protecting their markets.... So then, real democracies were being toppled. They were toppled in Iran, they were toppled all across Latin America, Chile. ~ Arundhati Roy,
102:Now we're in a situation where democracy has been taken into the workshop and fixed, remodelled to be market friendly. So now the United States is fighting wars to install democracies. First is was topple them, now it's install them. And the whole rise of corporate-funded NGOs in the modern world, this notion of CSR, corporate social responsibility--it's all part of a New Managed Democracy. In a sense, it's all part of the same machine. ~ Arundhati Roy,
103:Now we're in a situation where democracy has been taken into the workshop and fixed, remodeled to be market-friendly. So now the United States is fighting wars to instal democracies. First it was topple them, now it's instal them, right? And this whole rise of corporate-funded NGOs in the modern world, this notion of CSR, corporate social responsibility - it's all part of a New Managed Democracy. In that sense, it's all part of the same machine. ~ Arundhati Roy,
104:There are whole industries, such as venture capital, that are currently organized around the belief that innovation is essentially a game of playing the odds. But it’s time to topple that tired paradigm. I’ve spent twenty years gathering evidence so that you can put your time, energy, and resources into creating products and services that you can predict, in advance, customers will be eager to hire. Leave relying on luck to the other guys. ~ Clayton M Christensen,
105:I have a notion that, at big fires, a moment of extreme suspense can sometimes occur, when the jets of water slacken off, the firemen no longer climb, no one moves a muscle. Without a sound, a high black wall of masonry cants over up above, the fire blazing behind it, and, without a sound, leans, about to topple. Everyone stands waiting, shoulders tensed, faces drawn in around their eyes, for the terrible crash. That is how the silence is here. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke,
106:There's very much a domino effect when I'm playing. In fact, that's a good way of putting it. I'm trying to topple all the dominos in a single stroke. That would be a show with perfect momentum. Every now and again, you get one of those dominos that moves to the side a little bit, traps things and you have to stand them all up again and see if people will go with you. They'll let you off a few times but if you make too many mistakes they'll get a bit anxious. ~ Jamie Lidell,
107:Taking Beatrix's gloved hand in his, Christopher lifted it and pressed a kiss to the back of her wrist. He wanted to carry her away from the crowded drawing room and have her all to himself.
"Soon," Beatrix whispered, as if she had read his thoughts, and he let his gaze caress her. "And don't look at me like that," she added. "It makes my knees wobbly."
"Then I won't tell you what I'd like to do with you right now. Because you'd topple over like a ninepin. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
108:Taking Beatrix’s gloved hand in his, Christopher lifted it and pressed a kiss to the back of her wrist. He wanted to carry her away from the crowded drawing room and have her all to himself.
“Soon,” Beatrix whispered, as if she had read his thoughts, and he let his gaze caress her. “And don’t look at me like that,” she added. “It makes my knees wobbly.”
“Then I won’t tell you what I’d like to do with you right now. Because you’d topple over like a ninepin. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
109:My gift to you, Yukiko-chan.' He nodded. 'Use it to cut away your fear, and leave nothing in its wake. Cherish it. And cherish this truth I speak to you now, if no other before or after: The greatest tempest Shima has even known waits in the wings for you to call its name. Your anger can topple mountains. Crush empires. Change the very shape of the world.'
He pressed the blade into her hand, watched her with cool eyes the colour of steel.
'Your anger is a gift. ~ Jay Kristoff,
110:Anarchy wears two faces, both Creator and Destroyer. Thus Destroyers topple empires; make a canvas of clean rubble where creators can then build a better world. Rubble, once achieved makes further ruins' means irrelevant. Away with our explosives, then! Away with our Destroyers! They have no place within our better world. But let us raise a toast to all our bombers, all our bastards, most unlovely and most unforgivable, let's drink their health, then meet with them no more. ~ Alan Moore,
111:Suydam said, “The return of the Sleeping King would mean the end of your people’s wretchedness. The end of all the wreck and squalor of a billion lives. When he rises, he wipes away the follies of mankind. And he is only one of many. They are the Great Old Ones. Their footfalls cause mountains to topple. One gaze strikes ten million bodies dead. But imagine the fortunes of those of us who were allowed to survive? The reward for those of us who helped the Sleeping King wake? ~ Victor LaValle,
112:We all know why [the generals] are so critical of the defense secretary. They're being defensive because they weren't able to implement his brilliant plan [on screen: Operation 'Greet Us As Liberators']. It was so simple: Go in with 100,000 troops, topple the regime, everybody loves us, and we leave by Easter 2003. These ex-military men have their right to their opinions, that's fine. They just shouldn't voice them during a war [on screen: 'Loose Lips Sink Approval Ratings'] ~ Stephen Colbert,
113:Some people grow up gradually, the foundations of their childhood steadily sinking into the earth so slowly they barely notice the change. Until one day they’re simply standing on their own two feet with little idea how they got there. Then there are people whose childhoods are smashed to bits in one blow. They topple into adulthood, flailing about for something to hold onto, and the terror of falling leaves a permanent scar on their psyche. Do those people ever end up feeling safe? ~ Kristen Callihan,
114:The great wall of vegetation, an exuberant and entangled mass of trunks, branches, leaves, boughs, festoons, motionless in the moonlight, was like a rioting invasion of soundless life, a rolling wave of plants, piled up, crested, ready to topple over the creek, to sweep every little man of us out of his little existence. And it moved not. A deadened burst of mighty splashes and snorts reached us from afar, as though an ichthyosaurus had been taking a bath of glitter in the great river. ~ Joseph Conrad,
115:According to Hindu cosmology, we're in the kali yuga, a dark period when the cow of history is balanced precariously on one leg, soon to topple. Then there are our new-age friends who believe that this December we're in for a global cage-rattling which, once the dust has settled, will usher in a great spiritual awakening. Most of this apocalyptic noise appears to be just wishful thinking on the part of people who find life too messy and uncertain for comfort, let alone for serenity and mirth. ~ Tom Robbins,
116:We cannot afford the luxury of self pity. Our top priority now is to get on with the building process. My personal peace has come through helping boys and girls reach beyond the ordinary and strive for the extraordinary. We must teach our children to weather the hurricanes of life, pick up the pieces, and rebuild. We must impress upon our children that even when troubles rise to seven-point- one on life's Richter scale, they must be anchored so deeply that, though they sway, they will not topple ~ Mamie Till,
117:I'm going to build that house with my own hands, from the foundation to the roof. I'm going to do it for us, and I'm going to do it right, so it lasts forever. Can't go raising walls on a shaky foundation. Can't go slapping thatch over rafters so thin, they'll topple with the first winter storm. Do you know?"
She nodded. "I know."
He reached for her hand. "It's the same with us. I mean to build something with you. Something that will last. Much as I want you, I don't want to rush and bollocks it up. ~ Tessa Dare,
118:When you really look back and take the wider perspective, it makes total sense that if the status quo is to remain the way it is, women will not be lauded and applauded for bonding with and helping each other, because it would destroy the world order if women organized; it would topple the whole thing. And so, it makes perfect sense to me that the current order of things would encourage the cat fights and encourage the comparisons and encourage the girl-on-girl hate that you see just being promoted everywhere. ~ Amanda Palmer,
119:Elvis Presley's talent brightened millions of lives. He widened the horizons of my world certainly. The first record I ever owned was a 78 rpm of "Hound Dog" backed by "Don't Be Cruel" and when I listened to those tunes I felt about ten feet tall and I grinned so hard that I felt like the corners of my mouth would meet in the back and the tip of my head would simply topple off. All I know about Rock and Roll is that it makes people feel good. Elvis Presley more than made me feel good, he enriched my life and made it better. ~ Stephen King,
120:there was no dissent, no strike, no protest, no hesitation to shoulder a rifle against fellow workers of another land. When the call came, the worker, whom Marx declared to have no Fatherland identified himself with country, not class. He turned out to be a member of the national family like anyone else. The force of his antagonism which was supposed to topple capitalism found a better target in the foreigner. The working class went to war willingly, even eagerly, like the middle class, like the upper class, like the species. ~ Barbara W Tuchman,
121:The first black president found that he was personally toxic to the GOP base. An entire political party was organized around the explicit aim of negating Obama. It was thought by Obama and others that this toxicity was the result of a relentless assault waged by Fox News and right-wing talk radio. Trump’s genius was understanding that it was something more, that it was a hunger for revanche so strong that a political novice and accused rapist could topple the leadership of one major party and throttle the presumed favorite of another. ~ Ta Nehisi Coates,
122:Change can only come from local citizens and politicians - it cannot be imposed by well-meaning foreigners - not least because a society like Afghanistan or Iraq is suspicious of outsiders and often resistant to change. I am not going to get drawn into the ethics of intervening in other countries. My concern is the practical question. Can you actually achieve change in this way? My guess is we can stop wars sometimes as in the Balkans and topple regimes - but that the other stuff - such as corruption is not within our power to effect and alter. ~ Rory Stewart,
123:Declaring that we will master our fears is the first great leap toward freedom. Our vitality, growth, and destiny all demand that we can topple fear. As so much hangs in the balance, let us better understand what fear really is. Fear is the human motive of aversion. Fear doesn’t help us commit to higher aims. It doesn’t help us imagine greatness. Its sole aim is immediate release from threat, strain, or pain. It often becomes a by-all-means-necessary approach to controlling any given situation so that the body—but most often the ego—can feel safe and unchallenged. ~ Brendon Burchard,
124:Toronto won't topple New York or London as a financial center, nor will it dethrone Los Angeles as the international entertainment capital, but with its large and stable banks, numerous knowledge-based industries thriving in the surrounding mega-regions, and an increasingly diverse population, it will gain ground. And with employment opportunities in the largest centers eroding, it can make a big move on top global talent. It stands as a model of an older, once heavily industrial Frostbelt city that has not only turned itself around but continues to grow and thrive. ~ Richard Florida,
125:A key individual in the fascist-Islamist nexus and a go-between for the Nazis and al-Banna was the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin el-Husseini, himself a senior member of the Brotherhood. Having fled from Palestine to Iraq, the Mufti assisted there in the short-lived 1941 Nazi-financed coup to topple the British administration. But by June of that year British forces reasserted control in Baghdad, and the Mufti was on the run yet again. This time he fled via Tehran and Rome to Berlin, where he received a hero’s welcome. He remained in Germany as an honored guest of Hitler. ~ Dan Eaton,
126:Here is Thomas Kuhn, the philosopher of science, describing the way scientists react when their pet theories are unraveling: “What scientists never do when confronted by even severe and prolonged anomalies,” Kuhn wrote, “…. [is] renounce the paradigm that led them into crisis.” Instead, he concluded, “A scientific theory is declared invalid only if an alternate candidate is available to take its place.” That is, scientific theories very seldom collapse under the weight of their own inadequacy. They topple only when a new and seemingly better belief turns up to replace it. ~ Kathryn Schulz,
127:Ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. That was the whole idea, right? That‘s why we went. I am reluctant to let that fact disappear down the memory hole, because if— as the war ends, or at least starts to end— if, at this time, the history of the war is written as us going there to topple the regime of a bad man when that frankly isn‘t why were told that we were going there— Aren‘t we still at risk of making this horrific mistake again? And, aren‘t we letting the people who foisted the WMD idea on us, not many years ago, aren‘t we sort of letting them get away with it? ~ Rachel Maddow,
128:The key questions answered by tipping point leaders are as follows: What factors or acts exercise a disproportionately positive influence on breaking the status quo? On getting the maximum bang out of each buck of resources? On motivating key players to aggressively move forward with change? And on knocking down political roadblocks that often trip up even the best strategies? By single-mindedly focusing on points of disproportionate influence, tipping point leaders can topple the four hurdles that limit execution of blue ocean strategy. They can do this fast and at low cost. Let ~ W Chan Kim,
129:Ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. That was the whole idea, right? That‘s why we went. I am reluctant to let that fact disappear down the memory hole, because if — as the war ends, or at least starts to end — if, at this time, the history of the war is written as us going there to topple the regime of a bad man when that frankly isn‘t why were told that we were going there — Aren‘t we still at risk of making this horrific mistake again? And, aren‘t we letting the people who foisted the WMD idea on us, not many years ago, aren‘t we sort of letting them get away with it? ~ Rachel Maddow,
130:Mr. Italia sat belching under a pair of oval-framed photographs of parents hairier, if possible, than himself. His wife was dead, but there was a picture of her, too, in her casket, gazing out at us with an eerie simulacrum of motherly love. Dark-complected Mr. Italia was indeed, with handle-bar mustaches of a size that might have made him topple forward out of his chair were it not for the posture seemingly aimed at correcting the leverage in his favor. He drank beer after thrusting into my hand a bottle of soda pop of marked but unidentifiable flavor, pale yellow in color, and lukewarm. ~ Peter De Vries,
131:Idolatry takes hold of you and me when we depend on a human relationship, a circumstance, or a possession to never leave nor forsake us, to always remain. Idolatry takes hold of us when we believe that a difficult relationship or circumstance will never change, will always be hopeless, wounding, or sorrowful. But here is truth to topple idols: Every circumstance you encounter will change except the circumstance of your forgiveness. Every possession you own will pass away except the pearl of your salvation. Every relationship you enter into will waver except your adoption by your heavenly Father. ~ Jen Wilkin,
132:I leaned forward. “How did I turn out? Are you proud of the monster you made?”

Roland smiled. Hugh and Landon were right. It was like the sun had risen. Like digging a hole in your backyard and finding a glittering jewel in the dirt.

“Child, my dangerous one, my beautiful one. You’ve claimed your city. You shouldn’t have been able to do that for another hundred years. I’m so proud that my pride could topple mountains. If you let me, I would show you to the world. I would show the world to you.”

“So I could see it through your eyes?”

“So you could see it through your own. ~ Ilona Andrews,
133:That's how religions and histories make their way into the world, not through battles and conquests, but through poems and kennings and songs, passed through generations and written down by scholars and scribes. . . .

After all, words are what remain when all the deeds have been done. Words can shatter faith, start a war, change the course of history. A story can make your heart beat faster, topple walls, scale mountains--Hey, a story can even raise the dead. And that's why the King of Stories ended up being King of the gods, because writing history and making history are only the breadth of a page apart. ~ Joanne Harris,
134:Everything had been redefined, and everything had grown beautiful. Birds sang of this budding love, and flowers grew only to be plucked for her – though he hadn’t the nerve to do any more than pluck them, and so he left a colourful trail of discarded petals wherever he walked. He found himself thinking of her, imagining shining moments like her adoring laughter in response to one of his many witty remarks. Her ringing voice would cause the robins to faint and topple from their branches and butterflies to explode with happiness – joyful little puffs that would sprinkle the air with a soft haze as she leaned forward ~ Jonathan Renshaw,
135:When Harper was in among the stones she could see brass plaques screwed into the towering pillars of granite. One listed the names of seventeen boys who had died in the mud of eastern France during the First World War. Another listed the names of thirty-four boys who had died on the beaches of western France during the Second. Harper thought all tombstones should be this size, that the small blocks to be found in most graveyards did not even begin to express the sickening enormity of losing a virgin son, thousands of miles away, in the muck and cold. You needed something so big you felt it might topple over and crush you. ~ Joe Hill,
136:A raging, glowering full moon had come up, was peering down over the side of the sky well above the patio.

That was the last thing she saw as she leaned for a moment, inert with fatigue, against the doorway of the room in which her child lay. Then she dragged herself in to topple headlong upon the bed and, already fast asleep, to circle her child with one protective arm, moving as if of its own instinct.

Not the meek, the pallid, gentle moon of home. This was the savage moon that had shone down on Montezuma and Cuauhtemoc, and came back looking for them now. The primitive moon that had once looked down on terraced heathen cities and human sacrifices. The moon of Anahuac. ("The Moon Of Montezuma") ~ Cornell Woolrich,
137:As waves from a swell approach a shoreline, their lower ends begin to feel the sea bottom. Wave trains become sets—groups of waves that are larger and longer-interval than their more locally generated cousins. The approaching waves refract (bend) in response to the shape of the sea bottom. The visible part of the wave grows, its orbiting energy pushed higher above the surface. The resistance offered by the sea bottom increases as the water gets shallower, slowing the progress of the lowest part of the wave. The wave above the surface steepens. Finally, it becomes unstable and prepares to topple forward—to break. The rule of thumb is that it will break when the wave height reaches 80 percent of the water’s depth— ~ William Finnegan,
138:Not one of our political spokespeople—the same is true of the Arabs since Abdel Nasser’s time—ever speaks with self-respect and dignity of what we are, what we want, what we have done, and where we want to go. In the 1956 Suez War, the French colonial war against Algeria, the Israeli wars of occupation and dispossession, and the campaign against Iraq, a war whose stated purpose was to topple a specific regime but whose real goal was the devastation of the most powerful Arab country. And just as the French, British, Israeli, and American campaign against Gamal Abdel Nasser was designed to bring down a force that openly stated as its ambition the unification of the Arabs into a very powerful independent political force. ~ Edward W Said,
139:Great meals rarely start at points that all look like beginnings. They usually pick up where something else leaves off. This is how most of the best things are made - imagine if the world had to begin from scratch each dawn: a tree would never grow, nor would we ever get to see the etchings of gentle rings on a clamshell... Meals' ingredients must be allowed to topple into one another like dominos. Broccoli stems, their florets perfectly boiled in salty water, must be simmered with olive oil and eaten with shaved Parmesan on toast; their leftover cooking liquid kept for the base for soup, studded with other vegetables, drizzled with good olive oil, with the rind of the Parmesan added for heartiness. This continuity is the heart and soul of cooking. ~ Tamar Adler,
140:It's like chopping down a huge tree of immense girth. You won't accomplish it with one swing of your axe. If you keep chopping away at it, though, and do not let up, eventually, whether it wants to or not, it will suddenly topple down. When that time comes, you could round up everyone you could find and pay them to hold the tree up, but they wouldn't be able to do it. It would still come crashing to the ground. . . . But if the woodcutter stopped after one or two strokes of his axe to ask the third son of Mr. Chang, Why doesn't this tree fall? And after three or four more strokes stopped again to ask the fourth son of Mr. Li, Why doesn't this tree fall? he would never succeed in felling the tree. It is no different for someone who is practicing the Way.
   ~ Hakuin Ekaku,
141:If I had to name my disability, I would call it an unwillingness to fall. On the one hand, this is perfectly normal. I do not know anyone who likes to fall. But, on the other hand, this reluctance signals mistrust of the central truth of the Christian gospel: life springs from death, not only at the last but also in the many little deaths along the way. When everything you count on for protection has failed, the Divine Presence does not fail. The hands are still there – not promising to rescue, not promising to intervene – promising only to hold you no matter how far you fall. Ironically, those who try hardest not to fall learn this later than those who topple more easily. The ones who find their lives are the losers, while the winners come in last. ~ Barbara Brown Taylor,
142:It’s like chopping down a huge tree of immense girth. You won’t accomplish it with one swing of your axe. If you keep chopping away at it, though, and do not let up, eventually, whether it wants to or not, it will suddenly topple down. When that time comes, you could round up everyone you could find and pay them to hold the tree up, but they wouldn’t be able to do it. It would still come crashing to the ground…. But if the woodcutter stopped after one or two strokes of his axe to ask the third son of Mr. Chang, “Why doesn’t this tree fall?” And after three or four more strokes stopped again to ask the fourth son of Mr. Li, “Why doesn’t this tree fall?” he would never succeed in felling the tree. It is no different for someone who is practicing the Way. —ZEN MASTER HAKUIN ~ Robert Greene,
143:Why were we tortured? We were in love and life was a fast current swarming around our ankles, threatening to topple us into the wet part of the planet. It was intense, that's why we were tortured. It was enormous and exploding like palm tree. Iris was my Yuri-G, my Delilah, my Stella Marie. Strong dark women you had to love with a strong dark heart that throbbed in gorgeous pain because love is terrible. I mean, ultimately. It would go away like a needle lifting from the vinyl at the end of the song, we knew this. The music would cease, one of us would die or else we'd just break up, and this drove us to drink from each other like two twelve-year-olds sneaking vodka from the liquor cabinet, trying to get it all down, trying to get as fucked up as possible before we got caught. ~ Michelle Tea,
144:So tortured about what? Why were we tortured? We were in love and life was a fast current swarming around our ankles, threatening to topple us into the wet part of the planet. It was intense, that's why we were tortured. It was enormous and exploding like that palm tree. Iris was my Yuri-G, my Delilah, my Stella Marie. Strong dark women you had to love with a strong dark heart the throbbed in gorgeous pain because love is terrible. I mean, ultimately. It would go away like a needle lifting from the vinyl at the end of the song, we knew this. The music would cease, one of us would die or else we'd just break up, and this drove us to drink from each other like two twelve-year-olds sneaking vodka from the liquor cabinet, trying to get it all down, trying to get as fucked up as possible before we got caught. ~ Michelle Tea,
145:Don't say another goddamn word. Up until now, I've been polite. If you say anything else--word one--I will kill myself. And when my tainted spirit finds its destination, I will topple the master of that dark place. From my black throne, I will lash together a machine of bone and blood, and fueled by my hatred for you this fear engine will bore a hole between this world and that one. When it begins you will hear the sound of children screaming--as though from a great distance. A smoking orb of nothing will grow above your bed, and from it will emerge a thousand starving crows. As I slip through the widening maw in my new form, you will catch only a glimpse of my radiance before you are incinerated. Then, as tears of bubbling pitch stream down my face, my dark work will begin. I will open one of my six mouths, and I will sing the song that ends the Earth. ~ Jerry Holkins,
146:It’s being made out that the whole point of the war was to topple the Taliban regime and liberate Afghan women from their burqas, we are being asked to believe that the U.S. marines are actually on a feminist mission . (If so, will their next stop be America’s military ally Saudi Arabia?) Think of it this way: in India there are some pretty reprehensible social practices against “untouchables”, against Christians and Muslims, against women. Pakistan and Bangladesh have even worse ways of dealing with minority communities and women. Should they be bombed? Should Delhi, Islamabad and Dhaka be destroyed? Is it possible to bomb bigotry out of India? Can we bomb our way to a feminist paradise? Is that how women won the vote in the U.S? Or how slavery was abolished? Can we win redress for the genocide of the millions of Native Americans upon whose corpses the United States was founded by bombing Santa Fe? ~ Arundhati Roy,
147:Even as the stupid dwarves cut down a few of my lesser fighters, more warriors swarm to join the ranks of my army! Doom is upon you all, Drizzt Do’Urden! Akar Kessell is come!” The fog cleared. With a thousand fervent warriors behind him, Wulfgar approached the unsuspecting monsters. The goblins and orcs who were closest to the charging barbarians, holding unbending faith in the words of their master, cheered at the coming of their promised allies. Then they died. The barbarian horde drove through their ranks, singing and killing with wild abandonment. Even through the clatter of weapons, the sound of the dwarves joining in the Song of Tempos could be heard. Wide-eyed, jaw hanging open, trembling with rage, Kessell waved the shocking image away and swung back on Drizzt. “It does not matter!” he said, fighting to keep his tone steady. “I shall deal with them mercilessly! And then Bryn Shander shall topple in flames! ~ R A Salvatore,
148:The other gift — a book of poems, called, "The Cowardly Morning" — Waner put on Corinne's desk at the office, with a note saying, "This man is Coleridge and Blake and Rilke all in one, and more."
She didn't pick up the book again until she was in bed, late that night.
[...]
The first poem was the title poem. This time Corinne read it through aloud. But still she didn't hear it. She read it through a third time, and heard some of it. She read it through a fourth time, and heard all of it. It was the poem containing the lines:
'Not wasteland, but a great inverted forest
with all foliage underground.'
As though it might be best to look immediately for shelter, Corinne had to put the book down. At any moment the apartment building seemed liable to lose its balance and topple across Fifth Avenue into Central Park. She waited. Gradually the deluge of truth and beauty abated.
- The Inverted Forest (1947) ~ J D Salinger,
149:There are two kinds of people in the world, those who re-read and those who don’t. No, don’t be silly, there are far more than two kinds of people in the world. There are even people who don’t read at all. (What do they think about on buses?) But there are two kinds of readers in the world, though, those who re-read and those who don’t. Sometimes people who don’t re-read look at me oddly when I mention that I do. “There are so many books,” they say, “and so little time. If I live to be a mere Methuselah of 800, and read a book a week for 800 years, I will only have the chance to read 40,000 books, and my readpile is already 90,000 and starting to topple! If I re-read, why, I’ll never get through the new ones.” This is in fact true, they never will. And my readpile is also, well, let’s just say it’s pretty large, and that’s just the pile of unread books in my house, not the list of books I’d theoretically like to read someday, many of which have not even been written yet. ~ Jo Walton,
150:Adults, in their dealing with children, are insane," he [Ed Ricketts] said. "And children know it too. Adults lay down rules they would not think of following, speak truths they do not believe. And yet they expect children to obey the rules, believe the truths, and admire and respect their parents for this nonsense. Children must be very wise and secret to tolerate adults at all. And the greatest nonsense of all that adults expect children to believe is that people learn by experience. No greater lie was ever revered. And its falseness is immediately discerned by children since their parents obviously have not learned anything by experience. Far from learning, adults simply become set in a maze of prejudices and dreams and sets of rules whose origins they do not know and would not dare inspect for fear the whole structure might topple over on them. I think children instinctively know this," Ed said. "Intelligent children learn to conceal their knowledge and keep free of this howling mania. ~ John Steinbeck,
151:You see that stones are worn away by time,
Rocks rot, and twoers topple, even the shrines
And images of the gods grow very tired,
Develop crack or wrinkles, their holy wills
Unable to extend their fated term,
To litigate against the Laws of Nature.
And don't we see the monuments of men
Collapse, as if to ask us, "Are not we
As frail as those whom we commemorate?"?
Boulders come plunging down from the mountain heights,
Poor weaklings with no power to resist
The thrust that says to them, Your time has come!
But they would be rooted in steadfastness
Had they endured from time beyond all time,
As far back as infinity. Look about you!
Whatever it is that holds in its embrace
All earth, if it projects, as some men say,
All things out of itself, and takes them back
When they have perished, must itself consist
Of mortal elements. The parts must add
Up to the sum. Whatever gives away
Must lose in the procedure, and gain again
Whenever it takes back. ~ Lucretius,
152:A revolution on a world scale will take a very long time. But it is also possible to recognize that it is already starting to happen. The easiest way to get our minds around it is to stop thinking about revolution as a thing — “the” revolution, the great cataclysmic break—and instead ask “what is revolutionary action?” We could then
suggest: revolutionary action is any collective action which rejects, and therefore confronts, some form of power or domination and in doing so, reconstitutes social relations—even within the collectivity—in that light. Revolutionary action does not necessarily have to aim to topple governments. Attempts to create autonomous communities in the face of power (using Castoriadis’ definition
here: ones that constitute themselves, collectively make their own rules or principles of operation, and continually reexamine them), would, for
instance, be almost by definition revolutionary acts. And history shows us that the continual accumulation
of such acts can change (almost) everything. ~ David Graeber,
153:Netanyahu then explained to me why the stakes were so high. The Iranian leaders, he said, “want to concentrate on completing their nuclear program because once they have that, then they could threaten the West in ways that are unimaginable today. They could take over the Persian Gulf on all its sides and take control of the oil reserves of the world. They could topple Saudi Arabia and Jordan in short order and, of course, Iraq. All your internal debates in America on [the future of] Iraq would be irrelevant because nuclear-armed Iran would subordinate Iraq in two seconds. Then they would threaten to create a second Holocaust in Israel and proceed on their idea of building a global empire, producing twenty-five atomic bombs a year—250 bombs in a decade—with missiles that they are already working on [and that they want to develop] to reach the eastern seaboard of the United States. Everything else pales in comparison to this development. This has to be stopped, for the sake of the world, not only for the sake of Israel. ~ Joel C Rosenberg,
154:As I demonstrated this on Bob, he fell backwards onto me, completely inert and passive, with no hint of any reflexive reaction. Startled, I pushed him gently forward to the upright position, but now he started to topple forward; I could not balance him. I had a sense of bewilderment mixed with panic. For a moment, I thought that there had suddenly been a neurological catastrophe, that he had actually lost all his postural reflexes. Could acting like this, I wondered, actually alter the nervous system? The next day I was talking with him in his dressing room before the day’s shooting began, and as we talked, I noticed that his right foot was turned in with precisely the dystonic curvature it was held in when he portrayed Leonard L. on the set. I commented on this, and Bob seemed rather startled. “I didn’t realize,” he said. “I guess it’s unconscious.” He sometimes stayed in character for hours or days; he would make comments at dinner which belonged to Leonard, not himself, as if residues of the Leonard mind and character were still adhering to him. ~ Oliver Sacks,
155:The Fathers
Our fathers all were poor,
Poorer our fathers' fathers;
Beyond, we dare not look.
We, the sons, keep store
Of tarnished gold that gathers
Around us from the night,
Record it in this book
That, when the line is drawn,
Credit and creditor gone,
Column and figure flown,
Will open into light.
Archaic fevers shake
Our healthy flesh and blood
Plumped in the passing day
And fed with pleasant food.
The fathers' anger and ache
Will not, will not away
And leave the living alone,
But on our careless brows
Faintly their furrows engrave
Like veinings in a stone,
Breathe in the sunny house
Nightmare of blackened bone,
Cellar and choking cave.
Panics and furies fly
Through our unhurried veins,
Heavenly lights and rains
Purify heart and eye,
Past agonies purify
And lay the sullen dust.
The angers will not away.
We hold our fathers' trust,
Wrong, riches, sorrow and all
Until they topple and fall,
And fallen let in the day.
24
~ Edwin Muir,
156:The faculty of rationality inclines dangerously to pride: all I know is all that needs to be known. Pride falls in love with its own creations, and tries to make them absolute. I have seen people define their utopia and then bend their lives into knots trying to make it reality. A left-leaning student adopts a trendy, anti-authority stance and spends the next twenty years working resentfully to topple the windmills of his imagination. An eighteen-year-old decides, arbitrarily, that she wants to retire at fifty-two. She works for three decades to make that happen, failing to notice that she made that decision when she was little more than a child. What did she know about her fifty-two-year-old self, when still a teenager? Even now, many years later, she has only the vaguest, lowest-resolution idea of her post-work Eden. She refuses to notice. What did her life mean, if that initial goal was wrong? She’s afraid of opening Pandora’s box, where all the troubles of the world reside. But hope is in there, too. Instead, she warps her life to fit the fantasies of a sheltered adolescent. ~ Jordan Peterson,
157:The faculty of rationality inclines dangerously to pride: all I know is all that needs to be known. Pride falls in love with its own creations, and tries to make them absolute. I have seen people define their utopia and then bend their lives into knots trying to make it reality. A left-leaning student adopts a trendy, anti-authority stance and spends the next twenty years working resentfully to topple the windmills of his imagination. An eighteen-year-old decides, arbitrarily, that she wants to retire at fifty-two. She works for three decades to make that happen, failing to notice that she made that decision when she was little more than a child. What did she know about her fifty-two-year-old self, when still a teenager? Even now, many years later, she has only the vaguest, lowest-resolution idea of her post-work Eden. She refuses to notice. What did her life mean, if that initial goal was wrong? She’s afraid of opening Pandora’s box, where all the troubles of the world reside. But hope is in there, too. Instead, she warps her life to fit the fantasies of a sheltered adolescent. ~ Jordan B Peterson,
158:She watched beneath her lashes as his chair rocked with his weight. MacLean scowled and grabbed the edge of the table. Angus had cut varying lengths from each chair so that some rocked, while others were at a distinct forward slant so that you had to press back to keep from sliding into the floor.
"Is something wrong, Lord MacLean?"
"This chair." He scooted forward and slipped a little. With a scowl, he stood and pushed his chair to one side, selecting another.
"Lord MacLean-"
"Dougal," he said firmly, sitting down in the new chair. This one rocked backward, and he lurched, as if afraid it would topple over completely.
Sophia coughed to cover her amusement. From the dark scowl turned her way, she hadn't succeeded.
"That's it." Dougal shoved back the chair and stood,glancing about the room. "Ah!" He strode forward and picked out a thin book of sermons from a set on a side table. He lifted the back of his chair, placed a book beneath one leg, and sat down. "Much better."
Sophia wished he weren't quite so enterprising. She and Angus ha worked for hours to make every chair a uniquely uncomfortable experience. ~ Karen Hawkins,
159:On the course of that chariot and those horses.
A boy could not hope to control them.
You are my son, but mortal. No mortal
Could hope to manage those reins.
Not even the gods are allowed to touch them.

...

'Our first stretch is almost vertical.
Fresh as they are, first thing,
It is all the horses can do to get up it.
Then on to mid-heaven. Terrifying
To look down through nothing
At earth and sea, so tiny.
My heart nearly struggles out of my body
As the chariot sways.
Then the plunge towards evening -
There you need strength on the reins. Tethys,

'Who waits to receive me
Into her waters, is always afraid
I shall topple -
And come tumbling
Head over heels in a tangled mass.

'Remember, too,
That the whole sky is revolving
With its constellations, its planets.
I have to force my course against that -
Not to be swept backwards as all else is.

'What will you do,
Your feet braced at the chariot, the reins in your hands,
When you have to counter the pull
Of the whistling Poles? When the momentum
Of the whole reeling cosmos hauls you off sideways? ~ Ted Hughes,
160:Mr. Benedict’s amusement sent him right off to sleep, for he had a condition called narcolepsy that caused him to nod off at unexpected moments. These episodes occurred most often when he experienced strong emotion, and especially when he was laughing. His assistants (who were also, as it happened, his adopted daughters) did what they could to protect him—he could hardly take two steps without Rhonda or Number Two shadowing him watchfully in case he should fall asleep and topple over—and Mr. Benedict guarded against such incidents himself by always wearing a green plaid suit, which he had discovered long ago to have a calming effect. Nevertheless, the occasional bout of sudden sleep was inevitable, and as a result Mr. Benedict’s thick white hair was perpetually tousled, and his face, as often as not, was unevenly shaven and marked with razor nicks. (Unfortunately nothing was more comical, Mr. Benedict said, than the sight of himself in the shaving mirror, where his bright green eyes and long, lumpy nose—together with a false white beard of shaving lather—put him in mind of Santa Claus.) He also wore spectacles of the sturdiest variety, the better to protect against shattering in the event of a fall. But as ~ Trenton Lee Stewart,
161:they’ll start.” “What are they going to do about the Elder Council?” “Meritorious was a good man and the most powerful Grand Mage we had seen in a long time. The other Councils in Europe are worried about who will fill the vacuum now that he’s gone. The Americans are offering their support, the Japanese are sending delegates to help us wrest back some control, but…” “It sounds like a lot of people are panicking.” “And they have a right to. Our systems of power, our systems of self-government, are delicate. If we topple, others will follow. We need a strong leader.” “Why don’t you do it?” He laughed. “Because I’m not well liked, and I’m not well trusted, and I already have a job. I’m a detective, remember?” She gave her own little shrug. “Vaguely.” Another snippet of pub music drifted by the window, and Stephanie thought about the world she’d grown up in, and how different it was from the world she’d been introduced to, and yet how similar. There was joy and happiness in both, just as there was heartbreak and horror. There was good and evil and everything in between, and these qualities seemed to be shared equally in the worlds of the magical and the mundane. It was her life now. She couldn’t imagine living without either one. “How are you?” Skulduggery asked, his voice gentle. ~ Derek Landy,
162:Winter turns my mind to journeys those taken and those never done. Especially to a fantasy one I have always wanted to make: along the Grand Trunk Road from Calcutta to Peshawar. For the Road is a river. It may not be as sacred as the Ganga, which it greets at Kanpur and Varanasi, but it is just as permanent. It’s a river of life, an unending stream of humanity going places, intent on arriving and getting there most of the time. A long day’s journey into night that’s how I would describe the saga of the truck driver, that knight errant, or rather errant knight, of India’s Via Appia. Undervalued, underpaid and often disparaged, he drives all day and sometimes all night, carrying the country’s goods and produce for hundreds of miles, across state borders, through lawless tracts, at all seasons and in all weathers. We blame him for hogging the middle of the road, but he is usually overloaded and if he veers too much to the left or right he is quite likely to topple over, burying himself and crew under bricks or gas cylinders, sugarcane or TV sets. More than the railwayman, the truck driver is modern India’s lifeline, and yet his life is held cheap. He drinks, he swears, occasionally he picks up HIV, and frequently he is killed or badly injured. And we hate him for hogging the road. But we cannot do without him. ~ Ruskin Bond,
163:I’m not sure—You young people. There are going to be rocks in your way and rocks on your backs. You’re a man, you can’t approach this like a baby would. It won’t get any easier, Rashid. Not a lick easier. It’s gonna be like this forever. Shit, it’s going to get harder. Forever, huh? I was going to name Luce forever, or rather, Samad, one of the ninety-nine names of Allah—Al-Samad, the eternal. But then I started to think about eternity, what a curse if you’re not God, right? My man God doesn’t have holy rent and holy bills to pay. Eternity means someone always digging into your pocket, forever being distracted from your deepest desires, spending all your time doing something you don’t want to do in order to pay a petty light bill. So in that hospital room while Ricca was screaming and pushing Luce out, I changed my mind about wanting my son to be eternal. His little head looked sort of like a beam of light so I dropped my college Arabic for my high school Spanish. La Luz, the light. But light, it’s beautiful and all, but it generates heat: heat burns. That’s what this family shit does, it burns you. Sets you on fire. Burns you to a fucking crisp. All my sense is burned from me. Everything. I’m gutted like a burnt-out building. I’m burned. I can’t stand. One day I’m gonna topple over, a pile of fucking burnt ash that’ll burn forever. ~ Rion Amilcar Scott,
164:The rapt pupil will be forgive for assuming the Tsar of Death to be wicked and the Tsar of Life to be visrtuous. Let the truth be told: There is no virtue anywhere. Life is sly and unscrupulous, a blackguard, wolfish, severe. In service to itself, it wil commit any offense. So, too, is Death possessed of infinite strategies and a gaunt nature-but also mercy, also grace and tenderness. In his own country, Death can be kind. But of an end to their argument, we shall have none, not ever, until the end of all.

So where is the country of the Tsar of Death? Where is the nation of the Tsar of Life? They are not so easy to find, yet each day you step upon both one hundred times or more. Every portion of Eath is infinitely divided between them, to the smallest unit of measure, and smaller yet. Even the specks of soil war with one another. Even the atoms strangle each other in their sleep. To reach the country of the Tsar of Life, which is both impossibly near and hopelessly far, you must not wish to arrive there, but approach is stealthily, sideways. It is best to be ill, in a fever, a delirium. In the riot of sickness, when the threatened flesh rouses itself, all redness and fluid and heat, it is easiest to topple over into the country you seek.

Of course, it is just as easy, in this manner to reach the country of the Tsar of Death. Travel is never without risk. ~ Catherynne M Valente,
165:What about you, Mr. Shaw?" she asked. "Are your affections engaged by someone back home?"
He shook his head at once. "I'm afraid that I share McKenna's rather skeptical view of the benefits of marriage."
"I think you will fall in love someday."
"Doubtful. I'm afraid that particular emotion is unknown to me..." Suddenly his voice faded into silence. He set his cup down as he stared off into the distance with sudden alertness.
"Mr. Shaw?" As Aline followed his gaze, she realized what he had seen- Livia, wearing a pastel flower-printed walking dress as she headed to one of the forest trails leading away from the manor. A straw bonnet adorned with a sprig of fresh daisies swung from her fingers as she held it by the ribbons.
Gideon Shaw stood so quickly that his chair threatened to topple backward. "Pardon," he said to Aline, tossing his napkin to the table. "The figment of my imagination has reappeared- and I'm going to catch her."
"Of course," Aline said, struggling not to laugh. "Good luck, Mr. Shaw."
"Thanks." He was gone in a flash, descending one side of the U-shaped stone staircase with the ease of a cat. Once he reached the terraced gardens, he cut across the lawn with long, ground-eating strides, just short of breaking into a run.
Standing to better her view of his progress, Aline couldn't suppress a mocking grin. "Why, Mr. Shaw... I thought there was nothing in life you wanted badly enough to chase after it. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
166:Have you ever seen a building demolished? In the Word of God, the term fortress is the closest equivalent to a literal, ancient stronghold. Both were fortified buildings. The most common way a modern “fortress” is demolished today is by deliberately and strategically placing dynamite in the building and then detonating it. Imagine the demolition crew showing up at the building with sticks and stones. They could holler at that building with all their might and throw sticks and stones until they fainted from exhaustion and it would still be standing. No one would doubt they had tried. They simply had the wrong tools. What they needed was dynamite. You and I are just about as effective as the crew with loud mouths, sticks, and stones when we try to break down our strongholds with carnal weapons like pure determination, secular psychology, and denial. Many of us have expended unknown energy trying hard to topple these strongholds on our own, but they won’t fall, will they? That’s because they must be demolished. God has handed us two sticks of dynamite with which to demolish our strongholds: His Word and prayer. What is more powerful than two sticks of dynamite placed in separate locations? Two strapped together. Now, that’s what this book is all about: taking our two primary sticks of dynamite—prayer and the Word—strapping them together, and igniting them with faith in what God says He can do. Hallelujah! I’m getting excited just thinking about it! ~ Beth Moore,
167:He’s leaving.”
“It would appear so.” Leo came to her, extended a hand down, and pulled her up.
“Why did he leave right in the middle of a quarrel?” Beatrix demanded, dusting off her breeches with short, aggravated whacks. “One can’t just leave, one has to finish it.”
“If he had stayed, sweetheart,” Leo said, “there’s every chance I would have had to pry his hands from around your neck.”
Their conversation paused as they saw Christopher riding from the stables, his form straight as a blade as he spurred his horse into a swift graceful canter.
Beatrix sighed. “I was trying to score points rather than consider how he was feeling,” she admitted. “He was probably frightened for me, seeing the horse topple over like that.”
Probably?” Leo repeated. “He looked like he had just seen Death. I believe it may have touched off one of his bad spells, or whatever it is you call them.”
“I must go to him.”
“Not dressed like that.”
“For heaven’s sake, Leo, just this one time--”
“No exceptions, darling. I know my sisters. Give any one of you an inch, and you’ll take a mile.” He reached out and pushed back her tumbling hair. “Also…don’t go without a chaperone.”
“I don’t want a chaperone. That’s never any fun.”
“Yes, Beatrix, that’s the purpose of a chaperone.”
“Well, in our family, anyone who chaperoned me would probably need a chaperone more than I do.”
Leo opened his mouth to argue, then closed it.
Rare was the occasion when her brother was unable to argue a point.
Repressing a grin, Beatrix strode toward the house. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
168:I've been meaning to ask," Breckenridge said, "jus how you came to topple backward off that rail." He looked at her. "What with one thing and another, the point slipped my mind."
Heather met his gaze. "Mine, too."
he read her eyes, then, brows rising, looked in the direction in which the twins had gone. "Ah. Perhaps that's one of those questions that are better off left unasked."
"It's certainly one of those better left unanswered." Sliding her hand from his and retaking his arm, she started them strolling again.
Breckenridge was quiet for a while, then he looked up at the manor and said, "Will you think it odd of me to suggest that we should, perhaps, leave the Vale and your sometimes unnerving relatives by marriage as soon as we possibl can?"
"How about tomorrow?" She glanced up at his face.
He caught her gaze. "Immediately after breakfast. It's too late to set out today."
She nodded. "Indeed." She looked ahead. "And besides I have plans for tonight."
"Do you?"
"Of course." She met his gaze, her own filled with love and unexpected understanding. "The announcement you made a few minutes ago deserves and appropriate response, don't you think?"
He inclined his head. "Indubitably." After a moment, he added, "Who knows? With the right form of response, you might even induce me to utter the words again."
She laughed. "A challenge." She met his gaze. "A challenge we can wrestle with, wrestle over back and forth, for the rest of our days."
"Indeed." He held her loving gaze, raised her fingers to his lips. "For the rest of our days. ~ Stephanie Laurens,
169:I built, of blocks, a town three hundred thousand strong, whose avenues were paved with a wine-colored rug and decorated by large leaves outlined inappropriately in orange, and on this leafage I'd often park my Tootsie Toy trucks, as if on pads of camouflage, waiting their deployment against catastrophes which included alien invasions, internal treachery, and world war. It was always my intention, and my conceit, to use up, in the town's construction, every toy I possessed: my electronic train, of course, the Lincoln Logs, old kindergarten blocks—their deeply incised letters always a problem—the Erector set, every lead soldier that would stand (broken ones were sent to the hospital), my impressive array of cars, motorcycles, tanks, and trucks—some with trailers, some transporting gas, some tows, some dumps—and my squadrons of planes, my fleet of ships, my big and little guns, an undersized group of parachute people (looking as if one should always imagine them high in the sky, hanging from threads), my silversided submarines, along with assorted RR signs, poles bearing flags, prefab houses with faces pasted in their windows, small boxes of a dozen variously useful kinds, strips of blue cloth for streams and rivers, and glass jars for town water towers, or, in a pinch, jails. In time, the armies, the citizens, even the streets would divide: loyalties, friendships, certainties, would be undermined, the city would be shaken by strife; and marbles would rain down from formerly friendly planes, steeples would topple onto cars, and shellfire would soon throw aggie holes through homes, soldiers would die accompanied by my groans, and ragged bands of refugees would flee toward mountain caves and other chairs and tables. ~ William H Gass,
170:God, Rashid, that’s quite something, he said. I’m not sure—You young people. There are going to be rocks in your way and rocks on your backs. You’re a man, you can’t approach this like a baby would. It won’t get any easier, Rashid. Not a lick easier. It’s gonna be like this forever. Shit, it’s going to get harder. Forever, huh? I was going to name Luce forever, or rather, Samad, one of the ninety-nine names of Allah—Al-Samad, the eternal. But then I started to think about eternity, what a curse if you’re not God, right? My man God doesn’t have holy rent and holy bills to pay. Eternity means someone always digging into your pocket, forever being distracted from your deepest desires, spending all your time doing something you don’t want to do in order to pay a petty light bill. So in that hospital room while Ricca was screaming and pushing Luce out, I changed my mind about wanting my son to be eternal. His little head looked sort of like a beam of light so I dropped my college Arabic for my high school Spanish. La Luz, the light. But light, it’s beautiful and all, but it generates heat: heat burns. That’s what this family shit does, it burns you. Sets you on fire. Burns you to a fucking crisp. All my sense is burned from me. Everything. I’m gutted like a burnt-out building. I’m burned. I can’t stand. One day I’m gonna topple over, a pile of fucking burnt ash that’ll burn forever. And that, Rashid, is the good news. The sun burns and burns and burns and one day it’ll burn out. Massive explosion, taking everything with it, kid. But while it burns, look how much flourishes. Go back to your family, Rashid. Make the day special for Luce. Let Ricca scream at you. You deserve it. And then tomorrow, continue to burn, it’s all you can do. ~ Rion Amilcar Scott,
171:As The Team's Head- Brass
As the team's head-brass flashed out on the turn
The lovers disappeared into the wood.
I sat among the boughs of the fallen elm
That strewed the angle of the fallow, and
Watched the plough narrowing a yellow square
Of charlock. Every time the horses turned
Instead of treading me down, the ploughman leaned
Upon the handles to say or ask a word,
About the weather, next about the war.
Scraping the share he faced towards the wood,
And screwed along the furrow till the brass flashed
Once more.
The blizzard felled the elm whose crest
I sat in, by a woodpecker's round hole,
The ploughman said. 'When will they take it away? '
'When the war's over.' So the talk began –
One minute and an interval of ten,
A minute more and the same interval.
'Have you been out? ' 'No.' 'And don't want to, perhaps? '
'If I could only come back again, I should.
I could spare an arm, I shouldn't want to lose
A leg. If I should lose my head, why, so,
I should want nothing more...Have many gone
From here? ' 'Yes.' 'Many lost? ' 'Yes, a good few.
Only two teams work on the farm this year.
One of my mates is dead. The second day
In France they killed him. It was back in March,
The very night of the blizzard, too. Now if
He had stayed here we should have moved the tree.'
'And I should not have sat here. Everything
Would have been different. For it would have been
Another world.' 'Ay, and a better, though
If we could see all all might seem good.' Then
The lovers came out of the wood again:
The horses started and for the last time
I watched the clods crumble and topple over
After the ploughshare and the stumbling team.
14
~ Edward Thomas,
172:Wild eyes were another sign. It is something I have seldom seen — the expression of an ecstatic state — though much is foolishly written of them, as if they grew like Jerusalem artichokes along the road. The eyes are black, right enough, whatever their normal color is; they are black because their perception is condensed to a coal, because the touch and taste and perfume of the lover, the outcry of a dirty word, a welcome river, have been reduced in the heat of passion to a black ash, and this unburnt residue of oxidation, this calyx, replaces the pupil so it no longer receives but sends, and every hair is on end, though perhaps only outspread on a pillow, and the nostrils are flared, mouth agape, cheeks sucked so the whole face seems as squeezed as a juiced fruit; I know, for once Lou went into that wildness while we were absorbing one another, trying to kiss, not merely forcefully, not the skull of our skeleton, but the skull and all the bones on which the essential self is hung, kiss so the shape of the soul is stirred too, that's what is called the ultimate French, the furtherest fuck, when a cock makes a concept cry out and climax; I know, for more than once, though not often, I shuddered into that other region, when a mouth drew me through its generosity into the realm of unravel, and every sensation lay extended as a lake, every tie was loosed, and the glue of things dissolved. I knew I wore the wild look then. The greatest gift you can give another human being is to let them warm you till, in passing beyond pleasure, your defenses fall, your ego surrenders, its structure melts, its towers topple, lies, fancies, vanities, blow away in no wind, and you return, not to the clay you came from — the unfired vessel — but to the original moment of inspiration, when you were the unabbreviated breath of God. ~ William H Gass,
173:In general, repression had been good to Luka. As he’d discovered through talking with the copy of Ellie he’d brought with him from the San Francisco, repression had enabled him to function in circumstances where others might have given up. But repression was only one tool, and Luka now knew that the structures one built were often defined—or at least profoundly influenced—by the tools one used to build them. Repression was like constantly building upward in order to avoid the work of building out a more stable foundation, but eventually the instability compounded to the point where your life had no choice but to topple. Another problem with the past was that every year, it came back around. The cycle of the Gregorian calendar was like the constant rotation of a cylinder with 365 chambers, and the longer you lived, the more rounds filled those holes. Except these bullets were never fully spent, and rather than proving lethal, the wounds they left were a gradual accumulation of debilitating injury. A much better calendrical system would have been one where days never repeated; where lives were marked with infinitely incrementing integers, constantly leaving the things everyone wanted to forget further and further behind; where every second of every day was a chance to completely reinvent oneself out of newly created time that had no inherent knowledge whatsoever of the past. In the one year since Luka and Ayla had been alone together aboard the Hawk, they had each experienced a lot of anniversaries: the days they’d left their home pod systems as children; the times each had lost people they loved; the moments they’d been forced right up to the very edge of death—in fact, well past the point of peace and acceptance—only to be unexpectedly pulled back into the worlds they thought they were finally leaving behind. And the day that was ~ Christian Cantrell,
174:Don’t ask where I got this idea, because I couldn’t tell you, but I knew precisely where we were going, and I was sure that this might officially make me a slut. But when we reached the door of the unused janitor’s closet, I had no feeling of shame… not yet, at least.
I grasped the doorknob and noticed Wesley’s eyes narrow with suspicion. I yanked open the door, checked that no one was watching, and gestured for him to go inside. Wesley walked into the tiny closet, and I followed, shutting the door stealthily behind us.
“Something tells me this isn’t about The Scarlet Letter,” he said, and even in the dark I knew he was grinning.
“Be quiet.”
This time he met me halfway. His hands tangled in my hair and mine clawed at his forearms. We kissed violently, and my back slammed against the wall. I heard a mop-or maybe a broom-topple over, but my brain barely registered the sound as one of Wesley’s hands moved to my hip, holding me closer to him. He was so much taller than me that I had to tilt my head back almost all the way to meet his kiss. His lips pressed hard against mine, and I let my hands explore his biceps.
The smell of his cologne, rather than the lonely, stale air of the closet, filled my senses.
We wrestled in the darkness for a while before I felt his hand insistently lifting the hem of my T-shirt. With a gasp, I pulled away from the kiss and grabbed his wrist. “No… not now.”
“Then when?” Wesley asked in my ear, still pinning me to the wall. He didn’t even sound winded.
I, on the other hand, struggled to catch my breath. “Later.”
“Be more specific.”
I squirmed out of his arms and moved toward the door, nearly tripping over what felt like a bucket. I raised a hand to flatten my wavy hair and reached for the doorknob. “Tonight. I’ll be at your house around seven. Okay?” But before he could answer, I slipped out of the closet and hurried down the hall, hoping it didn’t look like a walk of shame. ~ Kody Keplinger,
175:Political leaders have two options in the face of extreme polarization. First, they can take society’s divisions as a given but try to counteract them through elite-level cooperation and compromise. This is what Chilean politicians did. As we saw in Chapter 5, intense conflict between the Socialists and the Christian Democrats helped destroy Chilean democracy in 1973. A profound distrust between the two parties persisted for years afterward, trumping their shared revulsion toward Pinochet’s dictatorship. Exiled Socialist leader Ricardo Lagos, who lectured at the University of North Carolina, recalled that when former Christian Democratic president Eduardo Frei Montalva visited the university in 1975, he decided that he couldn’t bear to talk to him—so he called in sick. But eventually, politicians started talking. In 1978, Lagos returned to Chile and was invited to dinner by former Christian Democratic senator Tomás Reyes. They began to meet regularly. At around the same time, Christian Democratic leader Patricio Aylwin attended meetings of lawyers and academics from diverse partisan backgrounds, many of whom had crossed paths in courtrooms while defending political prisoners. These “Group of 24” meetings were just casual dinners in members’ homes, but according to Aylwin, they “built up trust among those of us who had been adversaries.” Eventually, the conversations bore fruit. In August 1985, the Christian Democrats, Socialists, and nineteen other parties gathered in Santiago’s elegant Spanish Circle Club and signed the National Accord for a Transition to a Full Democracy. The pact formed the basis for the Democratic Concertation coalition. The coalition developed a practice of “consensus politics,” in which key decisions were negotiated between Socialist and Christian Democratic leaders. It was successful. Not only did the Democratic Concertation topple Pinochet in a 1988 plebiscite, but it won the presidency in 1989 and held it for two decades. ~ Steven Levitsky,
176:ALMOST EVERY FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF LIFE can be expressed in two opposite ways. There are those who say that to attain the highest wisdom we must be still and calm, immovable in the midst of turmoil. And there are those who say that we must move on as life moves, never stopping for a moment either in fear of what is to come or to turn a regretful glance at what has gone. The former are as those who listen to music, letting the flow of notes pass through their minds without trying either to arrest them or to speed them on. Like Chuang-tzu’s perfect man, they employ their minds as a mirror: it grasps nothing; it refuses nothing; it receives, but does not keep. The latter are as those who dance to music, keeping pace with its movement and letting their limbs flow with it as unceasingly and as unhesitatingly as clouds respond to the breath of wind. The one seems to reflect events as they pass, and the other to move forward with them. Both points of view, however, are true, for to attain that highest wisdom we must at once walk on and remain still. Consider life as a revolving wheel set upright with man walking on its tire. As he walks, the wheel is revolving toward him beneath his feet, and if he is not to be carried backward by it and flung to the ground he must walk at the same speed as the wheel turns. If he exceeds that speed, he will topple forward and slip off the wheel onto his face. For at every moment we stand, as it were, on the top of a wheel; immediately we try to cling to that moment, to that particular point of the wheel, it is no longer at the top and we are off our balance. Thus by not trying to seize the moment, we keep it, for the second we fail to walk on we cease to remain still. Yet within this there is a still deeper truth. From the standpoint of eternity we never can and never do leave the top of the wheel, for if a circle is set in infinite space it has neither top nor bottom. Wherever you stand is the top, and it revolves only because you are pushing it round with your own feet. ~ Alan W Watts,
177:Archaic societies have lasted so long because they know nothing of the desire to innovate, to grovel before ever-new simulacra. If you change images with each generation, you cannot anticipate historical longevity. Classical Greece and modern Europe typify civilisations stricken by a precocious death, following a greed for metamorphosis and an excessive consumption of gods, and of the surrogates for gods. Ancient China and Egypt wallowed for millennia in a magnificent sclerosis. As did African societies, before contact with the West. They too are threatened, because they have adopted another rhythm. Having lost the monopoly on stagnation, they grow increasingly frantic and will inevitably topple like their models, like those feverish civilisations incapable of lasting more than a dozen centuries. In the future, the peoples who accede to hegemony will enjoy it even less: history in slow motion has inexorably been replaced by history out of breath. Who can help regretting the pharaohs and their Chinese colleagues?
Institutions, societies, civilisations differ in duration and significance, yet all are subject to one and the same law, which decrees that the invincible impulse, the factor of their rise, must sag and settle after a certain time, this decadence corresponding to a slackening of that energiser which is . . . delirium. Compared with periods of expansion, of dementia really, those of decline seem sane and are so, are too much so—which makes them almost as deadly as the others.
A nation that has fulfilled itself, that has expended its talents and exploited the last resources of its genius, expiates such success by producing nothing thereafter. It has done its duty, it aspires to vegetate, but to its cost it will not have the latitude to do so. When the Romans—or what remained of them—sought repose, the Barbarians got under way, en masse. We read in a history of the invasions that the German tribes serving in the Empire’s army and administration assumed Latin names until the middle of the fifth century. After which, Germanic names became a requirement. Exhausted, in retreat on every front, the masters were no longer feared, no longer respected. What was the use of bearing their names? “A fatal somnolence reigned everywhere,” observed Salvian, bittersweet censor of the ancient deliquescence in its final stages. ~ Emil M Cioran,
178:So saying, she managed to straighten- which left her facing the house, looking directly at the blank bow windows of the downstairs parlor. With the storm darkening the skies, the windows were reflective. They reflected the image of a man standing directly behind her.
With a gasp, Patience whirled. Her gaze collided with the man's- his eyes were hard, crystalline gray, pale in the weak light. They were focused, intently, on her, their expression one she couldn't fathom. He stood no more than three feet away, large, elegant and oddly forbidding. In the instant her brain registered those facts, Patience felt her heels sink, and sink- into the soft soil of the flower bed.
The edge crumbled beneath her feet.
Her eyes flew wide- her lips formed a helpless "Oh." Arms flailing, she started to topple back-
The man reacted so swiftly his movement was a blur- he gripped her upper arms and hauled her forward.
She landed against him, breast to chest, hips to hard thighs. The breath was knocked out of her, leaving her gasping, mentally as well as physically. Hard hands held her upright, long fingers iron shackles about her arms. His chest was a wall of rock against her breasts; the rest of his body, the long thighs that held them braced, felt as resilient as tensile steel.
She was helpless. Utterly, completely, and absolutely helpless.
Patience looked up and met the stranger's hooded gaze. As she watched, his grey eyes darkened. The expression they contained- intensely concentrated- sent a most peculiar thrill through her.
She blinked; her gaze fell- to the man's lips. Long, thin yet beautifully proportioned, they'd been sculpted with a view to fascination. They certainly fascinated her; she couldn't drag her gaze away. The mesmerizing contours shifted, almost imperceptibly softening; her own lips tingled. She swallowed, and dragged in a desperately needed breath.
Her breasts rose, shifting against the stranger's coat, pressing more definitely against his chest. Sensation streaked through her, from unexpectedly tight nipples all the way to her toes. She caught another breath and tensed- but couldn't stop the quiver that raced through her.
The stranger's lips thinned; the austere planes of his face hardened. His fingers tightened about her arms. To Patience's stunned amazement, he lifted her- easily- and carefully set her down two feet away. ~ Stephanie Laurens,
179: Zhian, is that you? I focus the words on the clay jar above Darian.
The reply comes like a clap of thunder
GET ME OUT OF HERE!
I stumble at the force of his words, and Darian steps forward to catch me.
“Wine catching up to you?” he asks, grinning.
I just nod distractedly, stiffening a little when his hands slide up my arms.
Zhian, I’m here to help you.
GET ME OUT NOW!

Darian’s hands are far too familiar, one on my back now, the other cupping my jaw. His touch is repulsive, his heartbeat erratic and too fast. I feel assaulted on all sides: by Zhian’s shouting, by the jinn clamoring, by Darian’s desire.
“You really are quite pretty,” he says, his eyes dropping to my lips. “I’ve shown you something secret. Now what are you going to show me?”
Steeling myself, I grasp his coat and step forward, backing him into the shelves, and around him bottles shake dangerously.
“Easy,” he cautions, but his eyes brighten greedily. Our faces are just inches apart, his eyes locked on mine. “You’re a feisty one. I knew it the moment I saw you. No wonder Rahzad likes to keep you close.”
“What about the princess?” I murmur, working a hand behind him as if to thread my fingers in his oiled hair.
“Caspida hardly appreciates the finer pleasures in life. I, on the other hand, have a king’s appetite.”
He kisses me forcefully, stepping away from the wall, and I’m barely able to grab Zhian’s jar before it’s out of reach. No bigger than my hand, it’s simple to let it slip down my sleeve. The jinn prince rages inside, but I ignore him and focus on the human trying to force his tongue down my throat. I can feel myself hovering on the very edge of the lamp’s boundary. Ripples of smoke race under my skin as I strain to keep from shifting, the effort bringing tears to my eyes.
I shove Darian hard, and he shouts as he slams into the wall of bottled jinn. A few topple from their shelves, and panic springs into his eyes as he struggles to catch them all.
“Bleeding gods, you whore!” he growls. “Are you mad?”
“My master is probably looking for me,” I gasp. “I should go.”
I turn and flee the room, letting out a soft, relieved cry as the lamp’s pull on me slackens. Darian pursues too quickly for me to shift into a more speedy form. Zhian’s jar rattling in my sleeve, I hurry through the dark crypt and up the stairs, the prince close on my heels.
“Stop!” he shouts. “Or I’ll have you whipped!”
Sister! Zhian cries. Set me free and I will devour the wretch! ~ Jessica Khoury,
180:I remember once in the Arctic, when we were attempting to cross the frozen North Atlantic in a small, open rigid inflatable boat (RIB), that I heard that voice very clearly.

We had been caught out in a monster, sub-zero, gale-force 8 storm, 400 miles off the coast of Greenland - and we were struggling. We were reduced to a crawl as we battled up and down huge, freezing waves and crashing white water.

It felt like only a matter of time before we would be capsized to our deaths in the black and icy sea during this longest of nights.

Each time one of us handed over the control of the little boat to another crew member to do their shift at the wheel, we had an especially frightening few minutes as the new helmsman fought to become accustomed to the pitch and character of those freak waves.

If ever we were going to be capsized, it was during these change-over times.

We got lucky once. We were all thrown off our seats after the RIB had been tossed up and landed on the side of her tubes, only to topple back, by luck, the right way up. We then got lucky a second time in a similar incident. Instinct told me we wouldn’t get so lucky a third time.

‘No more mistakes. Helm this yourself,’ I felt the voice saying to me.

As I prepared to hand over to Mick, my old buddy, something deep inside me kept repeating, ‘Just keep helming for a bit longer - see this team through the storm yourself.’

But we had a rota and I also knew we should stick to it. That was the rule. Yet the voice persisted. Eventually I shouted over the wind and spray to Mick that I was going to keep helming. ‘Trust me,’ I told him.

Mick then helped me all through that night, pouring Red Bull down my throat as we got thrown left and right, fighting to cling on to the wheel and our seats.

By dawn, the seas were easing and by the next evening we could see the distant coast of Iceland ahead. Finally.

Afterwards, two of the crew said to me quietly that they had been so terrified to helm that they were praying someone else would do it. I had been exhausted, and logic had said to hand over, but instinct had told me I should keep steering.

Deep down I knew that I had been beginning to master how to control the small boat in the chaos of the waves and ice - and that voice told me we might not get a third lucky escape.

It was the right call - not an easy one, but a right one. Instinct doesn’t always tell us to choose the easier path, but it will guide you towards the right one. ~ Bear Grylls,
181:An Evening In Dandaloo
It was while we held our races -Hurdles, sprints and steplechases -Up in Dandaloo,
That a crowd of Sydney stealers,
Jockeys, pugilists and spielers
Brought some horses, real heelers,
Came and put us through.
Beat our nags and won our money,
Made the game by np means funny,
Made us rather blue;
When the racing was concluded,
Of our hard-earned coin denuded
Dandaloonies sat and brooded
There in Dandaloo.
Night came down on Johnson's shanty
Where the grog was no way scanty,
And a tumult grew
Till some wild, excited person
Galloped down the township cursing,
"Sydney push have mobbed Macpherson,
Roll up, Dandaloo!"
Great St Denis! what commotion!
Like the rush of stormy ocean
Fiery horsemen flew.
Dust and smoke and din and rattle,
Down the street they spurred their cattle
To the war-cry of the battle,
"Wade in, Dandaloo!"
So the boys might have their fight out,
Johnson blew the bar-room light out,
Then, in haste, withdrew.
And in darkness and in doubting
Raged the conflict and the shouting,
"Give the Sydney push a clouting,
52
Go it, Dandaloo!"
Jack Macpherson seized a bucket,
Every head he saw he struck it -Struck in earnest, too;
And a man from Lower Wattle,
Whom a shearer tried to throttle,
Hit out freely with a bottle
There in Dandaloo.
Skin and hair were flying thickly,
When a light was fetched, and quickly
Brought a fact to view -On the scene of the diversion
Every single, solid person
Come along to help Macpherson -All were Dandaloo!
When the list of slain was tabled -Some were drunk and some disabled -Still we found it true.
In the darkness and the smother
We'd been belting one another;
Jack Macpherson bashed his brother
There in Dandaloo.
So we drank, and all departed -How the "mobbing" yarn was started
No one ever knew -And the stockmen tell the story
Of that conflict fierce and gory,
How he fought for love and glory
Up in Dandaloo.
It's a proverb now, or near it -At the races you can hear it,
At the dog-fights, too!
Every shrieking, dancing drover
As the canines topple over
Yells applause to Grip or Rover,
"Give him 'Dandaloo'!"
53
And the teamster slowly toiling
Through the deep black country, soiling
Wheels and axles, too,
Lays the whip on Spot and Banker,
Rouses Tarboy with a flanker -"Redman! Ginger! Heave there! Yank her
Wade in, Dandaloo!"
~ Banjo Paterson,
182:Arya?”
“Yes?” She drew the word out, her voice rising and falling with a faint lilt.
“What do you want to do once this is all over?” If we’re still alive, that is.
“What do you want to do?”
He fingered Brisingr’s pommel as he considered the question. “I don’t know. I haven’t let myself think much past Urû-baen…It would depend on what she wants, but I suppose Saphira and I might return to Palancar Valley. I could build a hall on one of the foothills of the mountains. We might not spend much time there, but at least we would have a home to return to when we weren’t flying from one part of Alagaësia to another.” He half smiled. “I’m sure there will be plenty to keep us busy, even if Galbatorix is dead…But you still haven’t answered my question: what will you do if we win? You must have some idea. You’ve had longer to think about it than I have.”
Arya drew one leg up onto the stool, wrapped her arms around it, and rested her chin on her knee. In the dim half-light of the tent, her face appeared to float against a featureless black background, like an apparition conjured out of the night.
“I have spent more time among humans and dwarves than I have among the älfakyn,” she said, using the elves’ name in the ancient language. “I have grown used to it, and I would not want to return to live in Ellesméra. Too little happens there; centuries can slip by without notice while you sit and stare at the stars. No, I think I will continue to serve my mother as her ambassador. The reason I first left Du Weldenvarden was because I wanted to help right the balance of the world. As you said, there will still be much htat needs doing if we manage to topple Galbatorix, much that needs putting right, and I would be a part of it.”
“Ah.” It was not exactly what he had hoped she might say, but at least it presented the possibility that they would not entirely lose contact after Urû’baen, and that he would still be able to see her now and then.
If Arya noticed his discontent, she gave no sign of it.
They talked for another few minutes, then Arya made her excuses and rose to leave.
As she stepped past him, Eragon reached toward her, as if to stop her, then quickly drew back his hand. “Wait,” he said softly, unsure of what he hoped for, but hoping nevertheless. The beat of his heart increased, pounding in his ears, and his cheeks grew warm.
Arya paused with her back to him by the entrance of the tent. “Good night, Eragon,” she said. Then she slipped out between the entrance flaps and vanished into the night, leaving him to sit alone in the dark. ~ Christopher Paolini,
183:friends had started hanging around. Franny could feel her stomach hardening and twisting into knots when they arrived, pushing and shoving one another and tripping over their huge basketball shoes. It was a wonder they didn’t knock over a display rack or topple one of the neatly stacked pyramids of paint cans. They seemed to be everywhere at once, and she couldn’t possibly keep an eye on all of them. Actually, she was a little afraid of them. While they dressed like kids, she knew they were actually young men. They were bigger than she was and full of rough male energy. From what she observed it seemed Ben was their leader and they were reporting to him. She was sure they were up to no good. Their whispered conversation was full of winks and nudges, and they constantly checked over their shoulders to see if they were being overheard. She tried to keep her distance, but if she had to approach them to help a customer, she noticed they would move away or fall silent. Whenever Mr. Slack appeared, they disappeared. Returning to the invoices, Franny went through them one more time. She couldn’t understand it. According to the paperwork, the store had received enough batteries to last through the summer, based on her best estimate using last year’s figures. They’d gotten twenty boxes each of AA and D batteries, the most popular sellers, and ten boxes each of the other sizes. Last week she’d noticed the display rack was nearly empty, and she’d asked Ben to fill it. “Can’t,” he’d said, avoiding her eyes. “They’re all gone.” “There should be plenty in the storeroom,” she’d insisted, looking curiously at his two buddies, who were lounging by the paint display. They seemed to find the conversation extremely amusing. “Go check again.” “There’s no point. I’m telling you, they’re all gone. Look, I’m taking a break now,” he’d said, signaling his friends to follow him outside. Sure enough, she couldn’t find any batteries in the storeroom, either. She was sure they hadn’t been sold; she would have noticed the unusual number of sales and ordered more. Where had they gone? It was very disturbing, especially since she’d been having such a hard time lately making up the bank deposit. That was always the first task of the day. She would take the previous day’s take out of the safe and add up the checks and cash, square them with the total sales figure, and fill out the deposit slip. Then Mr. Slack would put the whole business in a blue vinyl zippered pouch and take it to the red-brick bank across the street. For the past few weeks, however, she hadn’t been able to get the figures to match, even though ~ Leslie Meier,
184:The inside of the tavern was well lit and filled with men and women in plain but sturdy clothes, most covered with some kind of fur, as though everyone worked with animals. They didn’t have the look of farmers. An odd stink rode under the scents of roasted meat and bread, but the food made his stomach grumble loudly. It was all he could do to keep from launching himself onto the nearest plate.

Conversation died as everyone stopped what they were doing and turned to look at him.

“Ah, hello.” He gathered his courage. This was just like reading poetry, but subtract poems and add people casually placing hunting knives and daggers on their tables. One of the women was filing her fingernails into sharp points, like claws.

Just like reading poetry.

G regathered his courage and strode to the far end of the room, toward the bar. He had to squeeze in between two burly men with tear-shaped scars on their faces. They all smelled vaguely like wet dog. A young man at the end of the bar leaned forward and smirked at him in a decidedly unpleasant manner.

The bartender eyed him. “What do you want?”

“I—” G had never needed to admit to not having money before. “I don’t suppose you have any work that needs doing around here?”

“Work?” This fellow clearly had not so much brain as ear wax.

“I could clean the tables or scrub the floor.”

The bartender pointed to a haggard-looking serving wench, who scowled at him. “Nell here does that.”

“Or I could peel potatoes. Or carrots. Or onions. Or any root vegetable, really.” G had never peeled anything before, but how hard could it be?

“We have someone who does that, too,” the man said. “Why don’t you push off. This isn’t the place for you.”

G would have suggested yet more menial tasks he’d never attempted, but at that moment, he put together the hints: the wet-dog smell; the fur on everyone’s clothes; the defensive/protective behavior when he, a stranger, entered.

That, and they were eating beef.

Cow.

Possibly that village’s only cow.

All at once, he knew. This was the Pack.

“Er, yes, perhaps I should be pushing off, as you suggest—” he started to say.

“Rat!” Someone near the door lurched from his chair, making it topple over behind him. “There’s a rat!”

It couldn’t be Jane, he thought. He’d told her to stay put.

“It’s not a rat, you daft idiot,” cried another. “It’s a squirrel!”

“It’s some kind of weasel!”

Bollocks. It was his wife.

“It’s dinner, that’s what it is.” That was the man directly to G’s right. “And he’s a spy. Asking all those questions about vegetables.”

“She’s clearly a ferret!” G yelled as he lunged toward the dear little creature dashing about on the floor.  ~ Cynthia Hand,
185:At the end of that class Demian said to me thoughtfully: "There’s something I don’t like about this story, Sinclair. Why don’t you read it once more and give it the acid test? There’s something about it that doesn’t taste right. I mean the business with the two thieves. The three crosses standing next to each other on the hill are almost impressive, to be sure. But now comes this sentimental little treatise about the good thief. At first he was a thorough scoundrel, had committed all those awful things and God knows what else, and now he dissolves in tears and celebrates such a tearful feast of self-improvement and remorse! What’s the sense of repenting if you’re two steps from the grave? I ask you. Once again, it’s nothing but a priest’s fairy tale, saccharine and dishonest, touched up with sentimentality and given a high edifying background. If you had to pick a friend from between the two thieves or decide which one you’d rather trust, you most certainly wouldn’t choose the sniveling convert. No, the other fellow, he’s a man of character. He doesn’t give a hoot for ‘conversion’, which to a man in his position can’t be anything but a pretty speech. He follows his destiny to it’s appointed end and does not turn coward and forswear the devil, who has aided and abetted him until then. He has character, and people with character tend to receive the short end of the stick in biblical stories. Perhaps he’s even a descendant of Cain. Don’t you agree?"

I was dismayed. Until now I had felt completely at home in the story of the Crucifixion. Now I saw for the first time with how little individuality, with how little power of imagination I had listened to it and read it. Still, Demian’s new concept seemed vaguely sinister and threatened to topple beliefs on whose continued existence I felt I simply had to insist. No, one could not make light of everything, especially not of the most Sacred matters.

As usual he noticed my resistance even before I had said anything.

"I know," he said in a resigned tone of voice, "it’s the same old story: don’t take these stories seriously! But I have to tell you something: this is one of the very places that reveals the poverty of this religion most distinctly. The point is that this God of both Old and New Testaments is certainly an extraordinary figure but not what he purports to represent. He is all that is good, noble, fatherly, beautiful, elevated, sentimental—true! But the world consists of something else besides. And what is left over is ascribed to the devil, this entire slice of world, this entire half is hushed up. In exactly the same way they praise God as the father of all life but simply refuse to say a word about our sexual life on which it’s all based, describing it whenever possible as sinful, the work of the devil. I have no objection to worshiping this God Jehovah, far from it. But I mean we ought to consider everything sacred, the entire world, not merely this artificially separated half! Thus alongside the divine service we should also have a service for the devil. I feel that would be right. Otherwise you must create for yourself a God that contains the devil too and in front of which you needn’t close your eyes when the most natural things in the world take place. ~ Hermann Hesse,
186:I Make This In A Warring Absence
I make this in a warring absence when
Each ancient, stone-necked minute of love's season
Harbours my anchored tongue, slips the quaystone,
When, praise is blessed, her pride in mast and fountain
Sailed and set dazzling by the handshaped ocean,
In that proud sailing tree with branches driven
Through the last vault and vegetable groyne,
And this weak house to marrow-columned heaven,
Is corner-cast, breath's rag, scrawled weed, a vain
And opium head, crow stalk, puffed, cut, and blown,
Or like the tide-looped breastknot reefed again
Or rent ancestrally the roped sea-hymen,
And, pride is last, is like a child alone
By magnet winds to her blind mother drawn,
Bread and milk mansion in a toothless town.
She makes for me a nettle's innocence
And a silk pigeon's guilt in her proud absence,
In the molested rocks the shell of virgins,
The frank, closed pearl, the sea-girls' lineaments
Glint in the staved and siren-printed caverns,
Is maiden in the shameful oak, omens
Whalebed and bulldance, the gold bush of lions,
Proud as a sucked stone and huge as sandgrains.
These are her contraries: the beast who follows
With priest's grave foot and hand of five assassins
Her molten flight up cinder-nesting columns,
Calls the starved fire herd, is cast in ice,
Lost in a limp-treed and uneating silence,
Who scales a hailing hill in her cold flintsteps
Falls on a ring of summers and locked noons.
I make a weapon of an ass's skeleton
And walk the warring sands by the dead town.
Cudgel great air, wreck east, and topple sundown,
Storm her sped heart, hang with beheaded veins
Its wringing shell, and let her eyelids fasten.
81
Destruction, picked by birds, brays through the jaw-bone,
And, for that murder's sake, dark with contagion
Like an approaching wave I sprawl to ruin.
Ruin, the room of errors, one rood dropped
Down the stacked sea and water-pillared shade,
Weighed in rock shroud, is my proud pyramid;
Where, wound in emerald linen and sharp wind,
The hero's head lies scraped of every legend,
Comes love's anatomist with sun-gloved hand
Who picks the live heart on a diamond.
'His mother's womb had a tongue that lapped up mud,'
Cried the topless, inchtaped lips from hank and hood
In that bright anchorground where I lay linened,
'A lizard darting with black venom's thread
Doubled, to fork him back, through the lockjaw bed
And the breath-white, curtained mouth of seed.'
'See,' drummed the taut masks, 'how the dead ascend:
In the groin's endless coil a man is tangled.'
These once-blind eyes have breathed a wind of visions,
The cauldron's root through this once-rindless hand
Fumed like a tree, and tossed a burning bird;
With loud, torn tooth and tail and cobweb drum
The crumpled packs fled past this ghost in bloom,
And, mild as pardon from a cloud of pride,
The terrible world my brother bares his skin.
Now in the cloud's big breast lie quiet countries,
Delivered seas my love from her proud place
Walks with no wound, nor lightning in her face,
A calm wind blows that raised the trees like hair
Once where the soft snow's blood was turned to ice.
And though my love pulls the pale, nippled air,
Prides of to-morrow suckling in her eyes,
Yet this I make in a forgiving presence.
~ Dylan Thomas,
187:It’s dark as a tomb in here,” she said, unable to see more than shadows. “Will you light the candles, please,” she asked, “assuming there are candles in here?”
“Aye, milady, right there, next to the bed.” His shadow crossed before her, and Elizabeth focused on a large, oddly shaped object that she supposed could be a bed, given its size.
“Will you light them, please?” she urged. “I-I can’t see a thing in here.”
“His lordship don’t like more’n one candle lit in the bedchambers,” the footman said. “He says it’s a waste of beeswax.”
Elizabeth blinked in the darkness, torn somewhere between laughter and tears at her plight. “Oh,” she said, nonplussed. The footman lit a small candle at the far end of the room and left, closing the door behind him. “Milady?” Berta whispered, peering through the dark, impenetrable gloom. “Where are you?”
“I’m over here,” Elizabeth replied, walking cautiously forward, her arms outstretched, her hands groping about for possible obstructions in her path as she headed for what she hoped was the outside wall of the bedchamber, where there was bound to be a window with draperies hiding its light.
“Where?” Berta asked in a frightened whisper, and Elizabeth could hear the maid’s teeth chattering halfway across the room.
“Here-on your left.”
Berta followed the sound of her mistress’s voice and let out a terrified gasp at the sight of the ghostlike figure moving eerily through the darkness, arms outstretched. “Raise your arm,” she said urgently, “so I’ll know ‘tis you.”
Elizabeth, knowing Berta’s timid nature, complied immediately. She raised her arm, which, while calming poor Berta, unfortunately caused Elizabeth to walk straight into a slender, fluted pillar with a marble bust upon it, and they both began to topple. “Good God!” Elizabeth burst out, wrapping her arms protectively around the pillar and the marble object upon it. “Berta!” she said urgently. “This is no time to be afraid of the dark. Help me, please. I’ve bumped into something-a bust and its stand, I think-and I daren’t let go of them until I can see how to set them upright. There are draperies over here, right in front of me. All you have to do is follow my voice and open them. Once we do, ‘twill be bright as day in here.”
“I’m coming, milady,” Berta said bravely, and Elizabeth breathed a sigh of relief. “I’ve found them!” Berta cried softly a few minutes later. “They’re heavy-velvet they are, with another panel behind them.” Berta pulled one heavy panel back across the wall, and then, with renewed urgency and vigor, she yanked back the other and turned around to survey the room.
“Light as last!” Elizabeth said with relief. Dazzling late-afternoon sunlight poured into the windows directly in front of her, blinding her momentarily. “That’s much better,” she said, blinking. Satisfied that the pillar was quite sturdy enough to stand without her aid, Elizabeth was about to place the bust back upon it, but Berta’s cry stopped her.
“Saints preserve us!”
With the fragile bust clutched protectively to her chest Elizabeth swung sharply around. There, spread out before her, furnished entirely in red and gold, was the most shocking room Elizabeth had ever beheld: Six enormous gold cupids seemed to hover in thin air above a gigantic bed clutching crimson velvet bed draperies in one pudgy fist and holding bows and arrows in the other; more cupids adorned the headboard. Elizabeth’s eyes widened, first in disbelief, and a moment later in mirth. “Berta,” she breathed on a smothered giggle, “will you look at this place! ~ Judith McNaught,
188:She blinked up at him in confusion. “What happened?”
“The horse reared and fell.” Christopher’s voice came out in a rasp. “Tell me your name.”
“Why are you asking me that?”
“Your name,” he insisted.
“Beatrix Heloise Hathaway.” She looked at him with round blue eyes. “Now that we know who I am…who are you?”

At Christopher’s expression, Beatrix snickered and wrinkled her nose impishly. “I’m teasing. Really. I know who you are. I’m perfectly all right.”
Over Christopher’s shoulder, Beatrix caught sight of Leo shaking his head in warning, drawing a finger across his throat.
She realized too late that it probably hadn’t been an appropriate moment for teasing. What to a Hathaway would have been a good chuckle was positively infuriating to Christopher.
He glared at her with incredulous wrath. It was only then that she realized he was shaking in the aftermath of his terror for her.
Definitely not the time for humor.
“I’m sorry--” she began contritely.
“I asked you not to train that horse,” Christopher snapped, “and you agreed.”
Beatrix felt instantly defensive. She was accustomed to doing as she pleased. This was certainly not the first time she’d ever fallen from a horse, nor the last.
“You didn’t ask that specifically,” she said reasonably, “you asked me not to do anything dangerous. And in my opinion, it wasn’t.”
Instead of calming Christopher, that seemed to enrage him even further. “In light of the fact that you were nearly flattened like a pikelet just now, I’d say you were wrong.”
Beatrix was intent on winning the argument. “Well, it doesn’t matter in any case, because the promise I made was for after we married. And we’re not married yet.”
Leo covered his eyes with his hand, shook his head, and retreated from her vision.
Christopher gave her an incinerating glare, opened his mouth to speak, and closed it again. Without another word, he lifted himself away from her and went to the stable in a long, ground-eating stride.
Sitting up, Beatrix stared after him in perplexed annoyance. “He’s leaving.”
“It would appear so.” Leo came to her, extended a hand down, and pulled her up.
“Why did he leave right in the middle of a quarrel?” Beatrix demanded, dusting off her breeches with short, aggravated whacks. “One can’t just leave, one has to finish it.”
“If he had stayed, sweetheart,” Leo said, “there’s every chance I would have had to pry his hands from around your neck.”
Their conversation paused as they saw Christopher riding from the stables, his form straight as a blade as he spurred his horse into a swift graceful canter.
Beatrix sighed. “I was trying to score points rather than consider how he was feeling,” she admitted. “He was probably frightened for me, seeing the horse topple over like that.”
Probably?” Leo repeated. “He looked like he had just seen Death. I believe it may have touched off one of his bad spells, or whatever it is you call them.”
“I must go to him.”
“Not dressed like that.”
“For heaven’s sake, Leo, just this one time--”
“No exceptions, darling. I know my sisters. Give any one of you an inch, and you’ll take a mile.” He reached out and pushed back her tumbling hair. “Also…don’t go without a chaperone.”
“I don’t want a chaperone. That’s never any fun.”
“Yes, Beatrix, that’s the purpose of a chaperone.”
“Well, in our family, anyone who chaperoned me would probably need a chaperone more than I do.”
Leo opened his mouth to argue, then closed it.
Rare was the occasion when her brother was unable to argue a point.
Repressing a grin, Beatrix strode toward the house. ~ Lisa Kleypas,
189:The House
In dreams
the same bad dream goes on.
Like some gigantic German toy
the house has been rebuilt
upon its kelly-green lawn.
The same dreadful set,
the same family of orange and pink faces
carved and dressed up like puppets
who wait for their jaws to open and shut.
Nineteen forty-two,
nineteen forty-three,
nineteen forty-four…
it's all the same. We're at war.
They've rationed the gas for all three cars.
The Lincoln Continental breathes in its stall,
a hopped up greyhound waiting to be sprung.
The Irish boy
who dated her
(lace curtain Irish, her mother said)
urges her through the lead-colored garages
to feel the patent-leather fenders
and peek at the mileage.
All that money!
and kisses too.
Kisses that stick in the mouth
like the vinegar candy she used to pull
with her buttery fingers, pull
until it was white like a dog's bone,
white, thick and impossible to chew.
Father,
an exact likeness,
his face bloated and pink
with black market scotch,
sits out his monthly bender
in his custom-made pajamas
and shouts, his tongue as quick as galloping horses,
shouts into the long distance telephone call.
His mouth is as wide as his kiss.
Mother,
289
with just the right gesture,
kicks her shoes off,
but is made all wrong,
impossibly frumpy as she sits there
in her alabaster dressing room
sorting her diamonds like a bank teller
to see if they add up.
The maid
as thin as a pencil stick,
holds dinner as usual,
rubs her angry knuckles over the porcelain sink
and grumbles at the gun-shy bird dog.
She knows something is going on.
She pricks a baked potato.
The aunt,
older than all the crooked women
in
The Brothers Grimm,
leans by a gooseneck lamp in her second floor suite,
turns up her earphone to eavesdrop
and continues to knit,
her needles working like kitchen shears
and her breasts blown out like two
pincushions.
The houseboy,
a quick-eyed Filipino,
slinks by like a Japanese spy
from French Provincial room
to French Provincial room,
emptying the ash trays and plumping up
the down upholstery.
His jacket shines, old shiny black,
a wise undertaker.
The milkman walks in his cartoon
every other day in the snoozy dawn,
rattling his bottles like a piggy bank.
And gardeners come, six at a time,
pulling petunias and hairy angel bells
up through the mulch.
This one again, made vaguely and cruelly,
one eye green and one eye blue,
290
has the only major walk-on so far,
has walked from her afternoon date
past the waiting baked potatoes,
past the flashing back of the Japanese spy,
up the cotton batten stairs,
past the clicking and unclicking of the earphones,
turns here at the hall
by the diamonds that she'll never earn
and the bender that she kissed last night
among thick set stars, the floating bed
and the strange white key…
up like a skein of yarn,
up another flight into the penthouse,
to slam the door on all the years
she'll have to live through…
the sailor who she won't with,
the boys who will walk on
from Andover, Exeter and St. Marks,
the boys who will walk off with pale unlined faces,
to slam the door on all the days she'll stay the same
and never ask why and never think who to ask,
to slam the door and rip off her orange blouse.
Father, father, I wish I were dead.
At thirty-five
she'll dream she's dead
or else she'll dream she's back.
All day long the house sits
larger than Russia
gleaming like a cured hide in the sun.
All day long the machine waits: rooms,
stairs, carpets, furniture, people those people who stand at the open windows like objects
waiting to topple.
~ Anne Sexton,
190:A Royal Princess
I, a princess, king-descended, decked with jewels, gilded, drest,
Would rather be a peasant with her baby at her breast,
For all I shine so like the sun, and am purple like the west.
Two and two my guards behind, two and two before,
Two and two on either hand, they guard me evermore;
Me, poor dove, that must not coo—eagle that must not soar.
All my fountains cast up perfumes, all my gardens grow
Scented woods and foreign spices, with all flowers in blow
That are costly, out of season as the seasons go.
All my walls are lost in mirrors, whereupon I trace
Self to right hand, self to left hand, self in every place,
Self-same solitary figure, self-same seeking face.
Then I have an ivory chair high to sit upon,
Almost like my father's chair, which is an ivory throne;
There I sit uplift and upright, there I sit alone.
Alone by day, alone by night, alone days without end;
My father and my mother give me treasures, search and spend—
O my father! O my mother! have you ne'er a friend?
As I am a lofty princess, so my father is
A lofty king, accomplished in all kingly subtilties,
Holding in his strong right hand world-kingdoms' balances.
He has quarrelled with his neighbours, he has scourged his foes;
Vassal counts and princes follow where his pennon goes,
Long-descended valiant lords whom the vulture knows,
On whose track the vulture swoops, when they ride in state
To break the strength of armies and topple down the great:
Each of these my courteous servant, none of these my mate.
My father counting up his strength sets down with equal pen
So many head of cattle, head of horses, head of men;
These for slaughter, these for breeding, with the how and when.
49
Some to work on roads, canals; some to man his ships;
Some to smart in mines beneath sharp overseers' whips;
Some to trap fur-beasts in lands where utmost winter nips.
Once it came into my heart, and whelmed me like a flood,
That these too are men and women, human flesh and blood;
Men with hearts and men with souls, though trodden down like mud.
Our feasting was not glad that night, our music was not gay:
On my mother's graceful head I marked a thread of grey,
My father frowning at the fare seemed every dish to weigh.
I sat beside them sole princess in my exalted place,
My ladies and my gentlemen stood by me on the dais:
A mirror showed me I look old and haggard in the face;
It showed me that my ladies all are fair to gaze upon,
Plump, plenteous-haired, to every one love's secret lore is known,
They laugh by day, they sleep by night; ah me, what is a throne?
The singing men and women sang that night as usual,
The dancers danced in pairs and sets, but music had a fall,
A melancholy windy fall as at a funeral.
Amid the toss of torches to my chamber back we swept;
My ladies loosed my golden chain; meantime I could have wept
To think of some in galling chains whether they waked or slept.
I took my bath of scented milk, delicately waited on,
They burned sweet things for my delight, cedar and cinnamon,
They lit my shaded silver lamp, and left me there alone.
A day went by, a week went by. One day I heard it said:
'Men are clamouring, women, children, clamouring to be fed;
Men like famished dogs are howling in the streets for bread.'
So two whispered by my door, not thinking I could hear,
Vulgar naked truth, ungarnished for a royal ear;
Fit for cooping in the background, not to stalk so near.
But I strained my utmost sense to catch this truth, and mark:
50
'There are families out grazing like cattle in the park.'
'A pair of peasants must be saved even if we build an ark.'
A merry jest, a merry laugh, each strolled upon his way;
One was my page, a lad I reared and bore with day by day;
One was my youngest maid as sweet and white as cream in May.
Other footsteps followed softly with a weightier tramp;
Voices said: 'Picked soldiers have been summoned from the camp
To quell these base-born ruffians who make free to howl and stamp.'
'Howl and stamp?' one answered: 'They made free to hurl a stone
At the minister's state coach, well aimed and stoutly thrown.'
'There's work then for the soldiers, for this rank crop must be mown.'
'One I saw, a poor old fool with ashes on his head,
Whimpering because a girl had snatched his crust of bread:
Then he dropped; when some one raised him, it turned out he was dead.'
'After us the deluge,' was retorted with a laugh:
'If bread's the staff of life, they must walk without a staff.'
'While I've a loaf they're welcome to my blessing and the chaff.'
These passed. The king: stand up. Said my father with a smile:
'Daughter mine, your mother comes to sit with you awhile,
She's sad to-day, and who but you her sadness can beguile?'
He too left me. Shall I touch my harp now while I wait,—
(I hear them doubling guard below before our palace gate—)
Or shall I work the last gold stitch into my veil of state;
Or shall my woman stand and read some unimpassioned scene,
There's music of a lulling sort in words that pause between;
Or shall she merely fan me while I wait here for the queen?
Again I caught my father's voice in sharp word of command:
'Charge!' a clash of steel: 'Charge again, the rebels stand.
Smite and spare not, hand to hand; smite and spare not, hand to hand.'
There swelled a tumult at the gate, high voices waxing higher;
A flash of red reflected light lit the cathedral spire;
I heard a cry for faggots, then I heard a yell for fire.
51
'Sit and roast there with your meat, sit and bake there with your bread,
You who sat to see us starve,' one shrieking woman said:
'Sit on your throne and roast with your crown upon your head.'
Nay, this thing will I do, while my mother tarrieth,
I will take my fine spun gold, but not to sew therewith,
I will take my gold and gems, and rainbow fan and wreath;
With a ransom in my lap, a king's ransom in my hand,
I will go down to this people, will stand face to face, will stand
Where they curse king, queen, and princess of this cursed land.
They shall take all to buy them bread, take all I have to give;
I, if I perish, perish; they to-day shall eat and live;
I, if I perish, perish; that's the goal I half conceive:
Once to speak before the world, rend bare my heart and show
The lesson I have learned which is death, is life, to know.
I, if I perish, perish; in the name of God I go.
~ Christina Georgina Rossetti,
191:Mortal miasma in Cecropian lands
Whilom reduced the plains to dead men's bones,
Unpeopled the highways, drained of citizens
The Athenian town. For coming from afar,
Rising in lands of Aegypt, traversing
Reaches of air and floating fields of foam,
At last on all Pandion's folk it swooped;
Whereat by troops unto disease and death
Were they o'er-given. At first, they'd bear about
A skull on fire with heat, and eyeballs twain
Red with suffusion of blank glare. Their throats,
Black on the inside, sweated oozy blood;
And the walled pathway of the voice of man
Was clogged with ulcers; and the very tongue,
The mind's interpreter, would trickle gore,
Weakened by torments, tardy, rough to touch.
Next when that Influence of bane had chocked,
Down through the throat, the breast, and streamed had
E'en into sullen heart of those sick folk,
Then, verily, all the fences of man's life
Began to topple. From the mouth the breath
Would roll a noisome stink, as stink to heaven
Rotting cadavers flung unburied out.
And, lo, thereafter, all the body's strength
And every power of mind would languish, now
In very doorway of destruction.
And anxious anguish and ululation (mixed
With many a groan) companioned alway
The intolerable torments. Night and day,
Recurrent spasms of vomiting would rack
Alway their thews and members, breaking down
With sheer exhaustion men already spent.
And yet on no one's body couldst thou mark
The skin with o'er-much heat to burn aglow,
But rather the body unto touch of hands
Would offer a warmish feeling, and thereby
Show red all over, with ulcers, so to say,
Inbranded, like the "sacred fires" o'erspread
Along the members. The inward parts of men,
In truth, would blaze unto the very bones;
A flame, like flame in furnaces, would blaze
Within the stomach. Nor couldst aught apply
Unto their members light enough and thin
For shift of aid- but coolness and a breeze
Ever and ever. Some would plunge those limbs
On fire with bane into the icy streams,
Hurling the body naked into the waves;
Many would headlong fling them deeply down
The water-pits, tumbling with eager mouth
Already agape. The insatiable thirst
That whelmed their parched bodies, lo, would make
A goodly shower seem like to scanty drops.
Respite of torment was there none. Their frames
Forspent lay prone. With silent lips of fear
Would Medicine mumble low, the while she saw
So many a time men roll their eyeballs round,
Staring wide-open, unvisited of sleep,
The heralds of old death. And in those months
Was given many another sign of death:
The intellect of mind by sorrow and dread
Deranged, the sad brow, the countenance
Fierce and delirious, the tormented ears
Beset with ringings, the breath quick and short
Or huge and intermittent, soaking sweat
A-glisten on neck, the spittle in fine gouts
Tainted with colour of crocus and so salt,
The cough scarce wheezing through the rattling throat.
Aye, and the sinews in the fingered hands
Were sure to contract, and sure the jointed frame
To shiver, and up from feet the cold to mount
Inch after inch: and toward the supreme hour
At last the pinched nostrils, nose's tip
A very point, eyes sunken, temples hollow,
Skin cold and hard, the shuddering grimace,
The pulled and puffy flesh above the brows!-
O not long after would their frames lie prone
In rigid death. And by about the eighth
Resplendent light of sun, or at the most
On the ninth flaming of his flambeau, they
Would render up the life. If any then
Had 'scaped the doom of that destruction, yet
Him there awaited in the after days
A wasting and a death from ulcers vile
And black discharges of the belly, or else
Through the clogged nostrils would there ooze along
Much fouled blood, oft with an aching head:
Hither would stream a man's whole strength and flesh.
And whoso had survived that virulent flow
Of the vile blood, yet into thews of him
And into his joints and very genitals
Would pass the old disease. And some there were,
Dreading the doorways of destruction
So much, lived on, deprived by the knife
Of the male member; not a few, though lopped
Of hands and feet, would yet persist in life,
And some there were who lost their eyeballs: O
So fierce a fear of death had fallen on them!
And some, besides, were by oblivion
Of all things seized, that even themselves they knew
No longer. And though corpse on corpse lay piled
Unburied on ground, the race of birds and beasts
Would or spring back, scurrying to escape
The virulent stench, or, if they'd tasted there,
Would languish in approaching death. But yet
Hardly at all during those many suns
Appeared a fowl, nor from the woods went forth
The sullen generations of wild beasts-
They languished with disease and died and died.
In chief, the faithful dogs, in all the streets
Outstretched, would yield their breath distressfully
For so that Influence of bane would twist
Life from their members. Nor was found one sure
And universal principle of cure:
For what to one had given the power to take
The vital winds of air into his mouth,
And to gaze upward at the vaults of sky,
The same to others was their death and doom.
In those affairs, O awfullest of all,
O pitiable most was this, was this:
Whoso once saw himself in that disease
Entangled, ay, as damned unto death,
Would lie in wanhope, with a sullen heart,
Would, in fore-vision of his funeral,
Give up the ghost, O then and there. For, lo,
At no time did they cease one from another
To catch contagion of the greedy plague,-
As though but woolly flocks and horned herds;
And this in chief would heap the dead on dead:
For who forbore to look to their own sick,
O these (too eager of life, of death afeard)
Would then, soon after, slaughtering Neglect
Visit with vengeance of evil death and base-
Themselves deserted and forlorn of help.
But who had stayed at hand would perish there
By that contagion and the toil which then
A sense of honour and the pleading voice
Of weary watchers, mixed with voice of wail
Of dying folk, forced them to undergo.
This kind of death each nobler soul would meet.
The funerals, uncompanioned, forsaken,
Like rivals contended to be hurried through.
   .  .  .  .  .  .
And men contending to ensepulchre
Pile upon pile the throng of their own dead:
And weary with woe and weeping wandered home;
And then the most would take to bed from grief.
Nor could be found not one, whom nor disease
Nor death, nor woe had not in those dread times
Attacked.
By now the shepherds and neatherds all,
Yea, even the sturdy guiders of curved ploughs,
Began to sicken, and their bodies would lie
Huddled within back-corners of their huts,
Delivered by squalor and disease to death.
O often and often couldst thou then have seen
On lifeless children lifeless parents prone,
Or offspring on their fathers', mothers' corpse
Yielding the life. And into the city poured
O not in least part from the countryside
That tribulation, which the peasantry
Sick, sick, brought thither, thronging from every quarter,
Plague-stricken mob. All places would they crowd,
All buildings too; whereby the more would death
Up-pile a-heap the folk so crammed in town.
Ah, many a body thirst had dragged and rolled
Along the highways there was lying strewn
Besides Silenus-headed water-fountains,-
The life-breath choked from that too dear desire
Of pleasant waters. Ah, everywhere along
The open places of the populace,
And along the highways, O thou mightest see
Of many a half-dead body the sagged limbs,
Rough with squalor, wrapped around with rags,
Perish from very nastiness, with naught
But skin upon the bones, well-nigh already
Buried- in ulcers vile and obscene filth.
All holy temples, too, of deities
Had Death becrammed with the carcasses;
And stood each fane of the Celestial Ones
Laden with stark cadavers everywhere-
Places which warders of the shrines had crowded
With many a guest. For now no longer men
Did mightily esteem the old Divine,
The worship of the gods: the woe at hand
Did over-master. Nor in the city then
Remained those rites of sepulture, with which
That pious folk had evermore been wont
To buried be. For it was wildered all
In wild alarms, and each and every one
With sullen sorrow would bury his own dead,
As present shift allowed. And sudden stress
And poverty to many an awful act
Impelled; and with a monstrous screaming they
Would, on the frames of alien funeral pyres,
Place their own kin, and thrust the torch beneath
Oft brawling with much bloodshed round about
Rather than quit dead bodies loved in life.


author class:Lucretius
~ such a manner of disease, 'twas such, The Plague Athens
,
192:Hurry Up Please It's Time
What is death, I ask.
What is life, you ask.
I give them both my buttocks,
my two wheels rolling off toward Nirvana.
They are neat as a wallet,
opening and closing on their coins,
the quarters, the nickels,
straight into the crapper.
Why shouldn't I pull down my pants
and moon the executioner
as well as paste raisins on my breasts?
Why shouldn't I pull down my pants
and show my little cunny to Tom
and Albert? They wee-wee funny.
I wee-wee like a squaw.
I have ink but no pen, still
I dream that I can piss in God's eye.
I dream I'm a boy with a zipper.
It's so practical, la de dah.
The trouble with being a woman, Skeezix,
is being a little girl in the first place.
Not all the books of the world will change that.
I have swallowed an orange, being woman.
You have swallowed a ruler, being man.
Yet waiting to die we are the same thing.
Jehovah pleasures himself with his axe
before we are both overthrown.
Skeezix, you are me. La de dah.
You grow a beard but our drool is identical.
Forgive us, Father, for we know not.
Today is November 14th, 1972.
I live in Weston, Mass., Middlesex County,
U.S.A., and it rains steadily
in the pond like white puppy eyes.
The pond is waiting for its skin.
the pond is waiting for its leather.
The pond is waiting for December and its Novocain.
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It begins:
Interrogator:
What can you say of your last seven days?
Anne:
They were tired.
Interrogator:
One day is enough to perfect a man.
Anne:
I watered and fed the plant.
My undertaker waits for me.
he is probably twenty-three now,
learning his trade.
He'll stitch up the gren,
he'll fasten the bones down
lest they fly away.
I am flying today.
I am not tired today.
I am a motor.
I am cramming in the sugar.
I am running up the hallways.
I am squeezing out the milk.
I am dissecting the dictionary.
I am God, la de dah.
Peanut butter is the American food.
We all eat it, being patriotic.
Ms. Dog is out fighting the dollars,
rolling in a field of bucks.
You've got it made if you take the wafer,
take some wine,
take some bucks,
the green papery song of the office.
What a jello she could make with it,
the fives, the tens, the twenties,
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all in a goo to feed the baby.
Andrew Jackson as an hors d'oeuvre,
la de dah.
I wish I were the U.S. Mint,
turning it all out,
turtle green
and monk black.
Who's that at the podium
in black and white,
blurting into the mike?
Ms. Dog.
Is she spilling her guts?
You bet.
Otherwise they cough…
The day is slipping away, why am I
out here, what do they want?
I am sorrowful in November…
(no they don't want that,
they want bee stings).
Toot, toot, tootsy don't cry.
Toot, toot, tootsy good-bye.
If you don't get a letter then
you'll know I'm in jail…
Remember that, Skeezix,
our first song?
Who's thinking those things?
Ms. Dog! She's out fighting the dollars.
Milk is the American drink.
Oh queens of sorrows,
oh water lady,
place me in your cup
and pull over the clouds
so no one can see.
She don't want no dollars.
She done want a mama.
The white of the white.
Anne says:
This is the rainy season.
I am sorrowful in November.
The kettle is whistling.
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I must butter the toast.
And give it jam too.
My kitchen is a heart.
I must feed it oxygen once in a while
and mother the mother.
Say the woman is forty-four.
Say she is five seven-and-a-half.
Say her hair is stick color.
Say her eyes are chameleon.
Would you put her in a sack and bury her,
suck her down into the dumb dirt?
Some would.
If not, time will.
Ms. Dog, how much time you got left?
Ms. Dog, when you gonna feel that cold nose?
You better get straight with the Maker
cuz it's coming, it's a coming!
The cup of coffee is growing and growing
and they're gonna stick your little doll's head
into it and your lungs a gonna get paid
and your clothes a gonna melt.
Hear that, Ms. Dog!
You of the songs,
you of the classroom,
you of the pocketa-pocketa,
you hungry mother,
you spleen baby!
Them angels gonna be cut down like wheat.
Them songs gonna be sliced with a razor.
Them kitchens gonna get a boulder in the belly.
Them phones gonna be torn out at the root.
There's power in the Lord, baby,
and he's gonna turn off the moon.
He's gonna nail you up in a closet
and there'll be no more Atlantic,
no more dreams, no more seeds.
One noon as you walk out to the mailbox
He'll snatch you up a wopman beside the road like a red mitten.
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There's a sack over my head.
I can't see. I'm blind.
The sea collapses.
The sun is a bone.
Hi-ho the derry-o,
we all fall down.
If I were a fisherman I could comprehend.
They fish right through the door
and pull eyes from the fire.
They rock upon the daybreak
and amputate the waters.
They are beating the sea,
they are hurting it,
delving down into the inscrutable salt.
When mother left the room
and left me in the big black
and sent away my kitty
to be fried in the camps
and took away my blanket
to wash the me out of it
I lay in the soiled cold and prayed.
It was a little jail in which
I was never slapped with kisses.
I was the engine that couldn't.
Cold wigs blew on the trees outside
and car lights flew like roosters
on the ceiling.
Cradle, you are a grave place.
Interrogator:
What color is the devil?
Anne:
Black and blue.
Interrogator:
What goes up the chimney?
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Anne:
Fat Lazarus in his red suit.
Forgive us, Father, for we know not.
Ms. Dog prefers to sunbathe nude.
Let the indifferent sky look on.
So what!
Let Mrs. Sewal pull the curtain back,
from her second story.
So what!
Let United Parcel Service see my parcel.
La de dah.
Sun, you hammer of yellow,
you hat on fire,
you honeysuckle mama,
pour your blonde on me!
Let me laugh for an entire hour
at your supreme being, your Cadillac stuff,
because I've come a long way
from Brussels sprouts.
I've come a long way to peel off my clothes
and lay me down in the grass.
Once only my palms showed.
Once I hung around in my woolly tank suit,
drying my hair in those little meatball curls.
Now I am clothed in gold air with
one dozen halos glistening on my skin.
I am a fortunate lady.
I've gotten out of my pouch
and my teeth are glad
and my heart, that witness,
beats well at the thought.
Oh body, be glad.
You are good goods.
Middle-class lady,
you make me smile.
You dig a hole
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and come out with a sunburn.
If someone hands you a glass of water
you start constructing a sailboat.
If someone hands you a candy wrapper,
you take it to the book binder.
Pocketa-pocketa.
Once upon a time Ms. Dog was sixty-six.
She had white hair and wrinkles deep as splinters.
her portrait was nailed up like Christ
and she said of it:
That's when I was forty-two,
down in Rockport with a hat on for the sun,
and Barbara drew a line drawing.
We were, at that moment, drinking vodka
and ginger beer and there was a chill in the air,
although it was July, and she gave me her sweater
to bundle up in. The next summer Skeezix tied
strings in that hat when we were fishing in Maine.
(It had gone into the lake twice.)
Of such moments is happiness made.
Forgive us, Father, for we know not.
Once upon a time we were all born,
popped out like jelly rolls
forgetting our fishdom,
the pleasuring seas,
the country of comfort,
spanked into the oxygens of death,
Good morning life, we say when we wake,
hail mary coffee toast
and we Americans take juice,
a liquid sun going down.
Good morning life.
To wake up is to be born.
To brush your teeth is to be alive.
To make a bowel movement is also desireable.
La de dah,
it's all routine.
Often there are wars
yet the shops keep open
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and sausages are still fried.
People rub someone.
People copulate
entering each other's blood,
tying each other's tendons in knots,
transplanting their lives into the bed.
It doesn't matter if there are wars,
the business of life continues
unless you're the one that gets it.
Mama, they say, as their intestines
leak out. Even without wars
life is dangerous.
Boats spring leaks.
Cigarettes explode.
The snow could be radioactive.
Cancer could ooze out of the radio.
Who knows?
Ms. Dog stands on the shore
and the sea keeps rocking in
and she wants to talk to God.
Interrogator:
Why talk to God?
Anne:
It's better than playing bridge.
Learning to talk is a complex business.
My daughter's first word was utta,
meaning button.
Before there are words
do you dream?
In utero
do you dream?
Who taught you to suck?
And how come?
You don't need to be taught to cry.
The soul presses a button.
Is the cry saying something?
Does it mean help?
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Or hello?
The cry of a gull is beautiful
and the cry of a crow is ugly
but what I want to know
is whether they mean the same thing.
Somewhere a man sits with indigestion
and he doesn't care.
A woman is buying bracelets
and earrings and she doesn't care.
La de dah.
Forgive us, Father, for we know not.
There are stars and faces.
There is ketchup and guitars.
There is the hand of a small child
when you're crossing the street.
There is the old man's last words:
More light! More light!
Ms. Dog wouldn't give them her buttocks.
She wouldn't moon at them.
Just at the killers of the dream.
The bus boys of the soul.
Or at death
who wants to make her a mummy.
And you too!
Wants to stuf her in a cold shoe
and then amputate the foot.
And you too!
La de dah.
What's the point of fighting the dollars
when all you need is a warm bed?
When the dog barks you let him in.
All we need is someone to let us in.
And one other thing:
to consider the lilies in the field.
Of course earth is a stranger, we pull at its
arms and still it won't speak.
The sea is worse.
It comes in, falling to its knees
but we can't translate the language.
It is only known that they are here to worship,
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to worship the terror of the rain,
the mud and all its people,
the body itself,
working like a city,
the night and its slow blood
the autumn sky, mary blue.
but more than that,
to worship the question itself,
though the buildings burn
and the big people topple over in a faint.
Bring a flashlight, Ms. Dog,
and look in every corner of the brain
and ask and ask and ask
until the kingdom,
however queer,
will come.
~ Anne Sexton,
193:The Deserted Garden
I know a village in a far-off land
Where from a sunny, mountain-girdled plain
With tinted walls a space on either hand
And fed by many an olive-darkened lane
The high-road mounts, and thence a silver band
Through vineyard slopes above and rolling grain,
Winds off to that dim corner of the skies
Where behind sunset hills a stately city lies.
Here, among trees whose overhanging shade
Strews petals on the little droves below,
Pattering townward in the morning weighed
With greens from many an upland garden-row,
Runs an old wall; long centuries have frayed
Its scalloped edge, and passers to and fro
Heard never from beyond its crumbling height
Sweet laughter ring at noon or plaintive song at night.
But here where little lizards bask and blink
The tendrils of the trumpet-vine have run,
At whose red bells the humming bird to drink
Stops oft before his garden feast is done;
And rose-geraniums, with that tender pink
That cloud-banks borrow from the setting sun,
Have covered part of this old wall, entwined
With fair plumbago, blue as evening heavens behind.
And crowning other parts the wild white rose
Rivals the honey-suckle with the bees.
Above the old abandoned orchard shows
And all within beneath the dense-set trees,
Tall and luxuriant the rank grass grows,
That settled in its wavy depth one sees
Grass melt in leaves, the mossy trunks between,
Down fading avenues of implicated green;
Wherein no lack of flowers the verdurous night
With stars and pearly nebula o'erlay;
Azalea-boughs half rosy and half white
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Shine through the green and clustering apple-spray,
Such as the fairy-queen before her knight
Waved in old story, luring him away
Where round lost isles Hesperian billows break
Or towers loom up beneath the clear, translucent lake;
And under the deep grass blue hare-bells hide,
And myrtle plots with dew-fall ever wet,
Gay tiger-lilies flammulate and pied,
Sometime on pathway borders neatly set,
Now blossom through the brake on either side,
Where heliotrope and weedy mignonette,
With vines in bloom and flower-bearing trees,
Mingle their incense all to swell the perfumed breeze,
That sprung like Hermes from his natal cave
In some blue rampart of the curving West,
Comes up the valleys where green cornfields wave,
Ravels the cloud about the mountain crest,
Breathes on the lake till gentle ripples pave
Its placid floor; at length a long-loved guest,
He steals across this plot of pleasant ground,
Waking the vocal leaves to a sweet vernal sound.
Here many a day right gladly have I sped,
Content amid the wavy plumes to lie,
And through the woven branches overhead
Watch the white, ever-wandering clouds go by,
And soaring birds make their dissolving bed
Far in the azure depths of summer sky,
Or nearer that small huntsman of the air,
The fly-catcher, dart nimbly from his leafy lair;
Pillowed at case to hear the merry tune
Of mating warblers in the boughs above
And shrill cicadas whom the hottest noon
Keeps not from drowsy song; the mourning dove
Pours down the murmuring grove his plaintive croon
That like the voice of visionary love
Oft have I risen to seek through this green maze
(Even as my feet thread now the great world's garden-ways);
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And, parting tangled bushes as I passed
Down beechen allies beautiful and dim,
Perhaps by some deep-shaded pool at last
My feet would pause, where goldfish poise and swim,
And snowy callas' velvet cups are massed
Around the mossy, fern-encircled brim.
Here, then, that magic summoning would cease,
Or sound far off again among the orchard trees.
And here where the blanched lilies of the vale
And violets and yellow star-flowers teem,
And pink and purple hyacinths exhale
Their heavy fume, once more to drowse and dream
My head would sink, from many an olden tale
Drawing imagination's fervid theme,
Or haply peopling this enchanting spot
Only with fair creations of fantastic thought.
For oft I think, in years long since gone by,
That gentle hearts dwelt here and gentle hands
Stored all this bowery bliss to beautify
The paradise of some unsung romance;
Here, safe from all except the loved one's eye,
'Tis sweet to think white limbs were wont to glance,
Well pleased to wanton like the flowers and share
Their simple loveliness with the enamored air.
Thrice dear to them whose votive fingers decked
The altars of First Love were these green ways,
These lawns and verdurous brakes forever flecked
With the warm sunshine of midsummer days;
Oft where the long straight allies intersect
And marble seats surround the open space,
Where a tiled pool and sculptured fountain stand,
Hath Evening found them seated, silent, hand in hand.
When twilight deepened, in the gathering shade
Beneath that old titanic cypress row,
Whose sombre vault and towering colonnade
Dwarfed the enfolded forms that moved below,
Oft with close steps these happy lovers strayed,
Till down its darkening aisle the sunset glow
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Grew less and patterning the garden floor
Faint flakes of filtering moonlight mantled more and more.
And the strange tempest that a touch imparts
Through the mid fibre of the molten frame,
When the sweet flesh in early youth asserts
Its heyday verve and little hints enflame,
Disturbed them as they walked; from their full hearts
Welled the soft word, and many a tender name
Strove on their lips as breast to breast they strained
And the deep joy they drank seemed never, never drained.
Love's soul that is the depth of starry skies
Set in the splendor of one upturned face
To beam adorably through half-closed eyes;
Love's body where the breadth of summer days
And all the beauty earth and air comprise
Come to the compass of an arm's embrace,
To burn a moment on impassioned lips
And yield intemperate joy to quivering finger-tips,
They knew; and here where morning-glories cling
Round carven forms of carefullest artifice,
They made a bower where every outward thing
Should comment on the cause of their own bliss;
With flowers of liveliest hue encompassing
That flower that the beloved body is
That rose that for the banquet of Love's bee
Has budded all the æons of past eternity.
But their choice seat was where the garden wall,
Crowning a little summit, far and near,
Looks over tufted treetops onto all
The pleasant outer country; rising here
From rustling foliage where cuckoos call
On summer evenings, stands a belvedere,
Buff-hued, of antique plaster, overrun
With flowering vines and weatherworn by rain and sun.
Still round the turrets of this antique tower
The bougainvillea hangs a crimson crown,
Wistaria-vines and clematis in flower,
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Wreathing the lower surface further down,
Hide the old plaster in a very shower
Of motley blossoms like a broidered gown.
Outside, ascending from the garden grove,
A crumbling stairway winds to the one room above.
And whoso mounts by this dismantled stair
Finds the old pleasure-hall, long disarrayed,
Brick-tiled and raftered, and the walls foursquare
Ringed all about with a twofold arcade.
Backward dense branches intercept the glare
Of afternoon with eucalyptus shade;
Eastward the level valley-plains expand,
Sweet as a queen's survey of her own Fairyland.
For through that frame the ivied arches make,
Wide tracts of sunny midland charm the eye,
Frequent with hamlet grove, and lucent lake
Where the blue hills' inverted contours lie;
Far to the east where billowy mountains break
In surf of snow against a sapphire sky,
Huge thunderheads loom up behind the ranges,
Changing from gold to pink as deepening sunset changes;
And over plain and far sierra spread
The fulgent rays of fading afternoon,
Showing each utmost peak and watershed
All clarified, each tassel and festoon
Of floating cloud embroidered overhead,
Like lotus-leaves on bluest waters strewn,
Flushing with rose, while all breathes fresh and free
In peace and amplitude and bland tranquillity.
Dear were such evenings to this gentle pair;
Love's tide that launched on with a blast too strong
Sweeps toward the foaming reef, the hidden snare,
Baffling with fond illusion's siren-song,
Too faint, on idle shoals, to linger there
Far from Youth's glowing dream, bore them along,
With purple sail and steered by seraph hands
To isles resplendent in the sunset of romance.
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And out of this old house a flowery fane,
A bridal bower, a pearly pleasure-dome,
They built, and furnished it with gold and grain,
And bade all spirits of beauty hither come,
And wingéd Love to enter with his train
And bless their pillow, and in this his home
Make them his priests as Hero was of yore
In her sweet girlhood by the blue Dardanian shore.
Tree-ferns, therefore, and potted palms they brought,
Tripods and urns in rare and curious taste,
Polychrome chests and cabinets inwrought
With pearl and ivory etched and interlaced;
Pendant brocades with massive braid were caught,
And chain-slung, oriental lamps so placed
To light the lounger on some low divan,
Sunken in swelling down and silks from Hindustan.
And there was spread, upon the ample floors,
Work of the Levantine's laborious loom,
Such as by Euxine or Ionian shores
Carpets the dim seraglio's scented gloom.
Each morn renewed, the garden's flowery stores
Blushed in fair vases, ochre and peach-bloom,
And little birds through wicker doors left wide
Flew in to trill a space from the green world outside.
And there was many a dainty attitude,
Bronze and eburnean. All but disarrayed,
Here in eternal doubt sweet Psyche stood
Fain of the bath's delight, yet still afraid
Lest aught in that palatial solitude
Lurked of most menace to a helpless maid.
Therefore forever faltering she stands,
Nor yet the last loose fold slips rippling from her hands.
Close by upon a beryl column, clad
In the fresh flower of adolescent grace,
They set the dear Bithynian shepherd lad,
The nude Antinous. That gentle face,
Forever beautiful, forever sad,
Shows but one aspect, moon-like, to our gaze,
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Yet Fancy pictures how those lips could smile
At revelries in Rome, and banquets on the Nile.
And there were shapes of Beauty myriads more,
Clustering their rosy bridal bed around,
Whose scented breadth a silken fabric wore
Broidered with peacock hues on creamiest ground,
Fit to have graced the barge that Cydnus bore
Or Venus' bed in her enchanted mound,
While pillows swelled in stuffs of Orient dyes,
All broidered with strange fruits and birds of Paradise.
'Twas such a bower as Youth has visions of,
Thither with one fair spirit to retire,
Lie upon rose-leaves, sleep and wake with Love
And feast on kisses to the heart's desire;
Where by a casement opening on a grove,
Wide to the wood-winds and the sweet birds' choir,
A girl might stand and gaze into green boughs,
Like Credhe at the window of her golden house.
Or most like Vivien, the enchanting fay,
Where with her friend, in the strange tower they planned,
She lies and dreams eternity away,
Above the treetops in Broceliande,
Sometimes at twilight when the woods are gray
And wolf-packs howl far out across the lande,
Waking to love, while up behind the trees
The large midsummer moon lifts-even so loved these.
For here, their pleasure was to come and sit
Oft when the sun sloped midway to the west,
Watching with sweet enjoyment interknit
The long light slant across the green earth's breast,
And clouds upon the ranges opposite,
Rolled up into a gleaming thundercrest,
Topple and break and fall in purple rain,
And mist of summer showers trail out across the plain.
Whereon the shafts of ardent light, far-flung
Across the luminous azure overhead,
Ofttimes in arcs of transient beauty hung
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The fragmentary rainbow's green and red.
Joy it was here to love and to be young,
To watch the sun sink to his western bed,
And streaming back out of their flaming core
The vesperal aurora's glorious banners soar.
Tinging each altitude of heaven in turn,
Those fiery rays would sweep. The cumuli
That peeped above the mountain-tops would burn
Carmine a space; the cirrus-whorls on high,
More delicate than sprays of maiden fern,
Streak with pale rose the peacock-breasted sky,
Then blanch. As water-lilies fold at night,
Sank back into themselves those plumes of fervid light.
And they would watch the first faint stars appear,
The blue East blend with the blue hills below,
As lovers when their shuddering bliss draws near
Into one pulse of fluid rapture grow.
New fragrance on the freshening atmosphere
Would steal with evening, and the sunset glow
Draw deeper down into the wondrous west
Round vales of Proserpine and islands of the blest.
So dusk would come and mingle lake and shore,
The snow-peaks fade to frosty, opaline,
To pearl the doméd clouds the mountains bore,
Where late the sun's effulgent fire had been
Showing as darkness deepened more and more
The incandescent lightnings flare within,
And Night that furls the lily in the glen
And twines impatient arms would fall, and then---and then . . .
Sometimes the peasant, coming late from town
With empty panniers on his little drove
Past the old lookout when the Northern Crown
Glittered with Cygnus through the scented grove,
Would hear soft noise of lute-strings wafted down
And voices singing through the leaves above
Those songs that well from the warm heart that woos
At balconies in Merida or Vera Cruz.
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And he would pause under the garden wall,
Caught in the spell of that voluptuous strain,
With all the sultry South in it, and all
Its importunity of love and pain;
And he would wait till the last passionate fall
Died on the night, and all was still again.
Then to his upland village wander home,
Marvelling whence that flood of elfin song might come.
O lyre that Love's white holy hands caress,
Youth, from thy bosom welled their passionate lays
Sweet opportunity for happiness
So brief, so passing beautiful---O days,
When to the heart's divine indulgences
All earth in smiling ministration pays
Thine was the source whose plenitude, past over,
What prize shall rest to pluck, what secret to discover!
The wake of color that follows her when May
Walks on the hills loose-haired and daisy-crowned,
The deep horizons of a summer's day,
Fair cities, and the pleasures that abound
Where music calls, and crowds in bright array
Gather by night to find and to be found;
What were these worth or all delightful things
Without thine eyes to read their true interpretings!
For thee the mountains open glorious gates,
To thee white arms put out from orient skies,
Earth, like a jewelled bride for one she waits,
Decks but to be delicious in thine eyes,
Thou guest of honor for one day, whose fêtes
Eternity has travailed to devise;
Ah, grace them well in the brief hour they last!
Another's turn prepares, another follows fast.
Yet not without one fond memorial
Let my sun set who found the world so fair!
Frail verse, when Time the singer's coronal
Has rent, and stripped the rose-leaves from his hair,
Be thou my tablet on the temple wall!
Among the pious testimonials there,
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Witness how sweetly on my heart as well
The miracles of dawn and starry evening fell!
Speak of one then who had the lust to feel,
And, from the hues that far horizons take,
And cloud and sunset, drank the wild appeal,
Too deep to live for aught but life's sweet sake,
Whose only motive was the will to kneel
Where Beauty's purest benediction spake,
Who only coveted what grove and field
And sunshine and green Earth and tender arms could yield--A nympholept, through pleasant days and drear
Seeking his faultless adolescent dream,
A pilgrim down the paths that disappear
In mist and rainbows on the world's extreme,
A helpless voyager who all too near
The mouth of Life's fair flower-bordered stream,
Clutched at Love's single respite in his need
More than the drowning swimmer clutches at a reed--That coming one whose feet in other days
Shall bleed like mine for ever having, more
Than any purpose, felt the need to praise
And seek the angelic image to adore,
In love with Love, its wonderful, sweet ways
Counting what most makes life worth living for,
That so some relic may be his to see
How I loved these things too and they were dear to me.
I sometimes think a conscious happiness
Mantles through all the rose's sentient vine
When summer winds with myriad calyces
Of bloom its clambering height incarnadine;
I sometimes think that cleaving lips, no less,
And limbs that crowned desires at length entwine
Are nerves through which that being drinks delight,
Whose frame is the green Earth robed round with day and night.
And such were theirs: the traveller without,
Pausing at night under the orchard trees,
Wondered and crossed himself in holy doubt,
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For through their song and in the murmuring breeze
It seemed angelic choirs were all about
Mingling in universal harmonies,
As though, responsive to the chords they woke,
All Nature into sweet epithalamium broke.
And still they think a spirit haunts the place:
'Tis said, when Night has drawn her jewelled pall
And through the branches twinkling fireflies trace
Their mimic constellations, if it fall
That one should see the moon rise through the lace
Of blossomy boughs above the garden wall,
That surely would he take great ill thereof
And famish in a fit of unexpressive love.
But this I know not, for what time the wain
Was loosened and the lily's petal furled,
Then I would rise, climb the old wall again,
And pausing look forth on the sundown world,
Scan the wide reaches of the wondrous plain,
The hamlet sites where settling smoke lay curled,
The poplar-bordered roads, and far away
Fair snowpeaks colored with the sun's last ray.
Waves of faint sound would pulsate from afar
Faint song and preludes of the summer night;
Deep in the cloudless west the evening star
Hung 'twixt the orange and the emerald light;
From the dark vale where shades crepuscular
Dimmed the old grove-girt belfry glimmering white,
Throbbing, as gentlest breezes rose or fell,
Came the sweet invocation of the evening bell.
~ Alan Seeger,
194:The Princess (Part 2)
At break of day the College Portress came:
She brought us Academic silks, in hue
The lilac, with a silken hood to each,
And zoned with gold; and now when these were on,
And we as rich as moths from dusk cocoons,
She, curtseying her obeisance, let us know
The Princess Ida waited: out we paced,
I first, and following through the porch that sang
All round with laurel, issued in a court
Compact of lucid marbles, bossed with lengths
Of classic frieze, with ample awnings gay
Betwixt the pillars, and with great urns of flowers.
The Muses and the Graces, grouped in threes,
Enringed a billowing fountain in the midst;
And here and there on lattice edges lay
Or book or lute; but hastily we past,
And up a flight of stairs into the hall.
There at a board by tome and paper sat,
With two tame leopards couched beside her throne,
All beauty compassed in a female form,
The Princess; liker to the inhabitant
Of some clear planet close upon the Sun,
Than our man's earth; such eyes were in her head,
And so much grace and power, breathing down
From over her arched brows, with every turn
Lived through her to the tips of her long hands,
And to her feet. She rose her height, and said:
'We give you welcome: not without redound
Of use and glory to yourselves ye come,
The first-fruits of the stranger: aftertime,
And that full voice which circles round the grave,
Will rank you nobly, mingled up with me.
What! are the ladies of your land so tall?'
'We of the court' said Cyril. 'From the court'
She answered, 'then ye know the Prince?' and he:
'The climax of his age! as though there were
One rose in all the world, your Highness that,
726
He worships your ideal:' she replied:
'We scarcely thought in our own hall to hear
This barren verbiage, current among men,
Light coin, the tinsel clink of compliment.
Your flight from out your bookless wilds would seem
As arguing love of knowledge and of power;
Your language proves you still the child. Indeed,
We dream not of him: when we set our hand
To this great work, we purposed with ourself
Never to wed. You likewise will do well,
Ladies, in entering here, to cast and fling
The tricks, which make us toys of men, that so,
Some future time, if so indeed you will,
You may with those self-styled our lords ally
Your fortunes, justlier balanced, scale with scale.'
At those high words, we conscious of ourselves,
Perused the matting: then an officer
Rose up, and read the statutes, such as these:
Not for three years to correspond with home;
Not for three years to cross the liberties;
Not for three years to speak with any men;
And many more, which hastily subscribed,
We entered on the boards: and 'Now,' she cried,
'Ye are green wood, see ye warp not. Look, our hall!
Our statues!--not of those that men desire,
Sleek Odalisques, or oracles of mode,
Nor stunted squaws of West or East; but she
That taught the Sabine how to rule, and she
The foundress of the Babylonian wall,
The Carian Artemisia strong in war,
The Rhodope, that built the pyramid,
Clelia, Cornelia, with the Palmyrene
That fought Aurelian, and the Roman brows
Of Agrippina. Dwell with these, and lose
Convention, since to look on noble forms
Makes noble through the sensuous organism
That which is higher. O lift your natures up:
Embrace our aims: work out your freedom. Girls,
Knowledge is now no more a fountain sealed:
Drink deep, until the habits of the slave,
The sins of emptiness, gossip and spite
727
And slander, die. Better not be at all
Than not be noble. Leave us: you may go:
Today the Lady Psyche will harangue
The fresh arrivals of the week before;
For they press in from all the provinces,
And fill the hive.'
She spoke, and bowing waved
Dismissal: back again we crost the court
To Lady Psyche's: as we entered in,
There sat along the forms, like morning doves
That sun their milky bosoms on the thatch,
A patient range of pupils; she herself
Erect behind a desk of satin-wood,
A quick brunette, well-moulded, falcon-eyed,
And on the hither side, or so she looked,
Of twenty summers. At her left, a child,
In shining draperies, headed like a star,
Her maiden babe, a double April old,
Aglaïa slept. We sat: the Lady glanced:
Then Florian, but not livelier than the dame
That whispered 'Asses' ears', among the sedge,
'My sister.' 'Comely, too, by all that's fair,'
Said Cyril. 'Oh hush, hush!' and she began.
'This world was once a fluid haze of light,
Till toward the centre set the starry tides,
And eddied into suns, that wheeling cast
The planets: then the monster, then the man;
Tattooed or woaded, winter-clad in skins,
Raw from the prime, and crushing down his mate;
As yet we find in barbarous isles, and here
Among the lowest.'
Thereupon she took
A bird's-eye-view of all the ungracious past;
Glanced at the legendary Amazon
As emblematic of a nobler age;
Appraised the Lycian custom, spoke of those
That lay at wine with Lar and Lucumo;
Ran down the Persian, Grecian, Roman lines
Of empire, and the woman's state in each,
How far from just; till warming with her theme
She fulmined out her scorn of laws Salique
728
And little-footed China, touched on Mahomet
With much contempt, and came to chivalry:
When some respect, however slight, was paid
To woman, superstition all awry:
However then commenced the dawn: a beam
Had slanted forward, falling in a land
Of promise; fruit would follow. Deep, indeed,
Their debt of thanks to her who first had dared
To leap the rotten pales of prejudice,
Disyoke their necks from custom, and assert
None lordlier than themselves but that which made
Woman and man. She had founded; they must build.
Here might they learn whatever men were taught:
Let them not fear: some said their heads were less:
Some men's were small; not they the least of men;
For often fineness compensated size:
Besides the brain was like the hand, and grew
With using; thence the man's, if more was more;
He took advantage of his strength to be
First in the field: some ages had been lost;
But woman ripened earlier, and her life
Was longer; and albeit their glorious names
Were fewer, scattered stars, yet since in truth
The highest is the measure of the man,
And not the Kaffir, Hottentot, Malay,
Nor those horn-handed breakers of the glebe,
But Homer, Plato, Verulam; even so
With woman: and in arts of government
Elizabeth and others; arts of war
The peasant Joan and others; arts of grace
Sappho and others vied with any man:
And, last not least, she who had left her place,
And bowed her state to them, that they might grow
To use and power on this Oasis, lapt
In the arms of leisure, sacred from the blight
Of ancient influence and scorn.
At last
She rose upon a wind of prophecy
Dilating on the future; 'everywhere
Who heads in council, two beside the hearth,
Two in the tangled business of the world,
Two in the liberal offices of life,
729
Two plummets dropt for one to sound the abyss
Of science, and the secrets of the mind:
Musician, painter, sculptor, critic, more:
And everywhere the broad and bounteous Earth
Should bear a double growth of those rare souls,
Poets, whose thoughts enrich the blood of the world.'
She ended here, and beckoned us: the rest
Parted; and, glowing full-faced welcome, she
Began to address us, and was moving on
In gratulation, till as when a boat
Tacks, and the slackened sail flaps, all her voice
Faltering and fluttering in her throat, she cried
'My brother!' 'Well, my sister.' 'O,' she said,
'What do you here? and in this dress? and these?
Why who are these? a wolf within the fold!
A pack of wolves! the Lord be gracious to me!
A plot, a plot, a plot to ruin all!'
'No plot, no plot,' he answered. 'Wretched boy,
How saw you not the inscription on the gate,
LET NO MAN ENTER IN ON PAIN OF DEATH?'
'And if I had,' he answered, 'who could think
The softer Adams of your Academe,
O sister, Sirens though they be, were such
As chanted on the blanching bones of men?'
'But you will find it otherwise' she said.
'You jest: ill jesting with edge-tools! my vow
Binds me to speak, and O that iron will,
That axelike edge unturnable, our Head,
The Princess.' 'Well then, Psyche, take my life,
And nail me like a weasel on a grange
For warning: bury me beside the gate,
And cut this epitaph above my bones;
~Here lies a brother by a sister slain,
All for the common good of womankind.~'
'Let me die too,' said Cyril, 'having seen
And heard the Lady Psyche.'
I struck in:
'Albeit so masked, Madam, I love the truth;
Receive it; and in me behold the Prince
Your countryman, affianced years ago
To the Lady Ida: here, for here she was,
730
And thus (what other way was left) I came.'
'O Sir, O Prince, I have no country; none;
If any, this; but none. Whate'er I was
Disrooted, what I am is grafted here.
Affianced, Sir? love-whispers may not breathe
Within this vestal limit, and how should I,
Who am not mine, say, live: the thunderbolt
Hangs silent; but prepare: I speak; it falls.'
'Yet pause,' I said: 'for that inscription there,
I think no more of deadly lurks therein,
Than in a clapper clapping in a garth,
To scare the fowl from fruit: if more there be,
If more and acted on, what follows? war;
Your own work marred: for this your Academe,
Whichever side be Victor, in the halloo
Will topple to the trumpet down, and pass
With all fair theories only made to gild
A stormless summer.' 'Let the Princess judge
Of that' she said: 'farewell, Sir--and to you.
I shudder at the sequel, but I go.'
'Are you that Lady Psyche,' I rejoined,
'The fifth in line from that old Florian,
Yet hangs his portrait in my father's hall
(The gaunt old Baron with his beetle brow
Sun-shaded in the heat of dusty fights)
As he bestrode my Grandsire, when he fell,
And all else fled? we point to it, and we say,
The loyal warmth of Florian is not cold,
But branches current yet in kindred veins.'
'Are you that Psyche,' Florian added; 'she
With whom I sang about the morning hills,
Flung ball, flew kite, and raced the purple fly,
And snared the squirrel of the glen? are you
That Psyche, wont to bind my throbbing brow,
To smoothe my pillow, mix the foaming draught
Of fever, tell me pleasant tales, and read
My sickness down to happy dreams? are you
That brother-sister Psyche, both in one?
You were that Psyche, but what are you now?'
'You are that Psyche,' said Cyril, 'for whom
I would be that for ever which I seem,
731
Woman, if I might sit beside your feet,
And glean your scattered sapience.'
Then once more,
'Are you that Lady Psyche,' I began,
'That on her bridal morn before she past
From all her old companions, when the kind
Kissed her pale cheek, declared that ancient ties
Would still be dear beyond the southern hills;
That were there any of our people there
In want or peril, there was one to hear
And help them? look! for such are these and I.'
'Are you that Psyche,' Florian asked, 'to whom,
In gentler days, your arrow-wounded fawn
Came flying while you sat beside the well?
The creature laid his muzzle on your lap,
And sobbed, and you sobbed with it, and the blood
Was sprinkled on your kirtle, and you wept.
That was fawn's blood, not brother's, yet you wept.
O by the bright head of my little niece,
You were that Psyche, and what are you now?'
'You are that Psyche,' Cyril said again,
'The mother of the sweetest little maid,
That ever crowed for kisses.'
'Out upon it!'
She answered, 'peace! and why should I not play
The Spartan Mother with emotion, be
The Lucius Junius Brutus of my kind?
Him you call great: he for the common weal,
The fading politics of mortal Rome,
As I might slay this child, if good need were,
Slew both his sons: and I, shall I, on whom
The secular emancipation turns
Of half this world, be swerved from right to save
A prince, a brother? a little will I yield.
Best so, perchance, for us, and well for you.
O hard, when love and duty clash! I fear
My conscience will not count me fleckless; yet-Hear my conditions: promise (otherwise
You perish) as you came, to slip away
Today, tomorrow, soon: it shall be said,
These women were too barbarous, would not learn;
They fled, who might have shamed us: promise, all.'
732
What could we else, we promised each; and she,
Like some wild creature newly-caged, commenced
A to-and-fro, so pacing till she paused
By Florian; holding out her lily arms
Took both his hands, and smiling faintly said:
'I knew you at the first: though you have grown
You scarce have altered: I am sad and glad
To see you, Florian. ~I~ give thee to death
My brother! it was duty spoke, not I.
My needful seeming harshness, pardon it.
Our mother, is she well?'
With that she kissed
His forehead, then, a moment after, clung
About him, and betwixt them blossomed up
From out a common vein of memory
Sweet household talk, and phrases of the hearth,
And far allusion, till the gracious dews
Began to glisten and to fall: and while
They stood, so rapt, we gazing, came a voice,
'I brought a message here from Lady Blanche.'
Back started she, and turning round we saw
The Lady Blanche's daughter where she stood,
Melissa, with her hand upon the lock,
A rosy blonde, and in a college gown,
That clad her like an April daffodilly
(Her mother's colour) with her lips apart,
And all her thoughts as fair within her eyes,
As bottom agates seen to wave and float
In crystal currents of clear morning seas.
So stood that same fair creature at the door.
Then Lady Psyche, 'Ah--Melissa--you!
You heard us?' and Melissa, 'O pardon me
I heard, I could not help it, did not wish:
But, dearest Lady, pray you fear me not,
Nor think I bear that heart within my breast,
To give three gallant gentlemen to death.'
'I trust you,' said the other, 'for we two
Were always friends, none closer, elm and vine:
But yet your mother's jealous temperament-Let not your prudence, dearest, drowse, or prove
733
The Danaïd of a leaky vase, for fear
This whole foundation ruin, and I lose
My honour, these their lives.' 'Ah, fear me not'
Replied Melissa; 'no--I would not tell,
No, not for all Aspasia's cleverness,
No, not to answer, Madam, all those hard things
That Sheba came to ask of Solomon.'
'Be it so' the other, 'that we still may lead
The new light up, and culminate in peace,
For Solomon may come to Sheba yet.'
Said Cyril, 'Madam, he the wisest man
Feasted the woman wisest then, in halls
Of Lebanonian cedar: nor should you
(Though, Madam, ~you~ should answer, ~we~ would ask)
Less welcome find among us, if you came
Among us, debtors for our lives to you,
Myself for something more.' He said not what,
But 'Thanks,' she answered 'Go: we have been too long
Together: keep your hoods about the face;
They do so that affect abstraction here.
Speak little; mix not with the rest; and hold
Your promise: all, I trust, may yet be well.'
We turned to go, but Cyril took the child,
And held her round the knees against his waist,
And blew the swollen cheek of a trumpeter,
While Psyche watched them, smiling, and the child
Pushed her flat hand against his face and laughed;
And thus our conference closed.
And then we strolled
For half the day through stately theatres
Benched crescent-wise. In each we sat, we heard
The grave Professor. On the lecture slate
The circle rounded under female hands
With flawless demonstration: followed then
A classic lecture, rich in sentiment,
With scraps of thunderous Epic lilted out
By violet-hooded Doctors, elegies
And quoted odes, and jewels five-words-long
That on the stretched forefinger of all Time
Sparkle for ever: then we dipt in all
That treats of whatsoever is, the state,
734
The total chronicles of man, the mind,
The morals, something of the frame, the rock,
The star, the bird, the fish, the shell, the flower,
Electric, chemic laws, and all the rest,
And whatsoever can be taught and known;
Till like three horses that have broken fence,
And glutted all night long breast-deep in corn,
We issued gorged with knowledge, and I spoke:
'Why, Sirs, they do all this as well as we.'
'They hunt old trails' said Cyril 'very well;
But when did woman ever yet invent?'
'Ungracious!' answered Florian; 'have you learnt
No more from Psyche's lecture, you that talked
The trash that made me sick, and almost sad?'
'O trash' he said, 'but with a kernel in it.
Should I not call her wise, who made me wise?
And learnt? I learnt more from her in a flash,
Than in my brainpan were an empty hull,
And every Muse tumbled a science in.
A thousand hearts lie fallow in these halls,
And round these halls a thousand baby loves
Fly twanging headless arrows at the hearts,
Whence follows many a vacant pang; but O
With me, Sir, entered in the bigger boy,
The Head of all the golden-shafted firm,
The long-limbed lad that had a Psyche too;
He cleft me through the stomacher; and now
What think you of it, Florian? do I chase
The substance or the shadow? will it hold?
I have no sorcerer's malison on me,
No ghostly hauntings like his Highness. I
Flatter myself that always everywhere
I know the substance when I see it. Well,
Are castles shadows? Three of them? Is she
The sweet proprietress a shadow? If not,
Shall those three castles patch my tattered coat?
For dear are those three castles to my wants,
And dear is sister Psyche to my heart,
And two dear things are one of double worth,
And much I might have said, but that my zone
Unmanned me: then the Doctors! O to hear
The Doctors! O to watch the thirsty plants
735
Imbibing! once or twice I thought to roar,
To break my chain, to shake my mane: but thou,
Modulate me, Soul of mincing mimicry!
Make liquid treble of that bassoon, my throat;
Abase those eyes that ever loved to meet
Star-sisters answering under crescent brows;
Abate the stride, which speaks of man, and loose
A flying charm of blushes o'er this cheek,
Where they like swallows coming out of time
Will wonder why they came: but hark the bell
For dinner, let us go!'
And in we streamed
Among the columns, pacing staid and still
By twos and threes, till all from end to end
With beauties every shade of brown and fair
In colours gayer than the morning mist,
The long hall glittered like a bed of flowers.
How might a man not wander from his wits
Pierced through with eyes, but that I kept mine own
Intent on her, who rapt in glorious dreams,
The second-sight of some Astræan age,
Sat compassed with professors: they, the while,
Discussed a doubt and tost it to and fro:
A clamour thickened, mixt with inmost terms
Of art and science: Lady Blanche alone
Of faded form and haughtiest lineaments,
With all her autumn tresses falsely brown,
Shot sidelong daggers at us, a tiger-cat
In act to spring.
At last a solemn grace
Concluded, and we sought the gardens: there
One walked reciting by herself, and one
In this hand held a volume as to read,
And smoothed a petted peacock down with that:
Some to a low song oared a shallop by,
Or under arches of the marble bridge
Hung, shadowed from the heat: some hid and sought
In the orange thickets: others tost a ball
Above the fountain-jets, and back again
With laughter: others lay about the lawns,
Of the older sort, and murmured that their May
Was passing: what was learning unto them?
736
They wished to marry; they could rule a house;
Men hated learned women: but we three
Sat muffled like the Fates; and often came
Melissa hitting all we saw with shafts
Of gentle satire, kin to charity,
That harmed not: then day droopt; the chapel bells
Called us: we left the walks; we mixt with those
Six hundred maidens clad in purest white,
Before two streams of light from wall to wall,
While the great organ almost burst his pipes,
Groaning for power, and rolling through the court
A long melodious thunder to the sound
Of solemn psalms, and silver litanies,
The work of Ida, to call down from Heaven
A blessing on her labours for the world.
Sweet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea,
Low, low, breathe and blow,
Wind of the western sea!
Over the rolling waters go,
Come from the dying moon, and blow,
Blow him again to me;
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps.
Sleep and rest, sleep and rest,
Father will come to thee soon;
Rest, rest, on mother's breast,
Father will come to thee soon;
Father will come to his babe in the nest,
Silver sails all out of the west
Under the silver moon:
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep.
~ Alfred Lord Tennyson,
195:A Tale Of True Love
Not in the mist of legendary ages,
Which in sad moments men call long ago,
And people with bards, heroes, saints, and sages,
And virtues vanished, since we do not know,
But here to-day wherein we all grow old,
But only we, this Tale of True Love will be told.
For Earth to tender wisdom grows not older,
But to young hearts remains for ever young,
Spring no less winsome, Winter winds no colder,
Than when tales first were told, songs first were sung.
And all things always still remain the same,
That touch the human heart, and feed Love's vestal flame.
And, if you have ears to hear and eyes for seeing,
Maidens there be, as were there in your youth,
That round you breathe, and move, and have their being,
Fair as Greek Helen, pure as Hebrew Ruth;
With Heaven-appointed poets, quick to sing
Of blameless warrior brave, and wisdom-counselled king.
And, tho' in this our day, youth, love, and beauty,
Are far too often glorified as slave
Of every sense except the sense of Duty,
In fables that dishonour and deprave,
The old-world Creeds still linger, taught us by
The pious lips that mute now in the churchyard lie.
And this true simple tale in verse as simple
Will from its prelude to its close be told,
As free from artifice as is the dimple
In childhood's cheek, whereby is age consoled.
And haply it may soothe some sufferer's lot,
When noisier notes are husht, and newer ones forgot.
And think not, of your graciousness, I pray you,
Who tells the tale is one of those who deem
That love will beckon only to betray you,
Life an illusion, happiness a dream;
96
Only that noble grief is happier far
Than transitory lusts and feverish raptures are.
It was the season when aggressive Winter,
That had so long invested the sealed world,
With frosts that starve and hurricanes that splinter,
And rain, hail, blizzard, mercilessly hurled,
Made one forlorn last effort to assail
Ere Spring's relieving spears came riding on the gale.
For Amazonian March with breast uncovered
Blew loud her clarion, and the wintry host
Took courage fresh and lingeringly hovered
Round vale and hill, wherever needed most;
And ever and anon the raging weather
And wolfish winds re-formed, and onward swept together,
Loud-bellowing to the thunder-clouds to follow:
But all in vain, for here, there, everywhere,
Primrose battalions, seizing ridge and hollow,
Dingle, and covert, wind-flowers wild that dare
Beyond their seeming, bluebells without sound,
And scentless violets peeped, to spring up from the ground.
And, covering their advance, swift-scouring showers,
Gathering, dispersing, skirmished through the sky,
Till squadrons of innumerable flowers
Thronged through the land far as you could descry.
Then Winter, smitten with despair and dread,
Folded his fluttering tents, sounded retreat, and fled.
Whereat the land, so long beleaguered, seeing
The peril past, and Winter's iron ring
Broken, and all his cohorts norward fleeing,
Came forth to welcome and embrace the Spring,
Spring the Deliverer, and from sea and shore
Rose the rejoicing shout, ``See, April dawns once more!''
Radiant she came, attended by her zephyrs,
And forth from dusky stall and hurdled fold
Poured lowing kine and sleeky-coated heifers,
To roam at will through pastures green and gold,
97
Where unweaned lambs from morning until night
Raced round their nibbling dams, and frolicked with delight.
High up, on larch and cypress, merle and mavis
Vociferated love-lays sweet as strong,
And the bird dear to Homer and to Hafiz
Proclaimed the joy of sadness all night long;
Vowed each new Spring more Spring-like than the last,
And triumphed over Time, futile iconoclast.
Then imperceptibly and slowly rounded
Slim girlish April into maiden May,
Whereat still louder everywhere resounded
The cuckoo's call and throstle's roundelay.
It was as though in meadow, chase, and wood,
God made the world anew, and saw that it was good.
Then feudal Avoncourt, the stern and stately,
Whose dawn deep hidden in undated days,
Not like those palaces erected lately
Whose feet swift crumble, and whose face decays,
Defieth Time's insatiable tooth,
Relaxed grave gaze and wore the countenance of youth.
It had beheld kings and proud empires vanish,
Male sceptres shattered, princedoms pass away,
Norman, Plantagenet, Lombard, Swabian, Spanish,
Rise, rule, then totter, and topple from their sway;
York and Lancastrian Rose unfold and bloom,
Then canker and decay, and vanish in the tomb.
It faces the four winds with like demeanour
Norward as Southernward, as though to say,
``Blow from some other, stronger and still keener,
Wherefrom you will, and I will face that way.''
And round it as you roam, to gaze perplexed
Each side seems loveliest till you look upon the next.
Its present seeming unto ages Tudor
It owes, by unnamed, unknown hands designed,
Who planned and worked amid a folk deemed ruder,
But who with grace enduring strength combined.
98
Like sturdy oak with all its leaves still on,
When foliage from elm and sycamore have gone.
Upon its delicate, lofty-jutting portal
Imaginative minds and hands have wrought
Of dead artificers once deemed immortal,
From Southern climes by kings and magnates brought,
When architects and sculptors smiled in scorn
On plain defensive days and called the world reborn.
But time hath mellowed mullion, roof, and gable,
Stone-work without, and wainscotting within;
And nigh them oaken-timbered barn and stable,
Lowlier, withal of countenance akin,
Cluster, for in times olden, meek, and proud,
Being nearer much than now, their kinship was avowed.
From it slope woodlands and long alleys shaded,
Saving that all around it and more near
Stretches wild chase by ploughshare uninvaded,
Where roam rough cattle and unherded deer,
That look up as you pass from brackened sod,
Then flee with step as fleet as that whereon they trod.
Through vale below from many a source unfailing
A river flows where deft hands cast the line,
Well stocked with wary trout and bolder grayling.
Through smooth, fat pastures dotted o'er with kine
League after league the water winds away,
Oft turning as though loth from Avoncourt to stray.
It was in the sweet season that hath ravished
The virgin heart since ever love began,
A maiden, upon whom had Nature lavished
Each fair gift given to maiden or to man,
Roamed all alone through windings of its wood,
Seeking the way to where Avoncourt haply stood.
Onward in search of it she went, but slowly,
For who could hasten through so fresh a scene,
With violets paved, the lovelier because lowly,
And pallid primroses on ground of green;
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While overhead each bird that hath a voice
Seemed in its own blithe notes to revel and rejoice.
And ever and anon she gazed around her,
Or knelt to gather some appealing flower,
And to dear God, the Father and the Founder
Of all things good, the all-protecting Power,
Breathed a brief prayer of thanks within her breast,
Feeling she roamed in Heaven on earth made manifest.
Sometimes she broke into spontaneous singing,
Such as fond nurse to fretful babe might sing,
Whose close as sudden is as its beginning.
Herself she seemed a portion of the Spring
Which, if she went, would lose the chiefest part
Of that which charms the gaze and captivates the heart.
At length she passed from out these paths embowered
To where meek does, young fawns, and shaggy beeves
Ranged amid bracken; but the House, that towered
Full nigh at hand, for intercepting leaves
She still descried not, so, advancing under
An arch of hornbeam, stood in husht, astonied wonder.
For there it rose as silent and abstracted
As though it nothing shared or had to say
With those that shadow-like have lived and acted
Upon the stage we call our later day;
From passing passions thoughtfully aloof,
Through age, not pride, without lamenting or reproof.
Then slowly timid, tentative explorer,
Longing to see yet dreading to be seen,
Asudden living figure rose before her
Of manly mould and meditative mien;
Modern, withal with air of ancient port,
As if the same blood flowed through him and Avoncourt.
``Forgive,'' she said, ``an overbold intruder!''
``I doubt if anywhere you would intrude;
But sooth none do on this survival Tudor,
Who visit its old age in reverent mood.''
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``And that indeed I do. I never saw
Aught that I so admired, or felt for so much awe.''
``Will you, I round it willingly can guide you,
Unless-and, told, shall fully understand,Wander you rather would with none beside you
To mar the silence of the windless land,
Saving Spring's choristers, whose constant trills
One hears or doth not hear, according as one wills.''
``You know it well?'' she asked. ``I ought to know it.
Here was I born, here grew to boy's estate,
Pored o'er the page of storier and poet,
All that is big, magnanimous, and great,
Hardened my own, tried my dear Mother's nerves,
Robbed the home orchard, poached my Father's own preserves.''
``And are you now its occupant and possessor?''
``So called, alas! whose ancestors have paid
The final tax, by Death the stern assessor
On all poor mortals equitably laid.
I have a leasehold; no one can have more,
This side at least the vague, still-undiscovered shore.''
Thereat there fell a silence on their speaking,
And on they moved, he follower more than guide;
Oblivious she what 'twas that she was seeking,
Since conscious now of manhood at her side.
Withal, so much there was to lure her gaze,
That his on her could rest, nor stint its look of praise.
Then when they reached the Jacobean portal,
Back rolled its doors of iron brace and stay,
On grooves that seemed more cut for feet immortal
Than for a feeble transitory day,
And mounted oaken stair axe-hewn, unplaned,
With lion-headed piers unpolished and unstained.
From coffered ceiling hung down tattered banners,
And weapons warlike deadly deemed no more
Were parked on landing; grants of ancient manors,
With charts and parchments of black-letter lore,
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Stacked spears and dinted armour; ebon presses
With jealous bolts stood locked in embrasured recesses.
Chamber on chamber wainscotted and spacious
Was lined with effigies of warriors wise,
Reticent rulers, dames revered and gracious,
Whose fingers wove the silken tapestries,
Time-toned but faded not, that draped the wall
Of gallery long and straight, and square-set banquet-hall.
About lay obsolete instruments, wheel and spindle,
When women read much less and knew much more,
Huge logs for early-rising maids to kindle
On deep-set hearths, mottoes of lasting lore
In ancient tongues, Norman, or Saxon stave,
Bidding man live and die, meek, pious, steadfast, brave.
And many a question asked she, always getting
The answer craved for, given prompt and plain.
``But look,'' she said, ``the sun will soon be setting,
And that old dial-hand that doth nor gain
Nor lose, I am sure, in its diurnal pace,
Reproves me I still lag in this enthralling place.''
``Then come again,'' he answered, ``at your leisure,''
And led her outward where the ancient pile
Looked as though dwelt within no special treasure,
And owned no spell nor charm save sunset's smile;
Like one of those large natures that betray
No sign that they are made of more than common clay.
``And may I ask, your homeward footsteps, whither?
What! there! it is on Avoncourt estate,
And I by shorter path can guide you thither
Than that you came by, fear you to be late.
You lodge with much-loved tenants, for the wife
My foster-parent was in rosy-dawning life.''
``She did not tell me that; but sooth our meeting
Was but two days back, though I quickly saw
That she for you would evermore be bleating
With voice of blent solicitude and awe.''
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``'Tis so: on Sundays with a spirit meek
She worships God, then me the rest of all the week.''
Wending and winding under curved ways shaded,
Wider than heretofore, they farmward trod,
While twilight incense all the air pervaded
Round flower-decked altar at the shrine of God,
This sacred Earth, and for approaching night
One star kept watch, as yet Heaven's only lamp alight.
To her it seemed the Real and Ideal
At last were one, and every bird that sings
Joined prayerfully in chorus hymeneal,
Ere folding music underneath its wings.
How little did she guess that ambushed grief
Watched all her thoughts and lurked 'neath every dewy leaf!
``Are both your parents at the farmstead staying?''
``Alas!'' she said, ``like yours, they both abide
My coming further off, and in my praying
Alone survive; my guardian and my guide
My Mother's sister, whom we there shall find,
Most loving and most loved of living womankind.''
Where buttressed Church with crenellated Tower
Over the village still kept watch and ward;
``For these,'' he said, ``inherited have that power,
The pious citadels of peace that guard
The sin-beleaguered soul, and still repel
From humble homes and hearts the ravening hosts of hell.''
Within were monuments of home-delved marble,
Whereon lay figures of his race and name,
Crusaders whose dead deeds no time can garble,
Learning destroy, malignity defame:
Legs crossed, feet resting against faithful hound,
And, at their side, their dames and children kneeling round.
Then would they wend them valeward to the river,
And he cast line that neither curled nor sank.
Round ran the reel, then the lithe rod would quiver,
And May-fly trout lie gasping on the bank,
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Or, like a flying shadow through the stream,
Startled, would pass to pool sheltered from noonday gleam.
Which pleased her most, for sooth she thought sport cruel,
Yet watched it for the sake of his rare skill,
But happiest when asudden wingèd jewel,
The king-fisher, disturbed near rustic mill,
Darted, and deep into its nest withdrew,
Shortly to issue forth, and, flickering, raid anew.
So passed the days unnoticed and uncounted,
As louder, longer, later, piped the merle,
And cuckoo oftener called, if harsher throated,
And hawthorn decked itself with loops of pearl.
It seemed a world reborn without its woes:
Woodbine was in the lanes, and everywhere the rose.
All things that are in that seductive season
In them struck root and with them got entwined;
Looking before or after had seemed treason
To the free heart and unconditioned mind,
As daily tightened beyond time's control
That strongest of all ties, the kinship of the soul.
And deeper into bliss they wandered blindly,
While woe and wet winds kept from them aloof,
As from screened homestead visitings unkindly,
Where old-world windows under gabled roof
Seem gazing at the present from the past,
And wondering how long such happiness will last.
Ah me! the days of Summer, not of Winter,
The shortest are and swiftest glide away,
And leaves of Autumn, sober mezzotinter,
Linger far longer than the blooms of May.
Time that, when fledged by joy, finds wings to fly,
With sorrow for its load limps slowly, wearily.
One evening, as they watched the sunset fading,
``To strangers Avoncourt must never pass,
For that would be dishonouring and degrading,''
Thinking aloud he said: ``withal, alas!
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Sit by its hearth they must, and much I fear
That there they must abide for many a coming year.
``No fault of mine nor yet of those now sleeping
In tombs ancestral. Unrelenting time,
That hath the future in its unseen keeping,
Hath lowered the lofty, let the lowly climb,
And swept away the sustenance of my home.
What is there that endures? Go ask of Greece or Rome.
``Mullion from sill, transom from beam, is cracking,
Beauty and majesty their only stay;
And, save new wealth supply what now is lacking,
These too in turn will slowly pass away.
And I must save and strive in duteous ways,
So irksome felt by most in these luxurious days.''
``There is another way, some deem a duty,
None call unworthy,'' slowly she replied.
``Women there be, gifted with charm and beauty,
On whom hath Fortune lavished wealth beside.''
``I am not made like that,'' he firmly said;
``I but for love alone should ever woo or wed.''
And, as he said it, on her face he centred
Strong tender gaze, as though to search her soul,
Which straight so deep into her being entered,
She felt a current beyond will's control.
Crimsoning she turned aside, and thus confessed
The secret she had thought to hide within her breast.
Out of a cloud long gathering burst a flashing,
Followed by thunder's discontented sound;
And straight they heard slow big round raindrops plashing
On the green leaves o'erhead and emerald ground.
``Hark! I must hasten home,'' she said, ``before
The storm-wrack breaks.''-``And I will see you to your door.''
All through the morrow much he seemed to ponder,
And oft would halt and gaze upon the ground,
Or look out fixedly on something yonder,
Unseen by others, which at last he found,
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And then strode quickly on, since he had solved
The doubt that would die out oftener the years revolved.
``Yes, for she hath that higher understanding
That routs Life's phantoms with a fearless face,
And knows, when spectral enemies throng banding,
The good from bad, the noble from the base.
To-morrow will I offer, ask for, all,
Love, Faith, and Hope can give, whatever else befall.''
But on the morrow came she not. More lonely,
Wandering, he felt than ever heretofore;
Nor on the morrow's morrow, and he only
Could wait her will, nor wend unto their door
Till wearily some doubtful days crept on,
And then the farmstead sought, to find its guests had gone!
Gone three days back, and none knew why or whither.
Then he with promptitude unleashed his mind,
In search for trace, now hither and now thither,
But trace or tidings nowhere could he find.
Still unremittingly he sought: in vain
Was search within our shore, was search beyond the main.
Slowly the glory from the Summer faded,
And ominously leaves began to fall;
And ever and anon harsh gusts invaded
Avoncourt, moaning through deserted hall,
And roaring woefully up chimney wide;
And mute the deerhound clung unto her master's side,
Or gazed at him with sad look sympathetic,
As though it too missed what its master missed.
``Ah, Lufra!'' said he in a voice prophetic,
``She is gone, and we shall never see her more.
Cling you to me, and I will take you where
Wander awhile I must, wherever I may fare.
``No more than you can I unmask the meaning
Of hapless things that baffle mortal vows.''
Then, sighing, saw he white-haired Winter gleaning,
Amid the crackling drift and fallen boughs
106
That lay on avenue, chase, and garden garth,
Fuel to feed faint flame upon her widowed hearth.
He was not one of those who love to wrangle
Before the populace for place and power,
Or fight for wealth with weapons that but strangle
The nobler passions, manhood's richest dower.
``I will return when wound shall less be felt,
And work among my folk, dwelling where once she dwelt.''
Farewell he took of wood-reeve, keeper, ranger,
And tenants grave with grief, and some in tears,
And order gave that Avoncourt to stranger
Be leased for maybe many coming years;
Then crossed the vigilant, unsleeping sea
That ranges round our Isle, to keep it great and free.
He lingered not in that vain-glorious city,
Whose Rulers pass the sceptre to the crowd,
But wended to the Land where amorous ditty
By swain at work to maid is sung aloud;
Where life is simple, and unchanging ways
Of tillage still recall loved Virgil's rustic lays:
Where on majestic pedestals the mighty
Marble imaginings of Art august,
Thought-wrinkled Zeus and dimpled Aphrodité,
Exact our homage and command our trust;
Immortal gods whose never-ending sway
Rebellion cannot shake nor scoffing sweep away.
And in that high companionship he slowly
Stifled his sighs and cicatrised his wound,
And, with the griefs the lofty and the lowly
Alike must feel, his share of pain attuned;
More willingly, it may be, since he knew
He unto love and loss would evermore keep true.
Ofttimes he stood by shrines where peasants kneeling
Told of their sorrows to the Mother-Maid,
Unto celestial sympathy appealing
From the world's pitiless splendour and parade;
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And in that sight he resignation found,
With sun, and sea, and sky, and mountain-peaks around.
So that when nigh upon a year had vanished
Homeward his longing and his looks were cast,
Feeling 'twere base to longer stay self-banished,
Grafting his future on a fruitless past.
And soon his steadfast journeying came to close,
Where Avoncourt amid its unchanged woodlands rose.
It had meanwhile been leased to lately wedded
Tenants, unknown to Fame, but well endowed
With what could rescue it from fate so dreaded
Of slow decay and ruin-mantling shroud,
And who already had done much to win
Its walls from storm without, and worm and moth within.
So, as in duty bound, he promptly started
From home prepared for him on his estate,
With cheerful step if somewhat heavy-hearted,
To visit those who lived within his gate;
Ascending through the woodland's winding ways,
That wore more careful mien than in the bygone days.
It was the dawn of Autumn, very season
When he from further search for her forbore,
Whom to forget had seemed to him a treason,
Though well he knew he ne'er should see her more.
Sound, sight, scent, yellowing elm, and conecrowned fir,
Sunshine and shade alike, reminded him of her.
But, resolute to curb regret, he entered,
And, led through hall and corridor, he wound
To long ancestral gallery, and centred
His curious gaze on what he saw around.
It seemed to have lost no look of days gone by,
Withal to blend young smile with ancient majesty.
Still on the walls the effigies ancestral,
In armour or in ermine, hung unchanged,
With the device of wild boar, wolf, or kestrel,
That once in English forests freely ranged;
108
With later draperies that seemed to bring
Distance more near and shed a grace round everything.
While gazing out on well-remembered garden,
Where old yew hedges screened new-planted rose,
Against whose beauty none his heart could harden,
He heard a door soft open and then close.
And, turning, saw Egeria, with a face
Pale as a moon that moves alone through lonely space!
``Are you a guest,'' he said, ``in my poor dwelling?''
``I am,'' she answered, ``your-your tenant's wife.
Hear me in patience, dear, while I am telling
What tell I must, but tell this once for life.''
Whereat they towards each other drew more near:
One spoke, one listened, both without a sob or tear.
``I loved, I love you. Noble since I know you,
Here I confess that I shall love you still;
Since you will never show me nor I show you
More tenderness than now, for such God's will.
Knowing I should, love once avowed, rejoice,
Should not refuse your love, could not resist your voice,
``From you I fled, and steadfast left behind me
No word to weaken you, no sign, no trace,
Whereby your manliness could following find me.
For well I knew, that day your face my face
Scanned in strong silence, probing to my heart,
Love once confessed, no power could keep our lives apart.
``And well, too well I knew, for all things told me,
Men's tongues, the air, I thus should wreck your life,
And Avoncourt reproachfully behold me
A selfish bride and paralysing wife;
That duty had decreed a harder fate
For you, for me. If wrong, I know the right too late.
``In innocency's life there comes an hour
When stands revealed what it could never guess:
That there is magical and mystic power
To make love strong or leave it powerless;
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If felt, if given without one selfish thought,
That Love is Wisdom's self, and all beside is nought.
``Ask me no more, I beg, than what I tell you:
I am your tenant, at another's will.
How, wherefore, when, on that which then befell, you,
Though I be mute, will understand me still.
Forgive, but ne'er forget me. Now depart,
Till to endurance Time shall mellowed have the smart.''
Her hand she stretched towards him, and, low bending,
On it his lips he reverently laid,
As on some sacred relic pilgrims wending
From far-off land with faith still undecayed.
Then he went forth, and she remained, alone,
Stern Duty unassailed upon its sovran throne.
But with the morrow's dawn there came the tidings
How that a crafty, freedom-loathing race,
Its schemes unmasked, had come from out its hidings,
And flung defiance in its Suzerain's face,
Then on his open territories burst,
Proclaiming these annexed unto its rule accursed.
Then England said, ``I must endure no longer
This long-conspiring, now presumptuous brood,
But must assert the Sceptre of the stronger
Against their vapourings vain and challenge rude,
Who have against me their false flag unfurled,
Urged to their ruin by an Empire-envying world.''
Nor England only, nor main-moated Britain,
But their brave offspring homed beyond the sea,
In righteous wrath arose, and, duty-smitten,
Vowed that their Afric brethren should be free
To think and speak the thing they would, and dwell
Equal and safe around Law's peaceful citadel.
Then said Sir Alured, ``Against such foemen
I too will ride and strike,'' and round him drew
All Avoncourt's hard-knit, well-mounted yeomen,
And to his lands ancestral bade adieu.
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Beneath him seethed the waters no one barred,
Over the wave-wide track our steel-shod sentries guard.
And day by day Egeria scans and watches
The ebb and flow of fluctuating war,
And ofttimes sees his name in terse dispatches
Shine among those that most distinguished are.
Then pride and terror in her heart contend,
And low she prays anew, ``Dear God! his life befriend!''
And when she reads of some fresh deed of daring
That decorates his breast and crowns his brow,
Sparing of others, of himself unsparing,
She weeps apart where no one sees. But now
This Tale of True Love hath been truly told.
May it by some be read, and by it some consoled!
~ Alfred Austin,
196:Cold Calls: War Music, Continued
Many believe in the stars.
Take Quinamid
The son of a Dardanian astrologer
Who disregarded what his father said
And came to Troy in a taxi.
Gone.
Odysseus to Greece:
“Hector has never fought this far from Troy.
We want him further out. Beyond King Ilus’ tower.
So walk him to the centre of the plain and, having killed him,
Massacre the Trojans there.”
“Ave!”
Immediately beyond the ridge is Primrose Hill
Where Paris favoured Aphrodité.
“Take it,” said Hector.
Greece shouted: “Hurry up!”
Troy shouted: “Wait for us!”
See,
Far off,
Masts behind the half-built palisade.
Then
Nearer to yourselves
Scamánder’s ford
From which the land ascends
Then merges with the centre of the plain—
The tower (a ruin) its highest point.
Heaven.
Bad music.
Queen Hera is examining her gums.
Looking in through a window
Teenaged Athena says:
“Trouble for Greece.”
They leave.
Sea.
Sky.
The sunlit snow.
Two armies on the plain.
Hector, driven by Lutie,
His godchild and his nephew,
Going from lord to Trojan lord:
“The ships by dark.”
The ruined tower.
In front of it—
Their banners rising one by one.
One after one, and then another one—
50,000 Greeks.
And on a rise in front of Greece
Two hero lords:
Ajax the Great of Salamis
Behind his shield—
As fifty Trojan shields
Topped with blue plumes, swivelling their points,
Come up the rise—
Lord Teucer (five feet high and five feet wide)
Loading his bow,
Peering round Ajax’ shield,
Dropping this Trojan plume or that,
Ordering his archers to lie flat,
Promising God as many sheep as there are sheep to count
If he can put a shaft through Hector’s neck.
Prosperity!
Beneath the blue, between the sea, the snow, there
Hector is
Surrendering the urn of one he has just killed
To one who thought that he had killed the same.
Lord Teucer’s eye/Prince Hector’s throat.
But God would not. The bowstring snaps.
Outside God’s inner court.
Queen Hera and Athena still in line.
Hera so angry she can hardly speak.
A voice:
“The Wife, the Daughter.”
“You go. His face will make me
heave.”
“Serene and Dignified Grandee.”
“Papa to you.”
“Papa”—His hand—
“I know you do not want the Holy Family
visiting the plain.
But some of us would like to help the Greeks.
They lost their champion she.
Thousands of them have died. Now they are in retreat.
Please look.”
The plain.
“You will come back the moment that I call?”
“Of course, Papa.”
“Then . . . yes. Encourage Greece.
But voices only.
Words. Shouts. That sort of thing. A move—and home you come.”
“Of course, Papa.”
The plain.
Lord Teucer’s archers hidden in its grass.
Chylábborak, Lord Hector’s brother-in-law, to his blue plumes:
“Move!”
“Move!”
And on their flanks, between the sea and snow,
Led by Teléspiax’ silver yard
All Ilium’s masks
“Down came their points. Out came their battle cry.
And our cool Mr 5 x 5 called: ‘Up.’ And up we got
And sent our arrows into them,
That made them pirouette,
Topple back down the rise, leaving their dead
For some of us to strip, and some, the most,
To pause, to point, to plant, a third, a fourth
Volley into their naked backs. Pure joy!”
Chylábborak,
Holding his ground:
“Centre on me.
More die in broken than in standing ranks.
Apollo! Aphrodité! Our gods are here!
You taste the air, you taste their breath!
The Greek fleet, ours, by dark!”
Then he is ringed.
See an imperial pig harassed by dogs.
How, like a masterchef his crêpes,
He tosses them; and on their way back down
Eviscerates, then flips them back into the pack.
Likewise Chylábborak the Greeks who rushed.
Hector has seen it. As—
Beneath the blue, the miles of empty air,
Him just one glitter in that glittering mass—
The hosts begin to merge.
Fine dust clouds mixed with beams of light.
The Prince, down from his plate.
Either sides’ arrows whingeing by:
“Cover my back.”
Finding a gap
Dismissing blows as gales do slates,
Then at a run, leaping into the ring,
Taking Chylábborak’s hand:
“If you don’t mind?”
Agamemnon:
“Our time has come. God keeps his word.
Fight now as you have never fought.
We will be at Troy’s gates by dusk,
Through them by dark,
By dawn, across our oars,
As we begin our journey home,
Watching the windmills on its Wall
Turn their sails in flames.”
Heaven. The Wife. The Daughter.
Hands release black lacquer clasps inlaid with particles of gold.
Silk sheaths—with crashing waves and fishscales woven on a
navy ground—
Flow on the pavement.
Hands take their hands
While other hands supply
Warwear,
Their car,
And put the reins into Athena’s hands.
“. . . Troy’s gates by dusk,
Through them by dark . . .”
The Hours, the undeniable,
Open the gates of Paradise.
Beyond
The wastes of space.
Before
The blue.
Below
Now near
The sea, the snow.
All time experts in hand-to-hand action—
Friecourt, Okinawa, Stalingrad West—
Could not believe the battle would gain.
But it did.
10
Chylábborak’s ring is ringed. And then no ring at all.
Some Trojans raise their hands in prayer;
Some Panachéans shout for joy and wait to drag the corpses off.
Lutie, alone, the reins in one, his other hand
Hacking away the hands that grab his chariot’s bodywork,
Rearing his horses, Starlight and Bertie, through,
To,
Yes,
Chylábborak up; rescued;
Prince Hector covering. Then:
“Zoo-born wolf! Front for a family of thieves!”
Lord Diomed, on foot, with Sethynos.
My Lutie answering:
“Be proud Prince Hector is your Fate.”
(Which will be so,
Though Lutie will not see it.)
Chylábborak and Hector do not want to disappoint this oily pair:
“Here come the Sisters Karamazof, Spark,”
Chylábborak said. “Let’s send them home in halves.”
And jumped back down.
Around the tower, 1000 Greeks, 1000 Ilians, amid their swirl,
His green hair dressed in braids, each braid
Tipped with a little silver bell, note
Nyro of Simi—the handsomest of all the Greeks, save A.
The trouble was, he had no fight. He dashed from fight to fight,
Struck a quick blow, then dashed straight out again.
Save that this time he caught,
As Prince Aenéas caught his breath,
That Prince’s eye; who blocked his dash,
And as Lord Panda waved and walked away,
Took his head off his spine with a backhand slice—
Beautiful stuff . . . straight from the blade . . .
Still, as it was a special head,
Mowgag, Aenéas’ minder—
Bright as a box of rocks, but musical—
11
Spiked it, then hoisted it, and twizzling the pole
Beneath the blue, the miles of empty air,
Marched to the chingaling of its tinklers,
A knees high majorette
Towards the Greeks, the tower.
A roar of wind across the battlefield.
A pause.
And then
Scattering light,
The plain turned crystal where their glidepath stopped,
The Queen of Heaven shrills: “Typhoid for Troy!”
And through poor Nyro’s wobbling mouth
Athena yells:
“Slew of assiduous mediocrities!
Meek Greeks!”
It is enough.
Centre-plain wide,
Lit everywhere by rays of glorious light,
They rushed their standards into Ilium,
Diomed (for once) swept forward;
Converting shame to exaltation with his cry:
“Never—to Helen’s gold without her self!
Never—to Helen’s self
without her gold!”
Mowgag well slain.
Hewn through his teeth, his jaw slashed off,
And Nyro’s head beside him in the grass.
When Nyro’s mother heard of this
12
She shaved her head; she tore her frock; she went outside
Ripping her fingernails through her cheeks:
Then down her neck; her chest; her breasts;
And bleeding to her waist ran round the shops,
Sobbing:
“God, kill Troy.
Console me with its death.
Revenge is all I have.
My boy was kind. He had his life to live.
I will not have the chance to dance in Hector’s blood,
But let me hear some have before I die.”
“I saw her running round.
I took the photograph.
It summed the situation up.
He was her son.
They put it out in colour. Right?
My picture went around the
world.”
Down the shaft of the shot in his short-staved bow
Lord Panda has been follow-spotting Diomed.
Between “her self ” / “her gold” he shoots.
It hits. And as its barbs protrude through Dio’s back
Aenéas hears Lord Panda shout:
“He bleeds! The totem Greek! Right-shoulder-front!
How wise of Artemis to make
Panda her matador! Her numero uno! Moi!”
Diomed hit,
The heart went out of those who followed him
And they fell back.
Shields all round
Diomed on his knees
13
Lifting his hands:
“Sister and wife of God”
As Sethynos breaks off the arrowhead
“Eliminate my pain.”
Settles his knee beneath his hero’s shoulderblades
“Let me kill that oaf who claims my death”
Bridges his nape with one hand
“Before it comes with honour to my name.”
Then with his other hand
In one long strong slow pull
Drew the shank back, and out.
She heard his prayer.
Before their breathless eyes
His blood ran back into the pout the shank had left,
And to complete her miracle
Lord Diomed rose up between them, stood in the air,
Then hovered down onto his toes
Brimming with homicidal joy,
Imparting it to Greece.
Then Troy was driven back,
Trampling the half-stripped still-masked carcasses
Hatching the centre of the plain.
Aenéas / Panda.
“Get him.”
14
“Get him! I got him. He is dead. But there he is.”
And Diomed has spotted them.
“Calm down,” Aenéas said. “Perhaps he is possessed.”
“What god would visit him?”
“So pray to yours—and try another shot.”
“Huntress,” Lord Panda prays,
Bright-ankled god of nets and lines,
Of tangled mountains, ilex groves and dark cascades . . .”
But Artemis was bored with him
And let him rise, still praying hard,
Into the downflight of the javelin
Diomed aired at Prince Aenéas.
Sunlit, it went through Panda’s lips, out through his neck, and then
Through Biblock’s neck.
And so they fell; the lord, face up; the friend, face down
Gripping the blood-smeared barb between his teeth,
Between the sea and snow.
Aenéas covers them.
Eyeing his plate
—Technology you can enjoy—
Diomed found, and threw, a stone
As heavy as a cabbage made of lead,
That hit, and split, Aenéas’ hip.
Who went down on one knee
And put his shield hand on the grass
And with his other hand covered his eyes.
Dido might have become a grandmother
And Rome not had its day, except
As Diomed came on to lop his top
Aenéas’ mama, Aphrodité (dressed
In grey silk lounge pyjamas piped with gold
And snake-skin flip-flops) stepped
15
Between him and the Greek.
A glow came from her throat, and from her hair
A fragrance that betokened the divine.
Stooping, she kissed him better, as
Queen Hera whispered: “Greek, cut that bitch.”
And, Diomed, you did; nicking Love’s wrist.
Studying the ichor as
It seeped across her pulse into her palm
Our Lady of the Thong lifted her other hand
Removed a baby cobra from her hair
And dropped it, Diomed, onto your neck,
And saw its bite release its bane into your blood.
Then nobody could say
Who Diomed fought for, or for what he fought.
Rapt through the mass
Now shouting at the sky, now stomping on the plain,
He killed and killed and killed, Greek, Trojan, Greek,
Lord/less, shame/fame, both gone; and gone
Loyalty nurtured in the face of death,
The duty of revenge, the right to kill,
To jeer, to strip, to gloat, to be the first
To rally but the last to run, all gone—
And gone, our Lady Aphrodité, giggling.
While everywhere,
Driving your fellow Greeks
Back down the long incline that leads to the Scamánder’s ford,
Surely as when
Lit from the dark part of the sky by sudden beams,
A bitter wind
Detonates line by line of waves against the shore.
No mind. Even as Teucer backed away
He kept his eyes on you.
“You feel the stress? You feel the fear?
Behold your enemy! the Prince God loves!”
See Teucer’s bow. Hear Teucer’s: “This time lucky.”
16
His—
But this time it was not our Father, God,
Who saved your life, my Prince.
As Agamemnon cried:
“The ships are safe.
Stand at the riverside’s far bank.”
Teléspiax heard the rustle of Lord Teucer’s shot
And stood between yourself and it.
His head was opened, egglike, at the back,
Mucked with thick blood, blood trickling from his mouth.
His last words were:
“Prince, your trumpeter has lost his breath.”
“Our worst fear was his face would fade,”
Teléspiax’s father said.
“But it did not. We will remember it until we die.”
“Give his instrument to Hogem,” Hector said, and went—
Lutie on reins—between the sea and snow,
Throwing his chariots wide, Scamánderwards,
As easily as others might a cloak.
Diomed among this traffic, on his own,
Among his dead,
Their pools of blood, their cut-off body-parts,
Their cut-off heads,
Ashamed as his head cleared
To see Odysseus, Idomeneo, the Ajax—Big and Small—
Whipping away downslope, shouting towards Odysseus:
“Where are you going with your back to the battle?”
Who shouted back, although he did not turn:
“Look left!”
And there was Lutie driving Hector onto him,
Sure they would trample him, for sure
Queen Hera’s human, Diomed,
Would stand and die, except:
“Arms up, young king—” Nestor, full tilt,
Reins round his tummy, leaning out “—and
17
Jump . . .” wrists locked “. . . You young are just . . .”
Swinging him up onto the plate “. . . too much.”
“With your permission, Da?”
Nod. Drew. Then threw the chariot’s javelin
As Lutie spun his wheels, and Hector threw—
Those skewers trading brilliance as they passed—
And missed—both vehicles slither-straightening,
Regaining speed, close, close, then driven apart
By empty cars careering off the incline,
Or stationary cars, their horses cropping grass.
“Daddy, go slow. Hector will say I ran.”
“But not the widows you have made.”
And slow
And low
Cruising the blue above this mix
Heaven’s Queen and Ringsight-eyed Athena
Trumpeting down huge worms of sound
As Hector’s car rereached king Nestor’s, and:
“What kept you, Prince?” Diomed offered as they came abreast:
“You went for a refreshing towel?”
And threw his axe, that toppled through the air, and, oh,
Hector, my Hector, as you thought:
“If Heaven helps me Heaven shows it loves the best,”
Parted your Lutie’s mesh and smashed into his heart.
What did you say as God called you to death
Dear Lutie?
“King Prince, I leave you
driverless.”
And put the reins into his hands, and fled
Into oblivion
As Hector with his other hand
Held what his Lutie was, upright, face forwards, in between
The chariot’s basket and himself,
Shouting as he drove after them:
“Loathsome Greek,
18
Your loathsome hair, your loathsome blood,
Your loathsome breath, your loathsome heart,
Jump in your loathsome ships,
I will come after you,
Come over the Aegean after you,
And find you though you hide inside
Your loathsome father’s grave
And with my bare hands twist your loathsome head
Off your loathsome neck.”
There was a Greek called Themion.
Mad about armour. If not armour, cars.
Of course he went to Troy. And Troy
Saw a stray spear transfix him as he drove.
Companionably, his horses galloped up
On Starlight’s side, and muddled Starlight down,
And Bertie down, and brought the Prince
(Still holding Lutie) down, as all the world
Hurried, as if by windheads, on towards Scamánder’s ford.
hether you reach it from the palisade
Or through the trees that dot the incline’s last stretch
You hear Scamánder’s voice before you see
What one may talk across on quiet days
Its rippling sunspangled breadth
Streaming across the bars of pebbly sand
That form its ford
—Though on the Fleet’s side deeper, darkly bright.
And here
Tiptoeing from this bar to that,
Settling the cloudy sunshine of her hair,
Her towel retained by nothing save herself,
The god of Tops and Thongs
Our Lady Aphrodité came,
Her eyes brimfull with tears.
Scamánder is astonished by his luck.
19
“Beauty of Beauties, why are you weeping?”
“I have been hurt, Scamánder.”
“No . . .”
“Humiliated.”
“No . . .”
“Me. A god. Just like yourself. Touched . . .”
“Touched!”
“By a man.”
“A man!”
“A Greek.”
“Death to all Greeks!”
“He cut me!”
“Sacrilege!
. . . But where?”
“I need your healing touch.”
“How can I help you if you do not show me where?”
“Moisten its lips and my wound will be healed.”
“You must say where!”
“Well . . .”
The towel has slipped an inch.
“I am afraid you will be disappointed.”
“Never.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes!”
“You will not criticize me?”
“No!”
Her wrist upturned.
Out-turned.
Her opened palm.
Fanning the fingers of her other hand,
Stroking his spangles with her fingertips.
“Goddess, I love you.
I have always loved you.
Say that you love me. Even a little.
I beg you. God grant it.”
“I need your help, Scamánder.”
“Take pity on me. Come into me.”
“You have your nymphs.”
“Bores! Bores!”
“I might be nibbled by an eel!”
“Death to all eels!”
The towel is down.
20
“Step into me . . .
I love your toes . . . please let me kiss your toes . . .
Your little dinkum-inkum toes . . .”
“No one has kissed them so nicely, Scamánder.”
“And now your knees . . .”
“You tickle me . . .”
“And now your thighs!”
“Oh, oh, go on . . .”
“And now your bum!
Your Holy Bum! Your Sacred Bum!
The Bum of Paradise!”
“Oh, my Scamánder, I must have your help . . .”
“Anything!”
The towel goes curling off,
And as she floated on his stream
Our Lady Aphrodité said:
“At any moment now the Greeks will reach your
Troy-side bank . . .”
Recall those sequences
When horsemen ride out of the trees and down into a
Somewhere in Kansas or Missouri, say.
So—save they were thousands—Greece
Into Scamánder’s ford.
stream
Coming downstream,
A smallish wave
That passes
But
Scamánder’s flow does not relapse.
Indeed
Almost without a sound
Its murmuring radiance rose
Into a dark, torrential surge,
Clouded with boulders, crammed with trees, as clamorous
21
as if it were a sea,
That lifted Greece, then pulled Greece down,
Cars gone, masks gone, gone under, reappearing, gone:
“Onto your knees! Praise Hector for this flood!
The Prince God loves!” Prince Hector claims
As he comes through the trees.
They do.
Then up and run, run, thousands of them,
To hold those Greeks who got back out
Under until their bubbles stopped; while those swept off
Turned somersaults amid Scamánder’s undertow.
The flat—
1000 yards of it between the river and the palisade.
The King:
“The Lord has not abandoned us.
To cross will be as bad for them.”
But it was not to be as bad for them.
Indeed,
As Hector drove towards Scamánder’s brink,
And as—their banners rising one by one,
One after one and then another one—
He and all Ilium began to enter it,
The river reassumed its softly-spoken, smooth, sunspangled way.
And Agamemnon cried:
“God, what are You for?
What use are You to me?”
As Hector cries:
22
“Two miracles!
Your Prince is close to God!”
And Hera to Athena:
“Fog?”
And fog came down.
And most of Greece got out.
Troy holding hands midstream.
An army peering through its masks.
Miss Tops and Thongs to God:
“Your Hera has . . .”
And with a wish He turned the fog to light
And with a word He called them back to Heaven.
Sky.
Snow.
The 1000 yards.
The palisade.
Hector:
“I am your Prince.
My name means He-Who-Holds.
Troy. And the plain. And now the ships.
For Troy!” his battle cry,
Rising into a common cry, that cry
Into a clamour, and that clamour to
Bayings of hatred.
23
800 yards.
The Child:
“We are the Greeks. We fight to win. If one is lost,
Close his eyes, step over him, and kill his enemy.”
800 yards.
The Greeks are tiring.
Nestor is on his knees:
“God of all Gods, Most Holy and Most High,
If Greece has ever sacrificed fresh blood to you,
Protect our ships.”
Heaven.
Soft music. Summertime. Queen Hera and Athena? Yes . . .
Some lesser gods
Observing their approach, approach,
Salaam, and then
Lead them—
Now both in black wraparound tops—
To God:
“Darling Daddy, here we are.”
“And” (Hera) “here we stay
Until you stop that worthless Hector killing Greeks.”
Up steps Love.
Hera: “Why is she wearing a tent?”
Love: “Father, see this.” (Her wrist.)
“Human strikes god! Communism! The end of everything!”
“Darlings,” He said,
“You know that being a god means being blamed.
Do this—no good. Do that—the same. The answer is:
Avoid humanity.
Remember—I am God.
I see the bigger picture.”
24
“And I am Hera, Heaven’s Queen,
Greece worships me.”
“Stuff Greece,” Love said.
“Your blubber-bummed wife with her gobstopper nipples
Hates Troy because Troy’s Paris put her last
When we stripped off for him.
As for the Ithacan boat-boy’s undercurved preceptatrix,
She hates Troy because my statue stands on its acropolis.”
Hera: “The cities’ whores were taxed to pay for it.”
Love (Dropping onto her knees before Himself):
“Please . . . stop them harming Troy. The greatest city
in the world.”
While Hera and Athena sang:
“Cleavage! Cleavage!
Queen of the Foaming Hole.
Mammoth or man or midge
She sucks from pole to pole.”
And God has had enough of it.
Lifting His scales He said:
“Hector will have his day of victory.”
Then crashed them to the ground.
700 yards.
The palisade.
Its gate.
Late sunlight on gilt beaks.
“There’s no escape from Troy.”
“Or from the plain at Troy.”
25
Begging for ransom, Trojan Hoti,
His arms around King Menelaos’ knees.
King Agamemnon: “Off.”
Then he punched Hoti in the face.
Then punched him in the face again.
And then again. And when he fell
King Agamemnon kicked him in the groin.
Kicking him in the groin with so much force
It took a step to follow up each kick.
Then pulled him up,
Then dragged him by his hair
This way and that,
Then left him, calling:
“Finish him off.”
And someone did.
“I was sixteen. I said: ‘Where is Achilles?’
Hard as it is to share another’s troubles when your own are pressing
Great Ajax took my hands in his and said:
‘He loves us. He is with us. He will come.’”
But he did not.
Then Ajax to himself:
“Dear Lord, you made me straight.
Give me the strength to last till dark.”
The Prince: “I get past
Their war is lost.”
everything I see.
It was.
Aenéas, Ábassee, Sarpédon, Gray,
Calling to one another down the line.
Then, with a mighty wall of sound,
As if a slope of stones
Rolled down into a lake of broken glass
26
We ran at them.
And now the light of evening has begun
To shawl across the plain:
Blue gray, gold gray, blue gold,
Translucent nothingnesses
Readying our space,
Within the deep, unchanging sea of space,
For Hesper’s entrance, and the silver wrap.
Covered with blood, mostly their own,
Loyal to death, reckoning to die
Odysseus, Ajax, Diomed,
Idomeneo, Nestor, Menelaos
And the King:
“Do not die because others have died.”
“Do not show them the palms of your hands.”
“Achil!”
“Achil!”
“If he won’t help us, Heaven help us.”
“Stand still and fight.”
“Feel shame in one another’s eyes.”
“I curse you, God. You are a liar, God.
Troy will be yours by dark—immortal lies.”
“Home!”
“Home!”
“There’s no such place.”
“You can’t launch burning ships.”
“More men survive if no one runs.”
But that is what Greece did.
Dropping their wounded,
Throwing down their dead,
Their shields, their spears, their swords,
They ran.
27
Leaving their heroes tattered, filthy, torn
And ran
And ran
Above their cries:
“I am the Prince! The victory is mine!”
Chylábborak:
“Do not take cowardice for granted.”
Scarce had he said it, when
His son, Kykéon, standing next to him
Took Ajax’ final spear cast in his chest.
“I shall not wear your armour, Sir,” he said.
And died.
“My son is dead.”
The Prince:
“Hector is loved by God.”
And Greece, a wall of walking swords,
But walking backwards,
Leaving the plain in silence
And in tears.
Idomeneo,
Running back out at those Trojans who came too close:
“You know my name. Come look for me. And boy,
The day you do will be the day you die.”
28
Hector to Troy:
“Soldiers!—
Unmatched my force, unconquerable my will.
After ten years of days, in one long day
To be remembered for as many days
As there are days to come, this is my day,
Your Hector’s day. Troy given back to Troy.
My day of victory!”
And when the cheering died:
“Some say: destroy Greece now. But I say no.
Out of your cars. Eat by your fires.
Two hundred fires! Around each fire
Five hundred men!
“The sound of grindstones turning through the night,
The firelight that stands between our blades,
So let King Agamemnon’s Own hold hands
And look into each other’s frightened eyes.
“True God! Great Master of the Widespread Sky!
If only you would turn
Me into a god,
As you, through me,
Tomorrow by their ships
Will see Greece die.”
Silence.
A ring of lights.
Within
Immaculate
In boat-cloaks lined with red
King Agamemnon’s lords—
The depression of retreat.
29
The depression of returning to camp.
Him at the centre of their circle
Sobbing,
Then shouting:
“We must run for it!”
Dark glasses in parked cars.
“King Agamemnon of Mycenae,
God called, God raised, God recognized,
You are a piece of shit,” Diomed said.
Silence again.
“Let us praise God,” Lord Ajax said,
“That Hector stopped before he reached the ships.”
Silence again.
Then
Nestor
(Putting his knee back in):
“Paramount Agamemnon, King of Kings,
Lord of the Shore, the Islands and the Sea
I shall begin, and end, with you.
Greece needs good words. Like them or not, the credit
will be yours.
Determined. Keen to fight, that is our Diomed—
As I should know. When just a boy of ten I fought
Blowback of Missolonghi, a cannibal, drank blood,
He captured you, he buggered you, you never walked again.
But Diomed lacks experience.
God has saved us, momentarily.
God loves Achilles.
You took, and you have kept, Achilles’ ribband she.”
“I was a fool!”
30
“And now you must appease him, Agamemnon.
Humble words. Hands shaken. Gifts.”
The King—wiping his eyes:
“As usual,
Pylos has said the only things worth hearing.
I was mad to take the she.
I shall pay fitting damages.
Plus her, I offer him
The Corfiot armour that my father wore.”
Silence.
The sea.
Its whispering.
“To which I add: a set of shields.
Posy, standard, ceremonial.
The last, cut from the hide of a one ton Lesbian bull.”
Silence.
The sea.
“And . . . a chariot!
From my own équipe!
They smoke along the ground . . .
They ride its undulations like a breeze . . .”
The sea.
“Plus: six horses—saddled, bridled and caparisoned,
Their grooms and veterinarians . . .
. . . And six tall shes:
Two good dancers, two good stitchers, two good cooks.
All capable of bearing boys . . .
“Oh, very well then: twenty loaves of gold,
31
The same of silver, and the same of iron.”
Masks. Lights.
Behind the lords
Some hundreds from the army have walked up.
Lord Nestor smiles.
Lord Menelaos smiles.
“Plus—
Though it may well reduce your King to destitution:
A’kimi’kúriex,
My summer palace by the Argive sea,
Its lawns, its terraces, its curtains in whose depths
Larks dive above a field of waving lilies
And fishscale-breakers shatter on blue rocks.
Then, as he draws their silky heights aside,
Standing among huge chests of looted booty,
Long necked, with lowered lids, but candid eyes,
My living daughter, Íphaniss, a diamond
Big as a cheeseball for her belly stud.
His wife to be! minus—I need not say—her otherwise huge
bride-price.”
“More!”
“More!”
“More!”
Lord Ajax almost has to hold him up.
“The whole of eastern Pel’po’nesia—
An area of outstanding natural beauty—
Its cities, Epi’dávros, Trów’é’zen,
Their fortresses, their harbours and their fleets,
Their taxpayers—glad to accept his modest ways—
All this, the greatest benefaction ever known,
If he agrees to fight. And he admits I am his King.”
Instantly, Nestor:
“An offer God himself could not refuse.
All that remains to say is:
Who shall take it to Achilles?”
32
Agamemnon: “You will.”
Starlight.
The starlight on the sea.
The sea.
Its whispering
Mixed with the prayers
Of Ajax and of Nestor as they walk
Along the shore towards Achilles’ gate.
“My lords?”
“Your lord.”
“This way.”
They find him, with guitar,
Singing of Gilgamesh.
“Take my hands. Here they are.”
You cannot take your eyes away from him.
His own so bright they slow you down.
His voice so low, and yet so clear.
You know that he is dangerous.
“Patroclus?
33
Friends in need.
Still,
Friends.
That has not changed,
I think.
Autómedon? Wine.
“Dear Lord and Master of the Widespread Sky,
Accept ourselves, accept our prayers.”
Their cups are taken.
“Father friend?”
King Nestor (for his life):
“You know why we are here.
We face death.
The mass choose slavery.
Mycenae has admitted he was wrong to wrong yourself.
In recompense he offers you
The greatest benefaction ever known.
Take it, and fight. Or else Hector will burn the ships
Then kill us randomly.
Remember what your Father said
The day when Ajax and myself drove up to ask
If you could come with us to Troy?
That you should stand among the blades where honour grows.
And secondly, to let your anger go.
Spirit, and strength, and beauty have combined
Such awesome power in you
A vacant Heaven would offer you its throne.
Think of what those who will come after us will say.
Save us from Hector’s god, from Hector, and from Hector’s force.
I go down on my knees to you, Achilles.”
“I must admire your courage, father friend,
For treating me as if I was a fool.
34
I shall deal with Hector as I want to.
You and your fellow countrymen will die
For how your King has treated me.
I have spent five years fighting for your King.
My record is: ten coastal and ten inland cities
Burnt to the ground. Their males, massacred.
Their cattle, and their women, given to him.
Among the rest, Briseis the Beautiful, my ribband she.
Not that I got her courtesy of him.
She joined my stock in recognition of
My strength, my courage, my superiority,
Courtesy of yourselves, my lords.
I will not fight for him.
He aims to personalise my loss.
Briseis taken from Achilles—standard practice:
Helen from Menelaos—war.
Lord Busy Busy, building his palisade, mounting my she,
One that I might have picked to run my house,
Raising her to the status of a wife.
Do I hate him? Yes, I hate him. Hate him.
And should he be afraid of me? He should.
I want to harm him. I want him to feel pain.
In his body, and between his ears.
I must admit,
Some of the things that you have said are true.
But look what he has done to me! To me!
The king on whom his kingliness depends!
I will not fight for him.
Hearing your steps, I thought: at last,
My friends have come to visit me.
They took their time about it, true—
After he took my she none of you came—
Now, though—admittedly they are in trouble,
Serious trouble—they have arrived as friends,
And of their own accord.
But you have not come here as friends.
And you have not come of your own accord.
You came because your King told you to come.
You came because I am his last resort.
And, incidentally, your last resort.
35
At least he offers stuff.
All you have offered is advice:
‘Keep your temper . . .
Mind your tongue . . .
Think what the world will say . . .’
No mention of your King’s treatment of me.
No sign of love for me behind your tears.
I will not fight for him.
I can remember very well indeed
The day you two grand lords came visiting my father’s house,
How I ran out to you, and took your hands—
The greatest men that I had ever seen:
Ajax, my fighting cousin, strong, brave, unafraid to die;
Nestor, the King of Sandy Pylos, wisdom’s sword.
And then, when all had had enough to eat and drink
And it was sealed that I should come to Troy,
Then my dear father said that lordship knows
Not only how to fight, and when to hold its tongue,
But of the difference between a child enraged
And honour bound lords.
I will not fight for him.
There is a King to be maintained. You are his lords.
My fighting powers prove my inferiority.
Whatever he, through you, may grant,
I must receive it as a favour, not of right,
Go back to him with downcast looks, a suppliant tone,
Acknowledge my transgressions—I did not
Applaud his sticky fingers on my she’s meek flesh.
My mother says I have a choice:
Live as a happy backwood king for aye
Or give the world an everlasting murmur of my name,
And die.
Be up tomorrow sharp
To see me sacrifice to Lord Poseidon and set sail.
Oh, yes, his gifts:
‘The greatest benefaction ever known.’
If he put Heaven in my hand I would not want it.
His offers magnify himself.
Likewise his child.
I do not want to trash the girl.
She is like me. Bad luck to have poor friends.
Bad luck to have his Kingship as your sire.
36
My father will select my wife.
Each spring a dozen local kings drive up
And lead their daughters naked round our yard.
Some decent local girl. My father’s worth
Is all the wealth we will require.
You Greeks will not take Troy.
You have disintegrated as a fighting force.
Troy is your cemetery. Blame your King.
The man who you say has done all he can.
The man who has admitted he was wrong.
But he has not done all he can.
And he has not admitted he was wrong.
Or not to me.
I want him here, your King.
His arms straight down his sides, his shoulders back,
Announcing loud and clear that he was wrong to take my she.
Apologising for that wrong, to me, the son of Péleus.
Before my followers, with you, Pylos and Salamis,
Crete. Sparta. Tyrins, Argos, Calydon, the Islands, here,
Stood to attention on either side of him.
That is my offer. Take it, or die.
Nestor may stay the night.
You, dear cousin Ajax, tell your King what I have said.
Preferably, in front of everyone.”
Who said,
As my Achilles lifted his guitar:
“Lord, I was never so bethumped with words
Since first I called my father Dad.”
The sea.
Their feet along the sand to Agamemnon’s gate.
And in starlit air
The Trojans singing:
“I love my wife, I love her dearly,
I love the hole she pisses through,
37
I love her lily-white tits
And her nut-brown arsehole,
I could eat her shit with a wooden spoon.”
~ Christopher Logue,
197:A TRAGEDY IN TWO ACTS

Translated from the Original Doric

'Choose Reform or Civil War,
When through thy streets, instead of hare with dogs,
A Consort-Queen shall hunt a King with hogs,
Riding on the IONIAN MINOTAUR.'

DRAMATIS PERSONAE
Tyrant Swellfoot, King of Thebes.
Iona Taurina, his Queen.
Mammon, Arch-Priest of Famine.
Purganax Wizard, Minister of Swellfoot.
Dakry Wizard, Minister of Swellfoot.
Laoctonos Wizard, Minister of Swellfoot.
The Gadfly.
The Leech.
The Rat.
Moses, the Sow-gelder.
Solomon, the Porkman.
Zephaniah, Pig-butcher.
The Minotaur.
Chorus of the Swinish Multitude.
Guards, Attendants, Priests, etc., etc.

SCENE.--THEBES

ACT I.

Scene I.-- A magnificent Temple, built of thigh-bones and death's-heads, and tiled with scalps. Over the Altar the statue of Famine, veiled; a number of Boars, Sows, and Sucking-Pigs, crowned with thistle, shamrock, and oak, sitting on the steps, and clinging round the Altar of the Temple.
Enter Swellfoot, in his Royal robes, without perceiving the Pigs.
Swellfoot.
Thou supreme Goddess! by whose power divine
These graceful limbs are clothed in proud array [He contemplates himself with satisfaction.

Of gold and purple, and this kingly paunch
Swells like a sail before a favouring breeze,
And these most sacred nether promontories
Lie satisfied with layers of fat; and these
Boeotian cheeks, like Egypt's pyramid,
(Nor with less toil were their foundations laid)[1],
Sustain the cone of my untroubled brain,
That point, the emblem of a pointless nothing!
Thou to whom Kings and laurelled Emperors,
Radical-butchers, Paper-money-millers,
Bishops and Deacons, and the entire army
Of those fat martyrs to the persecution
Of stifling turtle-soup, and brandy-devils,
Offer their secret vows! Thou plenteous Ceres
Of their Eleusis, hail!
The Swine.
            Eigh! eigh! eigh! eigh!
            Swellfoot.
                         Ha! what are ye,
Who, crowned with leaves devoted to the Furies,
Cling round this sacred shrine?
Swine.
                 Aigh! aigh! aigh!
                 Swellfoot.
                          What! ye that are
The very beasts that, offered at her altar
With blood and groans, salt-cake, and fat, and inwards,
Ever propitiate her reluctant will
When taxes are withheld?
Swine.
             Ugh! ugh! ugh!
             Swellfoot.
                     What! ye who grub
With filthy snouts my red potatoes up
In Allan's rushy bog? Who eat the oats
Up, from my cavalry in the Hebrides?
Who swill the hog-wash soup my cooks digest
From bones, and rags, and scraps of shoe-leather,
Which should be given to cleaner Pigs than you?
The Swine.Semichorus I.
The same, alas! the same;
Though only now the name
Of Pig remains to me.
Semichorus II.
If 'twere your kingly will
Us wretched Swine to kill,
What should we yield to thee?
Swellfoot.
Why, skin and bones, and some few hairs for mortar.
Chorus of Swine.
I have heard your Laureate sing,
That pity was a royal thing;
Under your mighty ancestors, we Pigs
Were bless'd as nightingales on myrtle sprigs,
Or grasshoppers that live on noonday dew,
And sung, old annals tell, as sweetly too;
But now our sties are fallen in, we catch
The murrain and the mange, the scab and itch;
Sometimes your royal dogs tear down our thatch,
And then we seek the shelter of a ditch;
Hog-wash or grains, or ruta-baga, none
Has yet been ours since your reign begun.
First Sow.
My Pigs, 'tis in vain to tug.
Second Sow.
I could almost eat my litter.
First Pig.
I suck, but no milk will come from the dug.
Second Pig.
Our skin and our bones would be bitter.
The Boars.
We fight for this rag of greasy rug,
Though a trough of wash would be fitter.
Semichorus.
  Happier Swine were they than we,
  Drowned in the Gadarean sea
I wish that pity would drive out the devils,
Which in your royal bosom hold their revels,
And sink us in the waves of thy compassion!
Alas! the Pigs are an unhappy nation!
Now if your Majesty would have our bristles
To bind your mortar with, or fill our colons
With rich blood, or make brawn out of our gristles,
In policyask else your royal Solons
You ought to give us hog-wash and clean straw,
And sties well thatched; besides it is the law!
Swellfoot.
This is sedition, and rank blasphemy!
Ho! there, my guards!
Enter a Guard.
Guard.
           Your sacred Majesty.
           Swellfoot.
Call in the Jews, Solomon the court porkman,
Moses the sow-gelder, and Zephaniah
The hog-butcher.
Guard.
         They are in waiting, Sire.
         Enter Solomon, Moses, and Zephaniah.
Swellfoot.
Out with your knife, old Moses, and spay those Sows [The Pigs run about in consternation.

That load the earth with Pigs; cut close and deep.
Moral restraint I see has no effect,
Nor prostitution, nor our own example,
Starvation, typhus-fever, war, nor prison
This was the art which the arch-priest of Famine
Hinted at in his charge to the Theban clergy
Cut close and deep, good Moses.
Moses.
                 Let your Majesty
Keep the Boars quiet, else
Swellfoot.
               Zephaniah, cut
That fat Hog's throat, the brute seems overfed;
Seditious hunks! to whine for want of grains.
Zephaniah.
Your sacred Majesty, he has the dropsy;
We shall find pints of hydatids in's liver,
He has not half an inch of wholesome fat
Upon his carious ribs
Swellfoot.
            'Tis all the same,
He'll serve instead of riot money, when
Our murmuring troops bivouac in Thebes' streets;
And January winds, after a day
Of butchering, will make them relish carrion.
Now, Solomon, I'll sell you in a lump
The whole kit of them.
Solomon.
            Why, your Majesty,
I could not give
Swellfoot.
          Kill them out of the way,
That shall be price enough, and let me hear
Their everlasting grunts and whines no more!
[Exeunt, driving in the Swine.
Enter Mammon, the Arch-Priest; and Purganax, Chief of the Council of Wizards.
Purganax.
The future looks as black as death, a cloud,
Dark as the frown of Hell, hangs over it
The troops grow mutinousthe revenue fails
There's something rotten in usfor the level
Of the State slopes, its very bases topple,
The boldest turn their backs upon themselves!
Mammon.
Why what's the matter, my dear fellow, now?
Do the troops mutiny?decimate some regiments;
Does money fail?come to my mintcoin paper,
Till gold be at a discount, and ashamed
To show his bilious face, go purge himself,
In emulation of her vestal whiteness.
Purganax.
Oh, would that this were all! The oracle!!
Mammon.
Why it was I who spoke that oracle,
And whether I was dead drunk or inspired,
I cannot well remember; nor, in truth,
The oracle itself!
Purganax.
          The words went thus:
'Boeotia, choose reform or civil war!
When through the streets, instead of hare with dogs,
A Consort Queen shall hunt a King with Hogs,
Riding on the Ionian Minotaur.'
Mammon.
Now if the oracle had ne'er foretold
This sad alternative, it must arrive,
Or not, and so it must now that it has;
And whether I was urged by grace divine
Or Lesbian liquor to declare these words,
Which must, as all words must, be false or true,
It matters not: for the same Power made all,
Oracle, wine, and me and youor none
'Tis the same thing. If you knew as much
Of oracles as I do
Purganax.
           You arch-priests
Believe in nothing; if you were to dream
Of a particular number in the Lottery,
You would not buy the ticket?
Mammon.
                Yet our tickets
Are seldom blanks. But what steps have you taken?
For prophecies, when once they get abroad,
Like liars who tell the truth to serve their ends,
Or hypocrites who, from assuming virtue,
Do the same actions that the virtuous do,
Contrive their own fulfilment. This Iona
Wellyou know what the chaste Pasiphae did,
Wife to that most religious King of Crete,
And still how popular the tale is here;
And these dull Swine of Thebes boast their descent
From the free Minotaur. You know they still
Call themselves Bulls, though thus degenerate,
And everything relating to a Bull
Is popular and respectable in Thebes.
Their arms are seven Bulls in a field gules;
They think their strength consists in eating beef,
Now there were danger in the precedent
If Queen Iona
Purganax.
        I have taken good care
That shall not be. I struck the crust o' the earth
With this enchanted rod, and Hell lay bare!
And from a cavern full of ugly shapes
I chose a Leech, a Gadfly, and a Rat.
The Gadfly was the same which Juno sent
To agitate Io[2], and which Ezekiel[3] mentions
That the Lord whistled for out of the mountains
Of utmost Aethiopia, to torment
Mesopotamian Babylon. The beast
Has a loud trumpet like the scarabee,
His crookd tail is barbed with many stings,
Each able to make a thousand wounds, and each
Immedicable; from his convex eyes
He sees fair things in many hideous shapes,
And trumpets all his falsehood to the world.
Like other beetles he is fed on dung
He has eleven feet with which he crawls,
Trailing a blistering slime, and this foul beast
Has tracked Iona from the Theban limits,
From isle to isle, from city unto city,
Urging her flight from the far Chersonese
To fabulous Solyma, and the Aetnean Isle,
Ortygia, Melite, and Calypso's Rock,
And the swart tribes of Garamant and Fez,
Aeolia and Elysium, and thy shores,
Parthenope, which now, alas! are free!
And through the fortunate Saturnian land,
Into the darkness of the West.
Mammon.
                But if
This Gadfly should drive Iona hither?
Purganax.
Gods! what an if! but there is my gray Rat:
So thin with want, he can crawl in and out
Of any narrow chink and filthy hole,
And he shall creep into her dressing-room,
And
Mammon.
   My dear friend, where are your wits? as if
She does not always toast a piece of cheese
And bait the trap? and rats, when lean enough
To crawl through such chinks
Purganax.
                But my Leecha leech
Fit to suck blood, with lubricous round rings,
Capaciously expatiative, which make
His little body like a red balloon,
As full of blood as that of hydrogen,
Sucked from men's hearts; insatiably he sucks
And clings and pullsa horse-leech, whose deep maw
The plethoric King Swellfoot could not fill,
And who, till full, will cling for ever.
Mammon.
                      This
For Queen Iona would suffice, and less;
But 'tis the Swinish multitude I fear,
And in that fear I have
Purganax.
              Done what?
              Mammon.
                   Disinherited
My eldest son Chrysaor, because he
Attended public meetings, and would always
Stand prating there of commerce, public faith,
Economy, and unadulterate coin,
And other topics, ultra-radical;
And have entailed my estate, called the Fool's Paradise,
And funds in fairy-money, bonds, and bills,
Upon my accomplished daughter Banknotina,
And married her to the gallows[4].
Purganax.
                  A good match!
                  Mammon.
A high connexion, Purganax. The bridegroom
Is of a very ancient family,
Of Hounslow Heath, Tyburn, and the New Drop,
And has great influence in both Houses;oh!
He makes the fondest husband; nay, too fond,
New-married people should not kiss in public;
But the poor souls love one another so!
And then my little grandchildren, the gibbets,
Promising children as you ever saw,
The young playing at hanging, the elder learning
How to hold radicals. They are well taught too,
For every gibbet says its catechism
And reads a select chapter in the Bible
Before it goes to play.
[A most tremendous humming is heard.
Purganax.
            Ha! what do I hear?
            Enter the Gadfly.
Mammon.
Your Gadfly, as it seems, is tired of gadding.
Gadfly.
  Hum! hum! hum!
From the lakes of the Alps, and the cold gray scalps
Of the mountains, I come!
  Hum! hum! hum!
From Morocco and Fez, and the high palaces
Of golden Byzantium;
From the temples divine of old Palestine,
From Athens and Rome,
With a ha! and a hum!
I come! I come!
  All inn-doors and windows
  Were open to me:
I saw all that sin does,
  Which lamps hardly see
That burn in the night by the curtained bed,
The impudent lamps! for they blushed not red,
Dinging and singing,
From slumber I rung her,
Loud as the clank of an ironmonger;
   Hum! hum! hum!
    Far, far, far!
With the trump of my lips, and the sting at my hips,
I drove herafar!
Far, far, far!
From city to city, abandoned of pity,
A ship without needle or star;
Homeless she passed, like a cloud on the blast,
Seeking peace, finding war;
She is here in her car,
From afar, and afar;
  Hum! hum!
   I have stung her and wrung her,
  The venom is working;
And if you had hung her
  With canting and quirking,
She could not be deader than she will be soon;
I have driven her close to you, under the moon,
Night and day, hum! hum! ha!
I have hummed her and drummed her
From place to place, till at last I have dumbed her,
   Hum! hum! hum!
   Enter the Leech and the Rat.
Leech.
I will suck
Blood or muck!
The disease of the state is a plethory,
Who so fit to reduce it as I?
Rat.
I'll slily seize and
Let blood from her weasand,
Creeping through crevice, and chink, and cranny,
With my snaky tail, and my sides so scranny.
Purganax.
Aroint ye! thou unprofitable worm! [To the Leech.

And thou, dull beetle, get thee back to hell! [To the Gadfly.

To sting the ghosts of Babylonian kings,
And the ox-headed Io
Swine
(within).
            Ugh, ugh, ugh!
Hail! Iona the divine,
We will be no longer Swine,
But Bulls with horns and dewlaps.
Rat.
                  For,
You know, my lord, the Minotaur
Purganax
(fiercely).
Be silent! get to hell! or I will call
The cat out of the kitchen. Well, Lord Mammon,
This is a pretty business.
[Exit the Rat.
Mammon.
              I will go
And spell some scheme to make it ugly then.
[Exit.
Enter Swellfoot.
Swellfoot.
She is returned! Taurina is in Thebes,
When Swellfoot wishes that she were in hell!
Oh, Hymen, clothed in yellow jealousy,
And waving o'er the couch of wedded kings
The torch of Discord with its fiery hair;
This is thy work, thou patron saint of queens!
Swellfoot is wived! though parted by the sea,
The very name of wife had conjugal rights;
Her cursd image ate, drank, slept with me,
And in the arms of Adiposa oft
Her memory has received a husband's
[A loud tumult, and cries of 'Iona for ever!No Swellfoot!'!
                    Hark!
How the Swine cry Iona Taurina;
I suffer the real presence; Purganax,
Off with her head!
Purganax.
          But I must first impanel
A jury of the Pigs.
Swellfoot.
          Pack them then.
          Purganax.
Or fattening some few in two separate sties,
And giving them clean straw, tying some bits
Of ribbon round their legsgiving their Sows
Some tawdry lace, and bits of lustre glass,
And their young Boars white and red rags, and tails
Of cows, and jay feathers, and sticking cauliflowers
Between the ears of the old ones; and when
They are persuaded, that by the inherent virtue
Of these things, they are all imperial Pigs,
Good Lord! they'd rip each other's bellies up,
Not to say, help us in destroying her.
Swellfoot.
This plan might be tried too;where's General
Laoctonos?
Enter Laoctonos and Dakry.
     It is my royal pleasure
That you, Lord General, bring the head and body,
If separate it would please me better, hither
Of Queen Iona.
Laoctonos.
       That pleasure I well knew,
And made a charge with those battalions bold,
Called, from their dress and grin, the royal apes,
Upon the Swine, who in a hollow square
Enclosed her, and received the first attack
Like so many rhinoceroses, and then
Retreating in good order, with bare tusks
And wrinkled snouts presented to the foe,
Bore her in triumph to the public sty.
What is still worse, some Sows upon the ground
Have given the ape-guards apples, nuts, and gin,
And they all whisk their tails aloft, and cry,
'Long live Iona! down with Swellfoot!'
Purganax.
                     Hark!
                     The Swine
(without).
Long live Iona! down with Swellfoot!
Dakry.
                    I
Went to the garret of the swineherd's tower,
Which overlooks the sty, and made a long
Harangue (all words) to the assembled Swine,
Of delicacy, mercy, judgement, law,
Morals, and precedents, and purity,
Adultery, destitution, and divorce,
Piety, faith, and state necessity,
And how I loved the Queen!and then I wept
With the pathos of my own eloquence,
And every tear turned to a mill-stone, which
Brained many a gaping Pig, and there was made
A slough of blood and brains upon the place,
Greased with the pounded bacon; round and round
The mill-stones rolled, ploughing the pavement up,
And hurling Sucking-Pigs into the air,
With dust and stones.
Enter Mammon.
Mammon.
            I wonder that gray wizards
Like you should be so beardless in their schemes;
It had been but a point of policy
To keep Iona and the Swine apart.
Divide and rule! but ye have made a junction
Between two parties who will govern you
But for my art.Behold this BAG! it is
The poison BAG of that Green Spider huge,
On which our spies skulked in ovation through
The streets of Thebes, when they were paved with dead:
A bane so much the deadlier fills it now
As calumny is worse than death,for here
The Gadfly's venom, fifty times distilled,
Is mingled with the vomit of the Leech,
In due proportion, and black ratsbane, which
That very Rat, who, like the Pontic tyrant,
Nurtures himself on poison, dare not touch;
All is sealed up with the broad seal of Fraud,
Who is the Devil's Lord High Chancellor,
And over it the Primate of all Hell
Murmured this pious baptism:'Be thou called
The GREEN BAG; and this power and grace be thine:
That thy contents, on whomsoever poured,
Turn innocence to guilt, and gentlest looks
To savage, foul, and fierce deformity.
Let all baptized by thy infernal dew
Be called adulterer, drunkard, liar, wretch!
No name left out which orthodoxy loves,
Court Journal or legitimate Review!
Be they called tyrant, beast, fool, glutton, lover
Of other wives and husbands than their own
The heaviest sin on this side of the Alps!
Wither they to a ghastly caricature
Of what was human!let not man or beast
Behold their face with unaverted eyes!
Or hear their names with ears that tingle not
With blood of indignation, rage, and shame!'
This is a perilous liquor;good my Lords. [Swellfoot approaches to touch the GREEN BAG.

Beware! for God's sake, beware!if you should break
The seal, and touch the fatal liquor
Purganax.
                     There,
Give it to me. I have been used to handle
All sorts of poisons. His dread Majesty
Only desires to see the colour of it.
Mammon.
Now, with a little common sense, my Lords,
Only undoing all that has been done
(Yet so as it may seem we but confirm it),
Our victory is assured. We must entice
Her Majesty from the sty, and make the Pigs
Believe that the contents of the GREEN BAG
Are the true test of guilt or innocence.
And that, if she be guilty, 'twill transform her
To manifest deformity like guilt.
If innocent, she will become transfigured
Into an angel, such as they say she is;
And they will see her flying through the air,
So bright that she will dim the noonday sun;
Showering down blessings in the shape of comfits.
This, trust a priest, is just the sort of thing
Swine will believe. I'll wager you will see them
Climbing upon the thatch of their low sties,
With pieces of smoked glass, to watch her sail
Among the clouds, and some will hold the flaps
Of one another's ears between their teeth,
To catch the coming hail of comfits in.
You, Purganax, who have the gift o' the gab,
Make them a solemn speech to this effect:
I go to put in readiness the feast
Kept to the honour of our goddess Famine,
Where, for more glory, let the ceremony
Take place of the uglification of the Queen.
Dakry
(to Swellfoot).
I, as the keeper of your sacred conscience,
Humbly remind your Majesty that the care
Of your high office, as Man-milliner
To red Bellona, should not be deferred.
Purganax.
All part, in happier plight to meet again.
[Exeunt.
END OF THE FIRST ACT.

ACT II
Scene I.
The Public Sty. The Boars in full Assembly.
Enter Purganax.
Purganax.
Grant me your patience, Gentlemen and Boars,
Ye, by whose patience under public burthens
The glorious constitution of these sties
Subsists, and shall subsist. The Lean-Pig rates
Grow with the growing populace of Swine,
The taxes, that true source of Piggishness
(How can I find a more appropriate term
To include religion, morals, peace, and plenty,
And all that fit Boeotia as a nation
To teach the other nations how to live?),
Increase with Piggishness itself; and still
Does the revenue, that great spring of all
The patronage, and pensions, and by-payments,
Which free-born Pigs regard with jealous eyes,
Diminish, till at length, by glorious steps,
All the land's produce will be merged in taxes,
And the revenue will amount tonothing!
The failure of a foreign market for
Sausages, bristles, and blood-puddings,
And such home manufactures, is but partial;
And, that the population of the Pigs,
Instead of hog-wash, has been fed on straw
And water, is a fact which isyou know
That isit is a state-necessity
Temporary, of course. Those impious Pigs,
Who, by frequent squeaks, have dared impugn
The settled Swellfoot system, or to make
Irreverent mockery of the genuflexions
Inculcated by the arch-priest, have been whipped
Into a loyal and an orthodox whine.
Things being in this happy state, the Queen
Iona
[A loud cry from the Pigs.
   She is innocent! most innocent!
   Purganax.
That is the very thing that I was saying,
Gentlemen Swine; the Queen Iona being
Most innocent, no doubt, returns to Thebes,
And the lean Sows and Boars collect about her,
Wishing to make her think that we believe
(I mean those more substantial Pigs, who swill
Rich hog-wash, while the others mouth damp straw)
That she is guilty; thus, the Lean-Pig faction
Seeks to obtain that hog-wash, which has been
Your immemorial right, and which I will
Maintain you in to the last drop of
A Boar
(interrupting him).
                    What
Does any one accuse her of?
Purganax.
               Why, no one
Makes any positive accusation;but
There were hints dropped, and so the privy wizards
Conceived that it became them to advise
His Majesty to investigate their truth;
Not for his own sake; he could be content
To let his wife play any pranks she pleased,
If, by that sufferance, he could please the Pigs;
But then he fears the morals of the Swine,
The Sows especially, and what effect
It might produce upon the purity and
Religion of the rising generation
Of Sucking-Pigs, if it could be suspected
That Queen Iona
[A pause.
First Boar.
         Well, go on; we long
To hear what she can possibly have done.
Purganax.
Why, it is hinted, that a certain Bull
Thus much is known:the milk-white Bulls that feed
Beside Clitumnus and the crystal lakes
Of the Cisalpine mountains, in fresh dews
Of lotus-grass and blossoming asphodel
Sleeking their silken hair, and with sweet breath
Loading the morning winds until they faint
With living fragrance, are so beautiful!
Well, I say nothing;but Europa rode
On such a one from Asia into Crete,
And the enamoured sea grew calm beneath
His gliding beauty. And Pasiphae,
Iona's grandmother,but she is innocent!
And that both you and I, and all assert.
First Boar.
Most innocent!
Purganax.
       Behold this BAG; a bag
       Second Boar.
Oh! no GREEN BAGS!! Jealousy's eyes are green,
Scorpions are green, and water-snakes, and efts,
And verdigris, and
Purganax.
           Honourable Swine,
In Piggish souls can prepossessions reign?
Allow me to remind you, grass is green
All flesh is grass;no bacon but is flesh
Ye are but bacon. This divining BAG
(Which is not green, but only bacon colour)
Is filled with liquor, which if sprinkled o'er
A woman guilty ofwe all know what
Makes her so hideous, till she finds one blind
She never can commit the like again.
If innocent, she will turn into an angel,
And rain down blessings in the shape of comfits
As she flies up to heaven. Now, my proposal
Is to convert her sacred Majesty
Into an angel (as I am sure we shall do),
By pouring on her head this mystic water.[Showing the Bag.

I know that she is innocent; I wish
Only to prove her so to all the world.
First Boar.
Excellent, just, and noble Purganax.
Second Boar.
How glorious it will be to see her Majesty
Flying above our heads, her petticoats
Streaming likelikelike
Third Boar.
               Anything.
               Purganax.
                    Oh no!
But like a standard of an admiral's ship,
Or like the banner of a conquering host,
Or like a cloud dyed in the dying day,
Unravelled on the blast from a white mountain;
Or like a meteor, or a war-steed's mane,
Or waterfall from a dizzy precipice
Scattered upon the wind.
First Boar.
             Or a cow's tail.
             Second Boar.
Or anything, as the learned Boar observed.
Purganax.
Gentlemen Boars, I move a resolution,
That her most sacred Majesty should be
Invited to attend the feast of Famine,
And to receive upon her chaste white body
Dews of Apotheosis from this BAG.
[A great confusion is heard of the Pigs out of Doors, which communicates itself to those within. During the first Strophe, the doors of the Sty are staved in, and a number of exceedingly leanPigs and Sows and Boars rush in.
Semichorus I.
No! Yes!
Semichorus II.
Yes! No!
Semichorus I.
A law!
Semichorus II.
A flaw!
Semichorus I.
Porkers, we shall lose our wash,
Or must share it with the Lean-Pigs!
First Boar.
Order! order! be not rash!
Was there ever such a scene, Pigs!
An old Sow
(rushing in).
I never saw so fine a dash
Since I first began to wean Pigs.
Second Boar
(solemnly).
The Queen will be an angel time enough.
I vote, in form of an amendment, that
Purganax rub a little of that stuff
Upon his face.
Purganax
(his heart is seen to beat through his waistcoat).
         Gods! What would ye be at?
         Semichorus I.
Purganax has plainly shown a
Cloven foot and jackdaw feather.
Semichorus II.
I vote Swellfoot and Iona
Try the magic test together;
Whenever royal spouses bicker,
Both should try the magic liquor.
An old Boar
(aside).
A miserable state is that of Pigs,
For if their drivers would tear caps and wigs,
The Swine must bite each other's ear therefore.
An old Sow
(aside).
A wretched lot Jove has assigned to Swine,
Squabbling makes Pig-herds hungry, and they dine
On bacon, and whip Sucking-Pigs the more.
Chorus.
  Hog-wash has been ta'en away:
   If the Bull-Queen is divested,
  We shall be in every way
   Hunted, stripped, exposed, molested;
  Let us do whate'er we may,
   That she shall not be arrested.
Queen, we entrench you with walls of brawn,
And palisades of tusks, sharp as a bayonet:
Place your most sacred person here. We pawn
Our lives that none a finger dare to lay on it.
  Those who wrong you, wrong us;
  Those who hate you, hate us;
  Those who sting you, sting us;
  Those who bait you, bait us;
The oracle is now about to be
Fulfilled by circumvolving destiny;
Which says: 'Thebes, choose reform or civil war,
When through your streets, instead of hare with dogs,
A Consort Queen shall hunt a King with Hogs,
Riding upon the IONIAN MINOTAUR.'
Enter Iona Taurina.
Iona Taurina
(coming forward).
Gentlemen Swine, and gentle Lady-Pigs,
The tender heart of every Boar acquits
Their Queen, of any act incongruous
With native Piggishness, and she, reposing
With confidence upon the grunting nation,
Has thrown herself, her cause, her life, her all,
Her innocence, into their Hoggish arms;
Nor has the expectation been deceived
Of finding shelter there. Yet know, great Boars,
(For such whoever lives among you finds you,
And so do I), the innocent are proud!
I have accepted your protection only
In compliment of your kind love and care,
Not for necessity. The innocent
Are safest there where trials and dangers wait;
Innocent Queens o'er white-hot ploughshares tread
Unsinged, and ladies, Erin's laureate sings it[5],
Decked with rare gems, and beauty rarer still,
Walked from Killarney to the Giant's Causeway,
Through rebels, smugglers, troops of yeomanry,
White-boys and Orange-boys, and constables,
Tithe-proctors, and excise people, uninjured!
Thus I!
Lord Purganax, I do commit myself
Into your custody, and am prepared
To stand the test, whatever it may be!
Purganax.
This magnanimity in your sacred Majesty
Must please the Pigs. You cannot fail of being
A heavenly angel. Smoke your bits of glass,
Ye loyal Swine, or her transfiguration
Will blind your wondering eyes.
An old Boar
(aside).
                 Take care, my Lord,
They do not smoke you first.
Purganax.
               At the approaching feast
Of Famine, let the expiation be.
Swine.
Content! content!
Iona Taurina
(aside).
         I, most content of all,
Know that my foes even thus prepare their fall!
[Exeunt omnes.
Scene II.
The interior of the Temple of Famine. The statue of the Goddess, a skeleton clothed in parti-coloured rags, seated upon a heap of skulls and loaves intermingled. A number of exceedingly fat Priests in black garments arrayed on each side, with marrow-bones and cleavers in their hands. [Solomon, the Court Porkman.] A flourish of trumpets.
Enter Mammon as arch-priest, Swellfoot, Dakry, Purganax, Laoctonos, followed by Iona Taurina guarded. On the other side enter the Swine.
Chorus of Priests, accompanied by the Court Porkman on marrow-bones and cleavers.
  Goddess bare, and gaunt, and pale,
  Empress of the world, all hail!
  What though Cretans old called thee
  City-crested Cybele?
   We call thee Famine!
Goddess of fasts and feasts, starving and cramming!
Through thee, for emperors, kings, and priests and lords,
Who rule by viziers, sceptres, bank-notes, words,
The earth pours forth its plenteous fruits,
Corn, wool, linen, flesh, and roots
Those who consume these fruits through thee grow fat,
Those who produce these fruits through thee grow lean,
Whatever change takes place, oh, stick to that!
And let things be as they have ever been;
  At least while we remain thy priests,
  And proclaim thy fasts and feasts.
Through thee the sacred Swellfoot dynasty
Is based upon a rock amid that sea
Whose waves are Swineso let it ever be!
[Swellfoot, etc., seat themselves at a table magnificently covered at the upper end of the Temple. Attendants pass over the stage with hog-wash in pails. A number of Pigs, exceedingly lean, follow them licking up the wash.
Mammon.
I fear your sacred Majesty has lost
The appetite which you were used to have.
Allow me now to recommend this dish
A simple kickshaw by your Persian cook,
Such as is served at the great King's second table.
The price and pains which its ingredients cost
Might have maintained some dozen families
A winter or twonot moreso plain a dish
Could scarcely disagree.
Swellfoot.
              After the trial,
And these fastidious Pigs are gone, perhaps
I may recover my lost appetite,
I feel the gout flying about my stomach
Give me a glass of Maraschino punch.
Purganax
(filling his glass, and standing up).
The glorious Constitution of the Pigs!
All.
A toast! a toast! stand up, and three times three!
Dakry.
No heel-tapsdarken daylights!
Laoctonos.
                  Claret, somehow,
Puts me in mind of blood, and blood of claret!
Swellfoot.
Laoctonos is fishing for a compliment,
But 'tis his due. Yes, you have drunk more wine,
And shed more blood, than any man in Thebes. [To Purganax.

For God's sake stop the grunting of those Pigs!
Purganax.
We dare not, Sire, 'tis Famine's privilege.
Chorus of Swine.
Hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine!
Thy throne is on blood, and thy robe is of rags;
Thou devil which livest on damning;
Saint of new churches, and cant, and GREEN BAGS,
Till in pity and terror thou risest,
Confounding the schemes of the wisest;
When thou liftest thy skeleton form,
When the loaves and the skulls roll about,
We will greet theethe voice of a storm
Would be lost in our terrible shout!
Then hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine!
Hail to thee, Empress of Earth!
When thou risest, dividing possessions;
When thou risest, uprooting oppressions,
In the pride of thy ghastly mirth;
Over palaces, temples, and graves,
We will rush as thy minister-slaves,
Trampling behind in thy train,
Till all be made level again!
Mammon.
I hear a crackling of the giant bones
Of the dread image, and in the black pits
Which once were eyes, I see two livid flames.
These prodigies are oracular, and show
The presence of the unseen Deity.
Mighty events are hastening to their doom!
Swellfoot.
I only hear the lean and mutinous Swine
Grunting about the temple.
Dakry.
              In a crisis
Of such exceeding delicacy, I think
We ought to put her Majesty, the Queen,
Upon her trial without delay.
Mammon.
                THE BAG
Is here.
Purganax.
    I have rehearsed the entire scene
With an ox-bladder and some ditchwater,
On Lady P-; it cannot fail. (Taking up the Bag.)
Your Majesty [To Swellfoot.

In such a filthy business had better
Stand on one side, lest it should sprinkle you.
A spot or two on me would do no harm,
Nay, it might hide the blood, which the sad Genius
Of the Green Isle has fixed, as by a spell,
Upon my browwhich would stain all its seas,
But which those seas could never wash away!
Iona Taurina.
My Lord, I am readynay, I am impatient
To undergo the test.
[A graceful figure in a semi-transparent veil passes unnoticed through the Temple; the word LIBERTY is seen through the veil, as if it were written in fire upon its forehead. Its words are almost drowned in the furious grunting of the Pigs, and the business of the trial. She kneels on the steps of the Altar, and speaks in tones at first faint and low, but which ever become louder and louder.
  Mighty Empress! Death's white wife!
  Ghastly mother-in-law of Life!
  By the God who made thee such,
  By the magic of thy touch,
  By the starving and the cramming
Of fasts and feasts! by thy dread self, O Famine!
I charge thee! when thou wake the multitude,
Thou lead them not upon the paths of blood.
The earth did never mean her foison
For those who crown life's cup with poison
Of fanatic rage and meaningless revenge
But for those radiant spirits, who are still
The standard-bearers in the van of Change.
Be they th'appointed stewards, to fill
The lap of Pain, and Toil, and Age!
Remit, O Queen! thy accustomed rage!
Be what thou art not! In voice faint and low
Freedom calls Famine,her eternal foe,
To brief alliance, hollow truce.Rise now!
[Whilst the Veiled Figure has been chanting this strophe, Mammon, Dakry, Laoctonos, and Swellfoot, have surrounded Iona Taurina, who, with her hands folded on her breast, and her eyes lifted to Heaven, stands, as with saint-like resignation, to wait the issue of the business, in perfect confidence of her innocence.
[Purganax, after unsealing the Green Bag, is gravely about to pour the liquor upon her head, when suddenly the whole expression of her figure and countenance changes; she snatches it from his hand with a loud laugh of triumph, and empties it over Swellfoot and his whole Court, who are instantly changed into a number of filthy and ugly animals, and rush out of the Temple. The image of Famine then arises with a tremendous sound, the Pigs begin scrambling for the loaves, and are tripped up by the skulls; all those who eat the loaves are turned into Bulls, and arrange themselves quietly behind the altar. The image of Famine sinks through a chasm in the earth, and a Minotaur rises.
Minotaur.
I am the Ionian Minotaur, the mightiest
Of all Europa's taurine progeny
I am the old traditional Man-Bull;
And from my ancestors having been Ionian,
I am called Ion, which, by interpretation,
Is John; in plain Theban, that is to say,
My name's John Bull; I am a famous hunter,
And can leap any gate in all Boeotia,
Even the palings of the royal park,
Or double ditch about the new enclosures;
And if your Majesty will deign to mount me,
At least till you have hunted down your game,
I will not throw you.
Iona Taurina.
(During this speech she has been putting on boots and spurs, and a hunting-cap, buckishly cocked on one side, and tucking up her hair, she leaps nimbly on his back.)
           Hoa! hoa! tallyho! tallyho! ho! ho!
Come, let us hunt these ugly badgers down,
These stinking foxes, these devouring otters,
These hares, these wolves, these anything but men.
Hey, for a whipper-in! my loyal Pigs,
Now let your noses be as keen as beagles',
Your steps as swift as greyhounds', and your cries
More dulcet and symphonious than the bells
Of village-towers, on sunshine holiday;
Wake all the dewy woods with jangling music.
Give them no law (are they not beasts of blood?)
But such as they gave you. Tallyho! ho!
Through forest, furze, and bog, and den, and desert,
Pursue the ugly beasts! tallyho! ho!
Full Chorus of Iona and the Swine.
Tallyho! tallyho!
Through rain, hail, and snow,
Through brake, gorse, and briar,
Through fen, flood, and mire,
We go! we go!
  Tallyho! tallyho!
Through pond, ditch, and slough,
Wind them, and find them,
Like the Devil behind them,
Tallyho! tallyho!
[Exeunt, in full cry; Iona driving on the Swine, with the empty Green Bag.
THE END
'Begun at the Baths of San Giuliano, near Pisa, August 24, 1819; published anonymously by J. Johnston, Cheapside (imprint C. F. Seyfang,) 1820. On a threat of prosecution the publisher surrendered the whole impression, seven copies -- the total number sold -- excepted. Oedipus does not appear in the first edition of the Poetical Works, 1839, but it was included by Mrs. Shelley in the second edition of that year.' ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley, Oedipus Tyrannus or Swellfoot The Tyrant
,
198:Gareth And Lynette
The last tall son of Lot and Bellicent,
And tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring
Stared at the spate. A slender-shafted Pine
Lost footing, fell, and so was whirled away.
'How he went down,' said Gareth, 'as a false knight
Or evil king before my lance if lance
Were mine to use--O senseless cataract,
Bearing all down in thy precipitancy-And yet thou art but swollen with cold snows
And mine is living blood: thou dost His will,
The Maker's, and not knowest, and I that know,
Have strength and wit, in my good mother's hall
Linger with vacillating obedience,
Prisoned, and kept and coaxed and whistled to-Since the good mother holds me still a child!
Good mother is bad mother unto me!
A worse were better; yet no worse would I.
Heaven yield her for it, but in me put force
To weary her ears with one continuous prayer,
Until she let me fly discaged to sweep
In ever-highering eagle-circles up
To the great Sun of Glory, and thence swoop
Down upon all things base, and dash them dead,
A knight of Arthur, working out his will,
To cleanse the world. Why, Gawain, when he came
With Modred hither in the summertime,
Asked me to tilt with him, the proven knight.
Modred for want of worthier was the judge.
Then I so shook him in the saddle, he said,
"Thou hast half prevailed against me," said so--he-Though Modred biting his thin lips was mute,
For he is alway sullen: what care I?'
And Gareth went, and hovering round her chair
Asked, 'Mother, though ye count me still the child,
Sweet mother, do ye love the child?' She laughed,
'Thou art but a wild-goose to question it.'
'Then, mother, an ye love the child,' he said,
'Being a goose and rather tame than wild,
107
Hear the child's story.' 'Yea, my well-beloved,
An 'twere but of the goose and golden eggs.'
And Gareth answered her with kindling eyes,
'Nay, nay, good mother, but this egg of mine
Was finer gold than any goose can lay;
For this an Eagle, a royal Eagle, laid
Almost beyond eye-reach, on such a palm
As glitters gilded in thy Book of Hours.
And there was ever haunting round the palm
A lusty youth, but poor, who often saw
The splendour sparkling from aloft, and thought
"An I could climb and lay my hand upon it,
Then were I wealthier than a leash of kings."
But ever when he reached a hand to climb,
One, that had loved him from his childhood, caught
And stayed him, "Climb not lest thou break thy neck,
I charge thee by my love," and so the boy,
Sweet mother, neither clomb, nor brake his neck,
But brake his very heart in pining for it,
And past away.'
To whom the mother said,
'True love, sweet son, had risked himself and climbed,
And handed down the golden treasure to him.'
And Gareth answered her with kindling eyes,
'Gold?' said I gold?--ay then, why he, or she,
Or whosoe'er it was, or half the world
Had ventured--HAD the thing I spake of been
Mere gold--but this was all of that true steel,
Whereof they forged the brand Excalibur,
And lightnings played about it in the storm,
And all the little fowl were flurried at it,
And there were cries and clashings in the nest,
That sent him from his senses: let me go.'
Then Bellicent bemoaned herself and said,
'Hast thou no pity upon my loneliness?
Lo, where thy father Lot beside the hearth
Lies like a log, and all but smouldered out!
For ever since when traitor to the King
108
He fought against him in the Barons' war,
And Arthur gave him back his territory,
His age hath slowly droopt, and now lies there
A yet-warm corpse, and yet unburiable,
No more; nor sees, nor hears, nor speaks, nor knows.
And both thy brethren are in Arthur's hall,
Albeit neither loved with that full love
I feel for thee, nor worthy such a love:
Stay therefore thou; red berries charm the bird,
And thee, mine innocent, the jousts, the wars,
Who never knewest finger-ache, nor pang
Of wrenched or broken limb--an often chance
In those brain-stunning shocks, and tourney-falls,
Frights to my heart; but stay: follow the deer
By these tall firs and our fast-falling burns;
So make thy manhood mightier day by day;
Sweet is the chase: and I will seek thee out
Some comfortable bride and fair, to grace
Thy climbing life, and cherish my prone year,
Till falling into Lot's forgetfulness
I know not thee, myself, nor anything.
Stay, my best son! ye are yet more boy than man.'
Then Gareth, 'An ye hold me yet for child,
Hear yet once more the story of the child.
For, mother, there was once a King, like ours.
The prince his heir, when tall and marriageable,
Asked for a bride; and thereupon the King
Set two before him. One was fair, strong, armed-But to be won by force--and many men
Desired her; one good lack, no man desired.
And these were the conditions of the King:
That save he won the first by force, he needs
Must wed that other, whom no man desired,
A red-faced bride who knew herself so vile,
That evermore she longed to hide herself,
Nor fronted man or woman, eye to eye-Yea--some she cleaved to, but they died of her.
And one--they called her Fame; and one,--O Mother,
How can ye keep me tethered to you--Shame.
Man am I grown, a man's work must I do.
Follow the deer? follow the Christ, the King,
109
Live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the King-Else, wherefore born?'
To whom the mother said
'Sweet son, for there be many who deem him not,
Or will not deem him, wholly proven King-Albeit in mine own heart I knew him King,
When I was frequent with him in my youth,
And heard him Kingly speak, and doubted him
No more than he, himself; but felt him mine,
Of closest kin to me: yet--wilt thou leave
Thine easeful biding here, and risk thine all,
Life, limbs, for one that is not proven King?
Stay, till the cloud that settles round his birth
Hath lifted but a little. Stay, sweet son.'
And Gareth answered quickly, 'Not an hour,
So that ye yield me--I will walk through fire,
Mother, to gain it--your full leave to go.
Not proven, who swept the dust of ruined Rome
From off the threshold of the realm, and crushed
The Idolaters, and made the people free?
Who should be King save him who makes us free?'
So when the Queen, who long had sought in vain
To break him from the intent to which he grew,
Found her son's will unwaveringly one,
She answered craftily, 'Will ye walk through fire?
Who walks through fire will hardly heed the smoke.
Ay, go then, an ye must: only one proof,
Before thou ask the King to make thee knight,
Of thine obedience and thy love to me,
Thy mother,--I demand.
And Gareth cried,
'A hard one, or a hundred, so I go.
Nay--quick! the proof to prove me to the quick!'
But slowly spake the mother looking at him,
'Prince, thou shalt go disguised to Arthur's hall,
And hire thyself to serve for meats and drinks
Among the scullions and the kitchen-knaves,
110
And those that hand the dish across the bar.
Nor shalt thou tell thy name to anyone.
And thou shalt serve a twelvemonth and a day.'
For so the Queen believed that when her son
Beheld his only way to glory lead
Low down through villain kitchen-vassalage,
Her own true Gareth was too princely-proud
To pass thereby; so should he rest with her,
Closed in her castle from the sound of arms.
Silent awhile was Gareth, then replied,
'The thrall in person may be free in soul,
And I shall see the jousts. Thy son am I,
And since thou art my mother, must obey.
I therefore yield me freely to thy will;
For hence will I, disguised, and hire myself
To serve with scullions and with kitchen-knaves;
Nor tell my name to any--no, not the King.'
Gareth awhile lingered. The mother's eye
Full of the wistful fear that he would go,
And turning toward him wheresoe'er he turned,
Perplext his outward purpose, till an hour,
When wakened by the wind which with full voice
Swept bellowing through the darkness on to dawn,
He rose, and out of slumber calling two
That still had tended on him from his birth,
Before the wakeful mother heard him, went.
The three were clad like tillers of the soil.
Southward they set their faces. The birds made
Melody on branch, and melody in mid air.
The damp hill-slopes were quickened into green,
And the live green had kindled into flowers,
For it was past the time of Easterday.
So, when their feet were planted on the plain
That broadened toward the base of Camelot,
Far off they saw the silver-misty morn
Rolling her smoke about the Royal mount,
That rose between the forest and the field.
111
At times the summit of the high city flashed;
At times the spires and turrets half-way down
Pricked through the mist; at times the great gate shone
Only, that opened on the field below:
Anon, the whole fair city had disappeared.
Then those who went with Gareth were amazed,
One crying, 'Let us go no further, lord.
Here is a city of Enchanters, built
By fairy Kings.' The second echoed him,
'Lord, we have heard from our wise man at home
To Northward, that this King is not the King,
But only changeling out of Fairyland,
Who drave the heathen hence by sorcery
And Merlin's glamour.' Then the first again,
'Lord, there is no such city anywhere,
But all a vision.'
Gareth answered them
With laughter, swearing he had glamour enow
In his own blood, his princedom, youth and hopes,
To plunge old Merlin in the Arabian sea;
So pushed them all unwilling toward the gate.
And there was no gate like it under heaven.
For barefoot on the keystone, which was lined
And rippled like an ever-fleeting wave,
The Lady of the Lake stood: all her dress
Wept from her sides as water flowing away;
But like the cross her great and goodly arms
Stretched under the cornice and upheld:
And drops of water fell from either hand;
And down from one a sword was hung, from one
A censer, either worn with wind and storm;
And o'er her breast floated the sacred fish;
And in the space to left of her, and right,
Were Arthur's wars in weird devices done,
New things and old co-twisted, as if Time
Were nothing, so inveterately, that men
Were giddy gazing there; and over all
High on the top were those three Queens, the friends
Of Arthur, who should help him at his need.
112
Then those with Gareth for so long a space
Stared at the figures, that at last it seemed
The dragon-boughts and elvish emblemings
Began to move, seethe, twine and curl: they called
To Gareth, 'Lord, the gateway is alive.'
And Gareth likewise on them fixt his eyes
So long, that even to him they seemed to move.
Out of the city a blast of music pealed.
Back from the gate started the three, to whom
From out thereunder came an ancient man,
Long-bearded, saying, 'Who be ye, my sons?'
Then Gareth, 'We be tillers of the soil,
Who leaving share in furrow come to see
The glories of our King: but these, my men,
(Your city moved so weirdly in the mist)
Doubt if the King be King at all, or come
From Fairyland; and whether this be built
By magic, and by fairy Kings and Queens;
Or whether there be any city at all,
Or all a vision: and this music now
Hath scared them both, but tell thou these the truth.'
Then that old Seer made answer playing on him
And saying, 'Son, I have seen the good ship sail
Keel upward, and mast downward, in the heavens,
And solid turrets topsy-turvy in air:
And here is truth; but an it please thee not,
Take thou the truth as thou hast told it me.
For truly as thou sayest, a Fairy King
And Fairy Queens have built the city, son;
They came from out a sacred mountain-cleft
Toward the sunrise, each with harp in hand,
And built it to the music of their harps.
And, as thou sayest, it is enchanted, son,
For there is nothing in it as it seems
Saving the King; though some there be that hold
The King a shadow, and the city real:
Yet take thou heed of him, for, so thou pass
Beneath this archway, then wilt thou become
A thrall to his enchantments, for the King
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Will bind thee by such vows, as is a shame
A man should not be bound by, yet the which
No man can keep; but, so thou dread to swear,
Pass not beneath this gateway, but abide
Without, among the cattle of the field.
For an ye heard a music, like enow
They are building still, seeing the city is built
To music, therefore never built at all,
And therefore built for ever.'
Gareth spake
Angered, 'Old master, reverence thine own beard
That looks as white as utter truth, and seems
Wellnigh as long as thou art statured tall!
Why mockest thou the stranger that hath been
To thee fair-spoken?'
But the Seer replied,
'Know ye not then the Riddling of the Bards?
"Confusion, and illusion, and relation,
Elusion, and occasion, and evasion"?
I mock thee not but as thou mockest me,
And all that see thee, for thou art not who
Thou seemest, but I know thee who thou art.
And now thou goest up to mock the King,
Who cannot brook the shadow of any lie.'
Unmockingly the mocker ending here
Turned to the right, and past along the plain;
Whom Gareth looking after said, 'My men,
Our one white lie sits like a little ghost
Here on the threshold of our enterprise.
Let love be blamed for it, not she, nor I:
Well, we will make amends.'
With all good cheer
He spake and laughed, then entered with his twain
Camelot, a city of shadowy palaces
And stately, rich in emblem and the work
Of ancient kings who did their days in stone;
Which Merlin's hand, the Mage at Arthur's court,
Knowing all arts, had touched, and everywhere
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At Arthur's ordinance, tipt with lessening peak
And pinnacle, and had made it spire to heaven.
And ever and anon a knight would pass
Outward, or inward to the hall: his arms
Clashed; and the sound was good to Gareth's ear.
And out of bower and casement shyly glanced
Eyes of pure women, wholesome stars of love;
And all about a healthful people stept
As in the presence of a gracious king.
Then into hall Gareth ascending heard
A voice, the voice of Arthur, and beheld
Far over heads in that long-vaulted hall
The splendour of the presence of the King
Throned, and delivering doom--and looked no more-But felt his young heart hammering in his ears,
And thought, 'For this half-shadow of a lie
The truthful King will doom me when I speak.'
Yet pressing on, though all in fear to find
Sir Gawain or Sir Modred, saw nor one
Nor other, but in all the listening eyes
Of those tall knights, that ranged about the throne,
Clear honour shining like the dewy star
Of dawn, and faith in their great King, with pure
Affection, and the light of victory,
And glory gained, and evermore to gain.
Then came a widow crying to the King,
'A boon, Sir King! Thy father, Uther, reft
From my dead lord a field with violence:
For howsoe'er at first he proffered gold,
Yet, for the field was pleasant in our eyes,
We yielded not; and then he reft us of it
Perforce, and left us neither gold nor field.'
Said Arthur, 'Whether would ye? gold or field?'
To whom the woman weeping, 'Nay, my lord,
The field was pleasant in my husband's eye.'
And Arthur, 'Have thy pleasant field again,
And thrice the gold for Uther's use thereof,
According to the years. No boon is here,
But justice, so thy say be proven true.
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Accursed, who from the wrongs his father did
Would shape himself a right!'
And while she past,
Came yet another widow crying to him,
'A boon, Sir King! Thine enemy, King, am I.
With thine own hand thou slewest my dear lord,
A knight of Uther in the Barons' war,
When Lot and many another rose and fought
Against thee, saying thou wert basely born.
I held with these, and loathe to ask thee aught.
Yet lo! my husband's brother had my son
Thralled in his castle, and hath starved him dead;
And standeth seized of that inheritance
Which thou that slewest the sire hast left the son.
So though I scarce can ask it thee for hate,
Grant me some knight to do the battle for me,
Kill the foul thief, and wreak me for my son.'
Then strode a good knight forward, crying to him,
'A boon, Sir King! I am her kinsman, I.
Give me to right her wrong, and slay the man.'
Then came Sir Kay, the seneschal, and cried,
'A boon, Sir King! even that thou grant her none,
This railer, that hath mocked thee in full hall-None; or the wholesome boon of gyve and gag.'
But Arthur, 'We sit King, to help the wronged
Through all our realm. The woman loves her lord.
Peace to thee, woman, with thy loves and hates!
The kings of old had doomed thee to the flames,
Aurelius Emrys would have scourged thee dead,
And Uther slit thy tongue: but get thee hence-Lest that rough humour of the kings of old
Return upon me! Thou that art her kin,
Go likewise; lay him low and slay him not,
But bring him here, that I may judge the right,
According to the justice of the King:
Then, be he guilty, by that deathless King
Who lived and died for men, the man shall die.'
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Then came in hall the messenger of Mark,
A name of evil savour in the land,
The Cornish king. In either hand he bore
What dazzled all, and shone far-off as shines
A field of charlock in the sudden sun
Between two showers, a cloth of palest gold,
Which down he laid before the throne, and knelt,
Delivering, that his lord, the vassal king,
Was even upon his way to Camelot;
For having heard that Arthur of his grace
Had made his goodly cousin, Tristram, knight,
And, for himself was of the greater state,
Being a king, he trusted his liege-lord
Would yield him this large honour all the more;
So prayed him well to accept this cloth of gold,
In token of true heart and felty.
Then Arthur cried to rend the cloth, to rend
In pieces, and so cast it on the hearth.
An oak-tree smouldered there. 'The goodly knight!
What! shall the shield of Mark stand among these?'
For, midway down the side of that long hall
A stately pile,--whereof along the front,
Some blazoned, some but carven, and some blank,
There ran a treble range of stony shields,-Rose, and high-arching overbrowed the hearth.
And under every shield a knight was named:
For this was Arthur's custom in his hall;
When some good knight had done one noble deed,
His arms were carven only; but if twain
His arms were blazoned also; but if none,
The shield was blank and bare without a sign
Saving the name beneath; and Gareth saw
The shield of Gawain blazoned rich and bright,
And Modred's blank as death; and Arthur cried
To rend the cloth and cast it on the hearth.
'More like are we to reave him of his crown
Than make him knight because men call him king.
The kings we found, ye know we stayed their hands
From war among themselves, but left them kings;
Of whom were any bounteous, merciful,
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Truth-speaking, brave, good livers, them we enrolled
Among us, and they sit within our hall.
But as Mark hath tarnished the great name of king,
As Mark would sully the low state of churl:
And, seeing he hath sent us cloth of gold,
Return, and meet, and hold him from our eyes,
Lest we should lap him up in cloth of lead,
Silenced for ever--craven--a man of plots,
Craft, poisonous counsels, wayside ambushings-No fault of thine: let Kay the seneschal
Look to thy wants, and send thee satisfied-Accursed, who strikes nor lets the hand be seen!'
And many another suppliant crying came
With noise of ravage wrought by beast and man,
And evermore a knight would ride away.
Last, Gareth leaning both hands heavily
Down on the shoulders of the twain, his men,
Approached between them toward the King, and asked,
'A boon, Sir King (his voice was all ashamed),
For see ye not how weak and hungerworn
I seem--leaning on these? grant me to serve
For meat and drink among thy kitchen-knaves
A twelvemonth and a day, nor seek my name.
Hereafter I will fight.'
To him the King,
'A goodly youth and worth a goodlier boon!
But so thou wilt no goodlier, then must Kay,
The master of the meats and drinks, be thine.'
He rose and past; then Kay, a man of mien
Wan-sallow as the plant that feels itself
Root-bitten by white lichen,
'Lo ye now!
This fellow hath broken from some Abbey, where,
God wot, he had not beef and brewis enow,
However that might chance! but an he work,
Like any pigeon will I cram his crop,
And sleeker shall he shine than any hog.'
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Then Lancelot standing near, 'Sir Seneschal,
Sleuth-hound thou knowest, and gray, and all the hounds;
A horse thou knowest, a man thou dost not know:
Broad brows and fair, a fluent hair and fine,
High nose, a nostril large and fine, and hands
Large, fair and fine!--Some young lad's mystery-But, or from sheepcot or king's hall, the boy
Is noble-natured. Treat him with all grace,
Lest he should come to shame thy judging of him.'
Then Kay, 'What murmurest thou of mystery?
Think ye this fellow will poison the King's dish?
Nay, for he spake too fool-like: mystery!
Tut, an the lad were noble, he had asked
For horse and armour: fair and fine, forsooth!
Sir Fine-face, Sir Fair-hands? but see thou to it
That thine own fineness, Lancelot, some fine day
Undo thee not--and leave my man to me.'
So Gareth all for glory underwent
The sooty yoke of kitchen-vassalage;
Ate with young lads his portion by the door,
And couched at night with grimy kitchen-knaves.
And Lancelot ever spake him pleasantly,
But Kay the seneschal, who loved him not,
Would hustle and harry him, and labour him
Beyond his comrade of the hearth, and set
To turn the broach, draw water, or hew wood,
Or grosser tasks; and Gareth bowed himself
With all obedience to the King, and wrought
All kind of service with a noble ease
That graced the lowliest act in doing it.
And when the thralls had talk among themselves,
And one would praise the love that linkt the King
And Lancelot--how the King had saved his life
In battle twice, and Lancelot once the King's-For Lancelot was the first in Tournament,
But Arthur mightiest on the battle-field-Gareth was glad. Or if some other told,
How once the wandering forester at dawn,
Far over the blue tarns and hazy seas,
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On Caer-Eryri's highest found the King,
A naked babe, of whom the Prophet spake,
'He passes to the Isle Avilion,
He passes and is healed and cannot die'-Gareth was glad. But if their talk were foul,
Then would he whistle rapid as any lark,
Or carol some old roundelay, and so loud
That first they mocked, but, after, reverenced him.
Or Gareth telling some prodigious tale
Of knights, who sliced a red life-bubbling way
Through twenty folds of twisted dragon, held
All in a gap-mouthed circle his good mates
Lying or sitting round him, idle hands,
Charmed; till Sir Kay, the seneschal, would come
Blustering upon them, like a sudden wind
Among dead leaves, and drive them all apart.
Or when the thralls had sport among themselves,
So there were any trial of mastery,
He, by two yards in casting bar or stone
Was counted best; and if there chanced a joust,
So that Sir Kay nodded him leave to go,
Would hurry thither, and when he saw the knights
Clash like the coming and retiring wave,
And the spear spring, and good horse reel, the boy
Was half beyond himself for ecstasy.
So for a month he wrought among the thralls;
But in the weeks that followed, the good Queen,
Repentant of the word she made him swear,
And saddening in her childless castle, sent,
Between the in-crescent and de-crescent moon,
Arms for her son, and loosed him from his vow.
This, Gareth hearing from a squire of Lot
With whom he used to play at tourney once,
When both were children, and in lonely haunts
Would scratch a ragged oval on the sand,
And each at either dash from either end-Shame never made girl redder than Gareth joy.
He laughed; he sprang. 'Out of the smoke, at once
I leap from Satan's foot to Peter's knee-These news be mine, none other's--nay, the King's--
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Descend into the city:' whereon he sought
The King alone, and found, and told him all.
'I have staggered thy strong Gawain in a tilt
For pastime; yea, he said it: joust can I.
Make me thy knight--in secret! let my name
Be hidden, and give me the first quest, I spring
Like flame from ashes.'
Here the King's calm eye
Fell on, and checked, and made him flush, and bow
Lowly, to kiss his hand, who answered him,
'Son, the good mother let me know thee here,
And sent her wish that I would yield thee thine.
Make thee my knight? my knights are sworn to vows
Of utter hardihood, utter gentleness,
And, loving, utter faithfulness in love,
And uttermost obedience to the King.'
Then Gareth, lightly springing from his knees,
'My King, for hardihood I can promise thee.
For uttermost obedience make demand
Of whom ye gave me to, the Seneschal,
No mellow master of the meats and drinks!
And as for love, God wot, I love not yet,
But love I shall, God willing.'
And the King
'Make thee my knight in secret? yea, but he,
Our noblest brother, and our truest man,
And one with me in all, he needs must know.'
'Let Lancelot know, my King, let Lancelot know,
Thy noblest and thy truest!'
And the King-'But wherefore would ye men should wonder at you?
Nay, rather for the sake of me, their King,
And the deed's sake my knighthood do the deed,
Than to be noised of.'
Merrily Gareth asked,
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'Have I not earned my cake in baking of it?
Let be my name until I make my name!
My deeds will speak: it is but for a day.'
So with a kindly hand on Gareth's arm
Smiled the great King, and half-unwillingly
Loving his lusty youthhood yielded to him.
Then, after summoning Lancelot privily,
'I have given him the first quest: he is not proven.
Look therefore when he calls for this in hall,
Thou get to horse and follow him far away.
Cover the lions on thy shield, and see
Far as thou mayest, he be nor ta'en nor slain.'
Then that same day there past into the hall
A damsel of high lineage, and a brow
May-blossom, and a cheek of apple-blossom,
Hawk-eyes; and lightly was her slender nose
Tip-tilted like the petal of a flower;
She into hall past with her page and cried,
'O King, for thou hast driven the foe without,
See to the foe within! bridge, ford, beset
By bandits, everyone that owns a tower
The Lord for half a league. Why sit ye there?
Rest would I not, Sir King, an I were king,
Till even the lonest hold were all as free
From cursd bloodshed, as thine altar-cloth
From that best blood it is a sin to spill.'
'Comfort thyself,' said Arthur. 'I nor mine
Rest: so my knighthood keep the vows they swore,
The wastest moorland of our realm shall be
Safe, damsel, as the centre of this hall.
What is thy name? thy need?'
'My name?' she said-'Lynette my name; noble; my need, a knight
To combat for my sister, Lyonors,
A lady of high lineage, of great lands,
And comely, yea, and comelier than myself.
She lives in Castle Perilous: a river
Runs in three loops about her living-place;
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And o'er it are three passings, and three knights
Defend the passings, brethren, and a fourth
And of that four the mightiest, holds her stayed
In her own castle, and so besieges her
To break her will, and make her wed with him:
And but delays his purport till thou send
To do the battle with him, thy chief man
Sir Lancelot whom he trusts to overthrow,
Then wed, with glory: but she will not wed
Save whom she loveth, or a holy life.
Now therefore have I come for Lancelot.'
Then Arthur mindful of Sir Gareth asked,
'Damsel, ye know this Order lives to crush
All wrongers of the Realm. But say, these four,
Who be they? What the fashion of the men?'
'They be of foolish fashion, O Sir King,
The fashion of that old knight-errantry
Who ride abroad, and do but what they will;
Courteous or bestial from the moment, such
As have nor law nor king; and three of these
Proud in their fantasy call themselves the Day,
Morning-Star, and Noon-Sun, and Evening-Star,
Being strong fools; and never a whit more wise
The fourth, who alway rideth armed in black,
A huge man-beast of boundless savagery.
He names himself the Night and oftener Death,
And wears a helmet mounted with a skull,
And bears a skeleton figured on his arms,
To show that who may slay or scape the three,
Slain by himself, shall enter endless night.
And all these four be fools, but mighty men,
And therefore am I come for Lancelot.'
Hereat Sir Gareth called from where he rose,
A head with kindling eyes above the throng,
'A boon, Sir King--this quest!' then--for he marked
Kay near him groaning like a wounded bull-'Yea, King, thou knowest thy kitchen-knave am I,
And mighty through thy meats and drinks am I,
And I can topple over a hundred such.
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Thy promise, King,' and Arthur glancing at him,
Brought down a momentary brow. 'Rough, sudden,
And pardonable, worthy to be knight-Go therefore,' and all hearers were amazed.
But on the damsel's forehead shame, pride, wrath
Slew the May-white: she lifted either arm,
'Fie on thee, King! I asked for thy chief knight,
And thou hast given me but a kitchen-knave.'
Then ere a man in hall could stay her, turned,
Fled down the lane of access to the King,
Took horse, descended the slope street, and past
The weird white gate, and paused without, beside
The field of tourney, murmuring 'kitchen-knave.'
Now two great entries opened from the hall,
At one end one, that gave upon a range
Of level pavement where the King would pace
At sunrise, gazing over plain and wood;
And down from this a lordly stairway sloped
Till lost in blowing trees and tops of towers;
And out by this main doorway past the King.
But one was counter to the hearth, and rose
High that the highest-crested helm could ride
Therethrough nor graze: and by this entry fled
The damsel in her wrath, and on to this
Sir Gareth strode, and saw without the door
King Arthur's gift, the worth of half a town,
A warhorse of the best, and near it stood
The two that out of north had followed him:
This bare a maiden shield, a casque; that held
The horse, the spear; whereat Sir Gareth loosed
A cloak that dropt from collar-bone to heel,
A cloth of roughest web, and cast it down,
And from it like a fuel-smothered fire,
That lookt half-dead, brake bright, and flashed as those
Dull-coated things, that making slide apart
Their dusk wing-cases, all beneath there burns
A jewelled harness, ere they pass and fly.
So Gareth ere he parted flashed in arms.
Then as he donned the helm, and took the shield
And mounted horse and graspt a spear, of grain
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Storm-strengthened on a windy site, and tipt
With trenchant steel, around him slowly prest
The people, while from out of kitchen came
The thralls in throng, and seeing who had worked
Lustier than any, and whom they could but love,
Mounted in arms, threw up their caps and cried,
'God bless the King, and all his fellowship!'
And on through lanes of shouting Gareth rode
Down the slope street, and past without the gate.
So Gareth past with joy; but as the cur
Pluckt from the cur he fights with, ere his cause
Be cooled by fighting, follows, being named,
His owner, but remembers all, and growls
Remembering, so Sir Kay beside the door
Muttered in scorn of Gareth whom he used
To harry and hustle.
'Bound upon a quest
With horse and arms--the King hath past his time-My scullion knave! Thralls to your work again,
For an your fire be low ye kindle mine!
Will there be dawn in West and eve in East?
Begone!--my knave!--belike and like enow
Some old head-blow not heeded in his youth
So shook his wits they wander in his prime-Crazed! How the villain lifted up his voice,
Nor shamed to bawl himself a kitchen-knave.
Tut: he was tame and meek enow with me,
Till peacocked up with Lancelot's noticing.
Well--I will after my loud knave, and learn
Whether he know me for his master yet.
Out of the smoke he came, and so my lance
Hold, by God's grace, he shall into the mire-Thence, if the King awaken from his craze,
Into the smoke again.'
But Lancelot said,
'Kay, wherefore wilt thou go against the King,
For that did never he whereon ye rail,
But ever meekly served the King in thee?
Abide: take counsel; for this lad is great
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And lusty, and knowing both of lance and sword.'
'Tut, tell not me,' said Kay, 'ye are overfine
To mar stout knaves with foolish courtesies:'
Then mounted, on through silent faces rode
Down the slope city, and out beyond the gate.
But by the field of tourney lingering yet
Muttered the damsel, 'Wherefore did the King
Scorn me? for, were Sir Lancelot lackt, at least
He might have yielded to me one of those
Who tilt for lady's love and glory here,
Rather than--O sweet heaven! O fie upon him-His kitchen-knave.'
To whom Sir Gareth drew
(And there were none but few goodlier than he)
Shining in arms, 'Damsel, the quest is mine.
Lead, and I follow.' She thereat, as one
That smells a foul-fleshed agaric in the holt,
And deems it carrion of some woodland thing,
Or shrew, or weasel, nipt her slender nose
With petulant thumb and finger, shrilling, 'Hence!
Avoid, thou smellest all of kitchen-grease.
And look who comes behind,' for there was Kay.
'Knowest thou not me? thy master? I am Kay.
We lack thee by the hearth.'
And Gareth to him,
'Master no more! too well I know thee, ay-The most ungentle knight in Arthur's hall.'
'Have at thee then,' said Kay: they shocked, and Kay
Fell shoulder-slipt, and Gareth cried again,
'Lead, and I follow,' and fast away she fled.
But after sod and shingle ceased to fly
Behind her, and the heart of her good horse
Was nigh to burst with violence of the beat,
Perforce she stayed, and overtaken spoke.
'What doest thou, scullion, in my fellowship?
Deem'st thou that I accept thee aught the more
Or love thee better, that by some device
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Full cowardly, or by mere unhappiness,
Thou hast overthrown and slain thy master--thou!-Dish-washer and broach-turner, loon!--to me
Thou smellest all of kitchen as before.'
'Damsel,' Sir Gareth answered gently, 'say
Whate'er ye will, but whatsoe'er ye say,
I leave not till I finish this fair quest,
Or die therefore.'
'Ay, wilt thou finish it?
Sweet lord, how like a noble knight he talks!
The listening rogue hath caught the manner of it.
But, knave, anon thou shalt be met with, knave,
And then by such a one that thou for all
The kitchen brewis that was ever supt
Shalt not once dare to look him in the face.'
'I shall assay,' said Gareth with a smile
That maddened her, and away she flashed again
Down the long avenues of a boundless wood,
And Gareth following was again beknaved.
'Sir Kitchen-knave, I have missed the only way
Where Arthur's men are set along the wood;
The wood is nigh as full of thieves as leaves:
If both be slain, I am rid of thee; but yet,
Sir Scullion, canst thou use that spit of thine?
Fight, an thou canst: I have missed the only way.'
So till the dusk that followed evensong
Rode on the two, reviler and reviled;
Then after one long slope was mounted, saw,
Bowl-shaped, through tops of many thousand pines
A gloomy-gladed hollow slowly sink
To westward--in the deeps whereof a mere,
Round as the red eye of an Eagle-owl,
Under the half-dead sunset glared; and shouts
Ascended, and there brake a servingman
Flying from out of the black wood, and crying,
'They have bound my lord to cast him in the mere.'
Then Gareth, 'Bound am I to right the wronged,
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But straitlier bound am I to bide with thee.'
And when the damsel spake contemptuously,
'Lead, and I follow,' Gareth cried again,
'Follow, I lead!' so down among the pines
He plunged; and there, blackshadowed nigh the mere,
And mid-thigh-deep in bulrushes and reed,
Saw six tall men haling a seventh along,
A stone about his neck to drown him in it.
Three with good blows he quieted, but three
Fled through the pines; and Gareth loosed the stone
From off his neck, then in the mere beside
Tumbled it; oilily bubbled up the mere.
Last, Gareth loosed his bonds and on free feet
Set him, a stalwart Baron, Arthur's friend.
'Well that ye came, or else these caitiff rogues
Had wreaked themselves on me; good cause is theirs
To hate me, for my wont hath ever been
To catch my thief, and then like vermin here
Drown him, and with a stone about his neck;
And under this wan water many of them
Lie rotting, but at night let go the stone,
And rise, and flickering in a grimly light
Dance on the mere. Good now, ye have saved a life
Worth somewhat as the cleanser of this wood.
And fain would I reward thee worshipfully.
What guerdon will ye?'
Gareth sharply spake,
'None! for the deed's sake have I done the deed,
In uttermost obedience to the King.
But wilt thou yield this damsel harbourage?'
Whereat the Baron saying, 'I well believe
You be of Arthur's Table,' a light laugh
Broke from Lynette, 'Ay, truly of a truth,
And in a sort, being Arthur's kitchen-knave!-But deem not I accept thee aught the more,
Scullion, for running sharply with thy spit
Down on a rout of craven foresters.
A thresher with his flail had scattered them.
Nay--for thou smellest of the kitchen still.
But an this lord will yield us harbourage,
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Well.'
So she spake. A league beyond the wood,
All in a full-fair manor and a rich,
His towers where that day a feast had been
Held in high hall, and many a viand left,
And many a costly cate, received the three.
And there they placed a peacock in his pride
Before the damsel, and the Baron set
Gareth beside her, but at once she rose.
'Meseems, that here is much discourtesy,
Setting this knave, Lord Baron, at my side.
Hear me--this morn I stood in Arthur's hall,
And prayed the King would grant me Lancelot
To fight the brotherhood of Day and Night-The last a monster unsubduable
Of any save of him for whom I called-Suddenly bawls this frontless kitchen-knave,
"The quest is mine; thy kitchen-knave am I,
And mighty through thy meats and drinks am I."
Then Arthur all at once gone mad replies,
"Go therefore," and so gives the quest to him-Him--here--a villain fitter to stick swine
Than ride abroad redressing women's wrong,
Or sit beside a noble gentlewoman.'
Then half-ashamed and part-amazed, the lord
Now looked at one and now at other, left
The damsel by the peacock in his pride,
And, seating Gareth at another board,
Sat down beside him, ate and then began.
'Friend, whether thou be kitchen-knave, or not,
Or whether it be the maiden's fantasy,
And whether she be mad, or else the King,
Or both or neither, or thyself be mad,
I ask not: but thou strikest a strong stroke,
For strong thou art and goodly therewithal,
And saver of my life; and therefore now,
For here be mighty men to joust with, weigh
Whether thou wilt not with thy damsel back
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To crave again Sir Lancelot of the King.
Thy pardon; I but speak for thine avail,
The saver of my life.'
And Gareth said,
'Full pardon, but I follow up the quest,
Despite of Day and Night and Death and Hell.'
So when, next morn, the lord whose life he saved
Had, some brief space, conveyed them on their way
And left them with God-speed, Sir Gareth spake,
'Lead, and I follow.' Haughtily she replied.
'I fly no more: I allow thee for an hour.
Lion and stout have isled together, knave,
In time of flood. Nay, furthermore, methinks
Some ruth is mine for thee. Back wilt thou, fool?
For hard by here is one will overthrow
And slay thee: then will I to court again,
And shame the King for only yielding me
My champion from the ashes of his hearth.'
To whom Sir Gareth answered courteously,
'Say thou thy say, and I will do my deed.
Allow me for mine hour, and thou wilt find
My fortunes all as fair as hers who lay
Among the ashes and wedded the King's son.'
Then to the shore of one of those long loops
Wherethrough the serpent river coiled, they came.
Rough-thicketed were the banks and steep; the stream
Full, narrow; this a bridge of single arc
Took at a leap; and on the further side
Arose a silk pavilion, gay with gold
In streaks and rays, and all Lent-lily in hue,
Save that the dome was purple, and above,
Crimson, a slender banneret fluttering.
And therebefore the lawless warrior paced
Unarmed, and calling, 'Damsel, is this he,
The champion thou hast brought from Arthur's hall?
For whom we let thee pass.' 'Nay, nay,' she said,
'Sir Morning-Star. The King in utter scorn
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Of thee and thy much folly hath sent thee here
His kitchen-knave: and look thou to thyself:
See that he fall not on thee suddenly,
And slay thee unarmed: he is not knight but knave.'
Then at his call, 'O daughters of the Dawn,
And servants of the Morning-Star, approach,
Arm me,' from out the silken curtain-folds
Bare-footed and bare-headed three fair girls
In gilt and rosy raiment came: their feet
In dewy grasses glistened; and the hair
All over glanced with dewdrop or with gem
Like sparkles in the stone Avanturine.
These armed him in blue arms, and gave a shield
Blue also, and thereon the morning star.
And Gareth silent gazed upon the knight,
Who stood a moment, ere his horse was brought,
Glorying; and in the stream beneath him, shone
Immingled with Heaven's azure waveringly,
The gay pavilion and the naked feet,
His arms, the rosy raiment, and the star.
Then she that watched him, 'Wherefore stare ye so?
Thou shakest in thy fear: there yet is time:
Flee down the valley before he get to horse.
Who will cry shame? Thou art not knight but knave.'
Said Gareth, 'Damsel, whether knave or knight,
Far liefer had I fight a score of times
Than hear thee so missay me and revile.
Fair words were best for him who fights for thee;
But truly foul are better, for they send
That strength of anger through mine arms, I know
That I shall overthrow him.'
And he that bore
The star, when mounted, cried from o'er the bridge,
'A kitchen-knave, and sent in scorn of me!
Such fight not I, but answer scorn with scorn.
For this were shame to do him further wrong
Than set him on his feet, and take his horse
And arms, and so return him to the King.
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Come, therefore, leave thy lady lightly, knave.
Avoid: for it beseemeth not a knave
To ride with such a lady.'
'Dog, thou liest.
I spring from loftier lineage than thine own.'
He spake; and all at fiery speed the two
Shocked on the central bridge, and either spear
Bent but not brake, and either knight at once,
Hurled as a stone from out of a catapult
Beyond his horse's crupper and the bridge,
Fell, as if dead; but quickly rose and drew,
And Gareth lashed so fiercely with his brand
He drave his enemy backward down the bridge,
The damsel crying, 'Well-stricken, kitchen-knave!'
Till Gareth's shield was cloven; but one stroke
Laid him that clove it grovelling on the ground.
Then cried the fallen, 'Take not my life: I yield.'
And Gareth, 'So this damsel ask it of me
Good--I accord it easily as a grace.'
She reddening, 'Insolent scullion: I of thee?
I bound to thee for any favour asked!'
'Then he shall die.' And Gareth there unlaced
His helmet as to slay him, but she shrieked,
'Be not so hardy, scullion, as to slay
One nobler than thyself.' 'Damsel, thy charge
Is an abounding pleasure to me. Knight,
Thy life is thine at her command. Arise
And quickly pass to Arthur's hall, and say
His kitchen-knave hath sent thee. See thou crave
His pardon for thy breaking of his laws.
Myself, when I return, will plead for thee.
Thy shield is mine--farewell; and, damsel, thou,
Lead, and I follow.'
And fast away she fled.
Then when he came upon her, spake, 'Methought,
Knave, when I watched thee striking on the bridge
The savour of thy kitchen came upon me
A little faintlier: but the wind hath changed:
I scent it twenty-fold.' And then she sang,
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'"O morning star" (not that tall felon there
Whom thou by sorcery or unhappiness
Or some device, hast foully overthrown),
"O morning star that smilest in the blue,
O star, my morning dream hath proven true,
Smile sweetly, thou! my love hath smiled on me."
'But thou begone, take counsel, and away,
For hard by here is one that guards a ford-The second brother in their fool's parable-Will pay thee all thy wages, and to boot.
Care not for shame: thou art not knight but knave.'
To whom Sir Gareth answered, laughingly,
'Parables? Hear a parable of the knave.
When I was kitchen-knave among the rest
Fierce was the hearth, and one of my co-mates
Owned a rough dog, to whom he cast his coat,
"Guard it," and there was none to meddle with it.
And such a coat art thou, and thee the King
Gave me to guard, and such a dog am I,
To worry, and not to flee--and--knight or knave-The knave that doth thee service as full knight
Is all as good, meseems, as any knight
Toward thy sister's freeing.'
'Ay, Sir Knave!
Ay, knave, because thou strikest as a knight,
Being but knave, I hate thee all the more.'
'Fair damsel, you should worship me the more,
That, being but knave, I throw thine enemies.'
'Ay, ay,' she said, 'but thou shalt meet thy match.'
So when they touched the second river-loop,
Huge on a huge red horse, and all in mail
Burnished to blinding, shone the Noonday Sun
Beyond a raging shallow. As if the flower,
That blows a globe of after arrowlets,
Ten thousand-fold had grown, flashed the fierce shield,
All sun; and Gareth's eyes had flying blots
133
Before them when he turned from watching him.
He from beyond the roaring shallow roared,
'What doest thou, brother, in my marches here?'
And she athwart the shallow shrilled again,
'Here is a kitchen-knave from Arthur's hall
Hath overthrown thy brother, and hath his arms.'
'Ugh!' cried the Sun, and vizoring up a red
And cipher face of rounded foolishness,
Pushed horse across the foamings of the ford,
Whom Gareth met midstream: no room was there
For lance or tourney-skill: four strokes they struck
With sword, and these were mighty; the new knight
Had fear he might be shamed; but as the Sun
Heaved up a ponderous arm to strike the fifth,
The hoof of his horse slipt in the stream, the stream
Descended, and the Sun was washed away.
Then Gareth laid his lance athwart the ford;
So drew him home; but he that fought no more,
As being all bone-battered on the rock,
Yielded; and Gareth sent him to the King,
'Myself when I return will plead for thee.'
'Lead, and I follow.' Quietly she led.
'Hath not the good wind, damsel, changed again?'
'Nay, not a point: nor art thou victor here.
There lies a ridge of slate across the ford;
His horse thereon stumbled--ay, for I saw it.
'"O Sun" (not this strong fool whom thou, Sir Knave,
Hast overthrown through mere unhappiness),
"O Sun, that wakenest all to bliss or pain,
O moon, that layest all to sleep again,
Shine sweetly: twice my love hath smiled on me."
What knowest thou of lovesong or of love?
Nay, nay, God wot, so thou wert nobly born,
Thou hast a pleasant presence. Yea, perchance,-'"O dewy flowers that open to the sun,
O dewy flowers that close when day is done,
Blow sweetly: twice my love hath smiled on me."
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'What knowest thou of flowers, except, belike,
To garnish meats with? hath not our good King
Who lent me thee, the flower of kitchendom,
A foolish love for flowers? what stick ye round
The pasty? wherewithal deck the boar's head?
Flowers? nay, the boar hath rosemaries and bay.
'"O birds, that warble to the morning sky,
O birds that warble as the day goes by,
Sing sweetly: twice my love hath smiled on me."
'What knowest thou of birds, lark, mavis, merle,
Linnet? what dream ye when they utter forth
May-music growing with the growing light,
Their sweet sun-worship? these be for the snare
(So runs thy fancy) these be for the spit,
Larding and basting. See thou have not now
Larded thy last, except thou turn and fly.
There stands the third fool of their allegory.'
For there beyond a bridge of treble bow,
All in a rose-red from the west, and all
Naked it seemed, and glowing in the broad
Deep-dimpled current underneath, the knight,
That named himself the Star of Evening, stood.
And Gareth, 'Wherefore waits the madman there
Naked in open dayshine?' 'Nay,' she cried,
'Not naked, only wrapt in hardened skins
That fit him like his own; and so ye cleave
His armour off him, these will turn the blade.'
Then the third brother shouted o'er the bridge,
'O brother-star, why shine ye here so low?
Thy ward is higher up: but have ye slain
The damsel's champion?' and the damsel cried,
'No star of thine, but shot from Arthur's heaven
With all disaster unto thine and thee!
For both thy younger brethren have gone down
Before this youth; and so wilt thou, Sir Star;
Art thou not old?'
135
'Old, damsel, old and hard,
Old, with the might and breath of twenty boys.'
Said Gareth, 'Old, and over-bold in brag!
But that same strength which threw the Morning Star
Can throw the Evening.'
Then that other blew
A hard and deadly note upon the horn.
'Approach and arm me!' With slow steps from out
An old storm-beaten, russet, many-stained
Pavilion, forth a grizzled damsel came,
And armed him in old arms, and brought a helm
With but a drying evergreen for crest,
And gave a shield whereon the Star of Even
Half-tarnished and half-bright, his emblem, shone.
But when it glittered o'er the saddle-bow,
They madly hurled together on the bridge;
And Gareth overthrew him, lighted, drew,
There met him drawn, and overthrew him again,
But up like fire he started: and as oft
As Gareth brought him grovelling on his knees,
So many a time he vaulted up again;
Till Gareth panted hard, and his great heart,
Foredooming all his trouble was in vain,
Laboured within him, for he seemed as one
That all in later, sadder age begins
To war against ill uses of a life,
But these from all his life arise, and cry,
'Thou hast made us lords, and canst not put us down!'
He half despairs; so Gareth seemed to strike
Vainly, the damsel clamouring all the while,
'Well done, knave-knight, well-stricken, O good knight-knave-O knave, as noble as any of all the knights-Shame me not, shame me not. I have prophesied-Strike, thou art worthy of the Table Round-His arms are old, he trusts the hardened skin-Strike--strike--the wind will never change again.'
And Gareth hearing ever stronglier smote,
And hewed great pieces of his armour off him,
But lashed in vain against the hardened skin,
And could not wholly bring him under, more
Than loud Southwesterns, rolling ridge on ridge,
136
The buoy that rides at sea, and dips and springs
For ever; till at length Sir Gareth's brand
Clashed his, and brake it utterly to the hilt.
'I have thee now;' but forth that other sprang,
And, all unknightlike, writhed his wiry arms
Around him, till he felt, despite his mail,
Strangled, but straining even his uttermost
Cast, and so hurled him headlong o'er the bridge
Down to the river, sink or swim, and cried,
'Lead, and I follow.'
But the damsel said,
'I lead no longer; ride thou at my side;
Thou art the kingliest of all kitchen-knaves.
'"O trefoil, sparkling on the rainy plain,
O rainbow with three colours after rain,
Shine sweetly: thrice my love hath smiled on me."
'Sir,--and, good faith, I fain had added--Knight,
But that I heard thee call thyself a knave,-Shamed am I that I so rebuked, reviled,
Missaid thee; noble I am; and thought the King
Scorned me and mine; and now thy pardon, friend,
For thou hast ever answered courteously,
And wholly bold thou art, and meek withal
As any of Arthur's best, but, being knave,
Hast mazed my wit: I marvel what thou art.'
'Damsel,' he said, 'you be not all to blame,
Saving that you mistrusted our good King
Would handle scorn, or yield you, asking, one
Not fit to cope your quest. You said your say;
Mine answer was my deed. Good sooth! I hold
He scarce is knight, yea but half-man, nor meet
To fight for gentle damsel, he, who lets
His heart be stirred with any foolish heat
At any gentle damsel's waywardness.
Shamed? care not! thy foul sayings fought for me:
And seeing now thy words are fair, methinks
There rides no knight, not Lancelot, his great self,
Hath force to quell me.'
137
Nigh upon that hour
When the lone hern forgets his melancholy,
Lets down his other leg, and stretching, dreams
Of goodly supper in the distant pool,
Then turned the noble damsel smiling at him,
And told him of a cavern hard at hand,
Where bread and baken meats and good red wine
Of Southland, which the Lady Lyonors
Had sent her coming champion, waited him.
Anon they past a narrow comb wherein
Where slabs of rock with figures, knights on horse
Sculptured, and deckt in slowly-waning hues.
'Sir Knave, my knight, a hermit once was here,
Whose holy hand hath fashioned on the rock
The war of Time against the soul of man.
And yon four fools have sucked their allegory
From these damp walls, and taken but the form.
Know ye not these?' and Gareth lookt and read-In letters like to those the vexillary
Hath left crag-carven o'er the streaming Gelt-'PHOSPHORUS,' then 'MERIDIES'--'HESPERUS'-'NOX'--'MORS,' beneath five figures, armd men,
Slab after slab, their faces forward all,
And running down the Soul, a Shape that fled
With broken wings, torn raiment and loose hair,
For help and shelter to the hermit's cave.
'Follow the faces, and we find it. Look,
Who comes behind?'
For one--delayed at first
Through helping back the dislocated Kay
To Camelot, then by what thereafter chanced,
The damsel's headlong error through the wood-Sir Lancelot, having swum the river-loops-His blue shield-lions covered--softly drew
Behind the twain, and when he saw the star
Gleam, on Sir Gareth's turning to him, cried,
'Stay, felon knight, I avenge me for my friend.'
And Gareth crying pricked against the cry;
But when they closed--in a moment--at one touch
Of that skilled spear, the wonder of the world--
138
Went sliding down so easily, and fell,
That when he found the grass within his hands
He laughed; the laughter jarred upon Lynette:
Harshly she asked him, 'Shamed and overthrown,
And tumbled back into the kitchen-knave,
Why laugh ye? that ye blew your boast in vain?'
'Nay, noble damsel, but that I, the son
Of old King Lot and good Queen Bellicent,
And victor of the bridges and the ford,
And knight of Arthur, here lie thrown by whom
I know not, all through mere unhappiness-Device and sorcery and unhappiness-Out, sword; we are thrown!' And Lancelot answered, 'Prince,
O Gareth--through the mere unhappiness
Of one who came to help thee, not to harm,
Lancelot, and all as glad to find thee whole,
As on the day when Arthur knighted him.'
Then Gareth, 'Thou--Lancelot!--thine the hand
That threw me? An some chance to mar the boast
Thy brethren of thee make--which could not chance-Had sent thee down before a lesser spear,
Shamed had I been, and sad--O Lancelot--thou!'
Whereat the maiden, petulant, 'Lancelot,
Why came ye not, when called? and wherefore now
Come ye, not called? I gloried in my knave,
Who being still rebuked, would answer still
Courteous as any knight--but now, if knight,
The marvel dies, and leaves me fooled and tricked,
And only wondering wherefore played upon:
And doubtful whether I and mine be scorned.
Where should be truth if not in Arthur's hall,
In Arthur's presence? Knight, knave, prince and fool,
I hate thee and for ever.'
And Lancelot said,
'Blessd be thou, Sir Gareth! knight art thou
To the King's best wish. O damsel, be you wise
To call him shamed, who is but overthrown?
Thrown have I been, nor once, but many a time.
Victor from vanquished issues at the last,
139
And overthrower from being overthrown.
With sword we have not striven; and thy good horse
And thou are weary; yet not less I felt
Thy manhood through that wearied lance of thine.
Well hast thou done; for all the stream is freed,
And thou hast wreaked his justice on his foes,
And when reviled, hast answered graciously,
And makest merry when overthrown. Prince, Knight
Hail, Knight and Prince, and of our Table Round!'
And then when turning to Lynette he told
The tale of Gareth, petulantly she said,
'Ay well--ay well--for worse than being fooled
Of others, is to fool one's self. A cave,
Sir Lancelot, is hard by, with meats and drinks
And forage for the horse, and flint for fire.
But all about it flies a honeysuckle.
Seek, till we find.' And when they sought and found,
Sir Gareth drank and ate, and all his life
Past into sleep; on whom the maiden gazed.
'Sound sleep be thine! sound cause to sleep hast thou.
Wake lusty! Seem I not as tender to him
As any mother? Ay, but such a one
As all day long hath rated at her child,
And vext his day, but blesses him asleep-Good lord, how sweetly smells the honeysuckle
In the hushed night, as if the world were one
Of utter peace, and love, and gentleness!
O Lancelot, Lancelot'--and she clapt her hands-'Full merry am I to find my goodly knave
Is knight and noble. See now, sworn have I,
Else yon black felon had not let me pass,
To bring thee back to do the battle with him.
Thus an thou goest, he will fight thee first;
Who doubts thee victor? so will my knight-knave
Miss the full flower of this accomplishment.'
Said Lancelot, 'Peradventure he, you name,
May know my shield. Let Gareth, an he will,
Change his for mine, and take my charger, fresh,
Not to be spurred, loving the battle as well
As he that rides him.' 'Lancelot-like,' she said,
140
'Courteous in this, Lord Lancelot, as in all.'
And Gareth, wakening, fiercely clutched the shield;
'Ramp ye lance-splintering lions, on whom all spears
Are rotten sticks! ye seem agape to roar!
Yea, ramp and roar at leaving of your lord!-Care not, good beasts, so well I care for you.
O noble Lancelot, from my hold on these
Streams virtue--fire--through one that will not shame
Even the shadow of Lancelot under shield.
Hence: let us go.'
Silent the silent field
They traversed. Arthur's harp though summer-wan,
In counter motion to the clouds, allured
The glance of Gareth dreaming on his liege.
A star shot: 'Lo,' said Gareth, 'the foe falls!'
An owl whoopt: 'Hark the victor pealing there!'
Suddenly she that rode upon his left
Clung to the shield that Lancelot lent him, crying,
'Yield, yield him this again: 'tis he must fight:
I curse the tongue that all through yesterday
Reviled thee, and hath wrought on Lancelot now
To lend thee horse and shield: wonders ye have done;
Miracles ye cannot: here is glory enow
In having flung the three: I see thee maimed,
Mangled: I swear thou canst not fling the fourth.'
'And wherefore, damsel? tell me all ye know.
You cannot scare me; nor rough face, or voice,
Brute bulk of limb, or boundless savagery
Appal me from the quest.'
'Nay, Prince,' she cried,
'God wot, I never looked upon the face,
Seeing he never rides abroad by day;
But watched him have I like a phantom pass
Chilling the night: nor have I heard the voice.
Always he made his mouthpiece of a page
Who came and went, and still reported him
As closing in himself the strength of ten,
And when his anger tare him, massacring
141
Man, woman, lad and girl--yea, the soft babe!
Some hold that he hath swallowed infant flesh,
Monster! O Prince, I went for Lancelot first,
The quest is Lancelot's: give him back the shield.'
Said Gareth laughing, 'An he fight for this,
Belike he wins it as the better man:
Thus--and not else!'
But Lancelot on him urged
All the devisings of their chivalry
When one might meet a mightier than himself;
How best to manage horse, lance, sword and shield,
And so fill up the gap where force might fail
With skill and fineness. Instant were his words.
Then Gareth, 'Here be rules. I know but one-To dash against mine enemy and win.
Yet have I seen thee victor in the joust,
And seen thy way.' 'Heaven help thee,' sighed Lynette.
Then for a space, and under cloud that grew
To thunder-gloom palling all stars, they rode
In converse till she made her palfrey halt,
Lifted an arm, and softly whispered, 'There.'
And all the three were silent seeing, pitched
Beside the Castle Perilous on flat field,
A huge pavilion like a mountain peak
Sunder the glooming crimson on the marge,
Black, with black banner, and a long black horn
Beside it hanging; which Sir Gareth graspt,
And so, before the two could hinder him,
Sent all his heart and breath through all the horn.
Echoed the walls; a light twinkled; anon
Came lights and lights, and once again he blew;
Whereon were hollow tramplings up and down
And muffled voices heard, and shadows past;
Till high above him, circled with her maids,
The Lady Lyonors at a window stood,
Beautiful among lights, and waving to him
White hands, and courtesy; but when the Prince
Three times had blown--after long hush--at last--
142
The huge pavilion slowly yielded up,
Through those black foldings, that which housed therein.
High on a nightblack horse, in nightblack arms,
With white breast-bone, and barren ribs of Death,
And crowned with fleshless laughter--some ten steps-In the half-light--through the dim dawn--advanced
The monster, and then paused, and spake no word.
But Gareth spake and all indignantly,
'Fool, for thou hast, men say, the strength of ten,
Canst thou not trust the limbs thy God hath given,
But must, to make the terror of thee more,
Trick thyself out in ghastly imageries
Of that which Life hath done with, and the clod,
Less dull than thou, will hide with mantling flowers
As if for pity?' But he spake no word;
Which set the horror higher: a maiden swooned;
The Lady Lyonors wrung her hands and wept,
As doomed to be the bride of Night and Death;
Sir Gareth's head prickled beneath his helm;
And even Sir Lancelot through his warm blood felt
Ice strike, and all that marked him were aghast.
At once Sir Lancelot's charger fiercely neighed,
And Death's dark war-horse bounded forward with him.
Then those that did not blink the terror, saw
That Death was cast to ground, and slowly rose.
But with one stroke Sir Gareth split the skull.
Half fell to right and half to left and lay.
Then with a stronger buffet he clove the helm
As throughly as the skull; and out from this
Issued the bright face of a blooming boy
Fresh as a flower new-born, and crying, 'Knight,
Slay me not: my three brethren bad me do it,
To make a horror all about the house,
And stay the world from Lady Lyonors.
They never dreamed the passes would be past.'
Answered Sir Gareth graciously to one
Not many a moon his younger, 'My fair child,
What madness made thee challenge the chief knight
Of Arthur's hall?' 'Fair Sir, they bad me do it.
They hate the King, and Lancelot, the King's friend,
143
They hoped to slay him somewhere on the stream,
They never dreamed the passes could be past.'
Then sprang the happier day from underground;
And Lady Lyonors and her house, with dance
And revel and song, made merry over Death,
As being after all their foolish fears
And horrors only proven a blooming boy.
So large mirth lived and Gareth won the quest.
And he that told the tale in older times
Says that Sir Gareth wedded Lyonors,
But he, that told it later, says Lynette.
~ Alfred Lord Tennyson,

IN CHAPTERS [39/39]



   17 Integral Yoga
   11 Poetry
   7 Fiction
   3 Philosophy
   2 Yoga
   2 Mysticism


   13 Satprem
   9 The Mother
   6 H P Lovecraft
   3 Nolini Kanta Gupta
   3 Lucretius
   2 William Butler Yeats
   2 Walt Whitman
   2 Swami Krishnananda
   2 Percy Bysshe Shelley


   6 Lovecraft - Poems
   4 On the Way to Supermanhood
   3 Of The Nature Of Things
   3 Agenda Vol 04
   2 Yeats - Poems
   2 Whitman - Poems
   2 The Study and Practice of Yoga
   2 Shelley - Poems
   2 Agenda Vol 12


0 1963-06-15, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   It must be (on a much lower level) at such moments that you fall ill; when people fall ill, it must be (on their scale, of course, probably a very, very small scale), it must be due to that (gesture of precarious balance): they must be going from one moment to another, from one balance to another, and if they are not careful, they topple over. Then its IN the illness that they find a new harmony(laughing) either here or in another world!
   ***

0 1963-10-19, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Then I said to myself: thats how it is, there must be a certain tamasan uncomprehending tamaswhich in order to change needs to be violently shaken up. With illnesses, its the same thing, in the sense that only when things really seem about to topple over on the wrong side I go out of my body deliberately, hovering over all things, and the body recoversnow it takes very little time: a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes.
   From the point of view of government, it also seems to be the same thing, as if all the difficulties little by little BROUGHT to power people who are under my influence.2 But its still sporadic I think it is the thing that will give way last. Sri Aurobindo said it would happen in 67 we still have some time, its only 63, four years to go. Its not that well govern ourselves (God knows we dont have the time!), but to be the government means that in the government, there will be people directly under the Influence. And its not enough if its local (God knows! [laughing] I have never seen anything more rotten!), its not enough if its local, its not enough if its Indian, not at all: it has to be global for And clearly, for the moment, we are still very far from iteven in the invisible, even in the Inconscient.

0 1963-12-31, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   In fact, in Savitri, Sri Aurobindo went through all the worlds, and it so happens that I am following that without knowing it (because I never rememberthank God, I really thank heaven!I asked the Lord to take away my mental memory and He took it away entirely, so I am not weighed down), but I follow that description in Savitri without mentally knowing the sequence of the worlds, and these last few days I was in that Muddle of Falsehood (I told you last time), it was really painful, and I was tracking it down to the most tenuous vibrations, those that go back to the origin, to the moment when Truth could turn into Falsehoodhow it all happened. And it is so tenuous, almost imperceptible, that deformation, the original Deformation, that you tend to lose heart and you think, Its still really quite easy to topple over the slightest thing and you can still topple over into Falsehood, into Deformation. And yesterday, I had in my hands a passage from Savitri that was brought to meits a marvel, but its so sad, so miserable, oh, I could have cried (I dont easily cry).
   The world grew full of menacing Energies,

0 1964-08-22, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   So the first day, I was almost dazed; I was constantly groping for the way to do things. Yesterday, it was still strong. And this morning, suddenly I began to understand (what I call to understand is to have control), I understood: Ah, thats it! Because I was wondering, But what on earth does all this mean? How can I do my work? I remember, yesterday I had to see a host of people, people who arent close and whose atmosphere isnt good: it was very difficult, I had to keep a hold on myself, and I must have looked strange, very absent I was very far away, in a very deep consciousness, so that my body wouldnt be you know, that gave it discomfort of sortsdiscomfort, yesit was hard to bear. Yesterday the body was still that way the whole morning; towards evening it got better. But the night wasnt good, oh! In the night, I am always given a state of human consciousness to put right, one after another there are millions of them. And there are always all the images and events that illustrate that particular state of consciousness. At times, its very hard going: I wake up tired, as after a long period of work. And last night, thats how it was; its always the various, multiple ways which men have of complicating the original Simplicity: of turning a simple vibration into extremely complicated eventswhere the thing should be simple and flow naturally, there are endless complications, and such difficulties! Unbearable and insuperable difficulties. I dont know if you have experienced that: you want to go somewhere, but there are hindrances everywhere; you want to go out of a room, but there is no way out, or there is one, but you have to crawl on the ground under kinds of rocks and then something in the being refuses, No, I wont do it. And with a sense of insecurity, as if at any moment the thing could topple over and crush you. There are people who want to help you, but they cant do anything at all, they only make the complication still more complicated; you start on a road with the certainty of reaching a particular place, then all of a sudden, in the middle of it the road changes, everything changes, and you have your back to the place you wanted to go. All kinds of things like that. The symbolism of it is extremely clear. But then, it makes for a lot of work.
   Anyway, I got up in that state and began to wonder, Wont there be an end to it? Its always, always, always like that. And more and more I have an inner conviction that it isnt a thing you can obtain through effort and progressive transformationit would take millions of years! Its only the Grace. When the Lord decides, Its finished, now its going to be like that, it will be like that. Then you find rest and tranquillity.

0 1966-05-22, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Its because all the vital force is used to keep the bodys balance in the phase of transformation. Thats what I have called the change of government, its the phase of transformation. And during that change, well, all the vital force is there just to keep your balance so you dont topple over. Because its difficult.
   One must remain very calm and do what is indispensable, nothing more.

0 1967-04-12, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Here is Dr. Albert Hofmann's description: "Vertigo. Intermittent sensation of heaviness in the head and the body, as if it were filled with metal. Everything seemed to topple over. When I closed my eyes, I was overcome by an uninterrupted succession of fantastic images of extraordinary intensity. All sound perceptions (the sound of a car, for instance) were transformed into optical effects, each one creating a corresponding coloured hallucination, constantly changing form and colour. At times I felt I was outside my body."
   ***

0 1969-12-20, #Agenda Vol 10, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Its very interesting. The first effect of every new progress is a more total and complete perception of the incapacity we live in in ordinary life. Thats the first result, because one begins to feel, see, sense, perceive how things should be, and so (gesture of a gap opening abruptly). Its really the effect of the Grace if its graded and apparently slow, because any rapid movement would produce such a despair at the opposition between the two that one couldnt bear it. The body is growing increasingly conscious of its infirmity, its incapacity; the clearer the consciousness becomes, the more conscious the body grows, so one must be very careful because it shouldnt topple over.
   (Mother suddenly turns to Sujata)

0 1971-12-11, #Agenda Vol 12, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   This year, we are celebrating Sri Aurobindos Birth Centenary. He is known to barely a handful of men and yet his name will resound when the great men of today or yesterday are buried under their own debris. His work is discussed by philosophers, praised by poets, people acclaim his sociological vision and his yoga but Sri Aurobindo is a living ACTION, a Word becoming real, and every day in the thousand circumstances that seem to want to rend the earth and topple its structures we can witness the first reflux of the Force he has set in motion. At the beginning of this century, when India was still struggling against British domination, Sri Aurobindo asserted: It is not a revolt against the British Government [that is needed]. It is, in fact, a revolt against the whole universal Nature.2
   For the problem is fundamental. It is not a question of bringing a new philosophy to the world or new ideas or illuminations, as they are called. The question is not of making the Prison of our lives more habitable, or of endowing man with ever more fantastic powers. Armed with his microscopes and telescopes, the human gnome remains a gnome, pain-ridden and helpless. We send rockets to the moon, but we know nothing of our own hearts. It is a question, says Sri Aurobindo, of creating a new physical nature which is to be the habitation of the Supramental being in a new evolution.3 For, in actuality, he says, the imperfection of Man is not the last word of Nature, but his perfection too is not the last peak of the Spirit.4 Beyond the mental man we are, there exists the possibility of another being who will be the spearhead of evolution as man was once the spearhead of evolution among the great apes. If, says Sri Aurobindo, the animal is a living laboratory in which Nature has, it is said, worked out man, man himself may well be a thinking and living laboratory in whom and with whose conscious co-operation she wills to work out the superman, the god.5 Sri Aurobindo has come to tell us how to create this other being, this supramental being, and not only to tell us but actually to create this other being and open the path of the future, to hasten upon earth the rhythm of evolution, the new vibration that will replace the mental vibrationexactly as a thought one day disturbed the slow routine of the beastsand will give us the power to shatter the walls of our human prison.
  --
   But if this new consciousness is not to be found on the peaks of the human, where then, are we to find it? Perhaps, quite simply in that which we have most neglected since we entered the mental cycle, in the body. The body is our base, our evolutionary foundation, the old stock to which we always return, and which painfully compels our attention by making us suffer, age and die. In that imperfection, Sri Aurobindo assures us, is the urge towards a higher and more many-sided perfection. It contains the last finite which yet yearns to the Supreme Infinite. God is pent in the mire but the very fact imposes a necessity to break through that prison.8 That is the old, uncured Illness, the unchanged root, the dark matrix of our misery, hardly different now from what it was in the time of Lemuria. It is this physical substance which we must transform, otherwise it will topple, one after another, all the human or superhuman devices we try to graft on it. This body, this physical cellular substance contains almighty powers,9 a dumb consciousness that harbors all the lights and all the infinitudes, just as much as the mental and spiritual immensities do. For, in truth, all is Divine and unless the Lord of all the universe resides in a single little cell he resides nowhere. It is this original, dark cellular Prison which we must break open; for as long as we have not broken it, we will continue to turn vainly in the golden or iron circles of our mental prison. These laws of Nature, says Sri Aurobindo, that you call absolute merely mean an equilibrium established to work in order to produce certain results. But, if you change the consciousness, then the groove also is bound to change.10
   Such is the new adventure to which Sri Aurobindo invites us, an adventure into mans unknown. Whether we like it or not, the whole earth is moving into a new groove, but why shouldnt we like it? Why shouldnt we collaborate in this great, unprecedented adventure? Why shouldnt we collaborate in our own evolution, instead of repeating endlessly the same old story, instead of chasing hallucinatory paradises which will never quench our thirst or otherworldly paradises which leave the earth to rot along with our bodies? Why be born if it is to get out at the end? exclaims the Mother, who continues Sri Aurobindos work. What is the use of having struggled so much, suffered so much, of having created something which, in its outer appearance at least, is so tragic and dramatic, if it is only to learn how to get out of itit would have been better not to start at all. Evolution is not a tortuous course that brings us back, somewhat battered, to the starting point. Quite the contrary, it is meant, says Mother, to teach the whole of creation the joy of being, the beauty of being, the grandeur of being, the majesty of a sublime life, and the perpetual development, perpetually progressive, of this joy, this beauty, this grandeur. Then everything has a meaning.11

0 1971-12-15, #Agenda Vol 12, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Yes. That president should be toppled.4
   Oh, yes! Yes.

02.03 - The Shakespearean Word, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   topple down headlong.
   Glo. Set me where you stand.

02.12 - The Ideals of Human Unity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   A new type of imperialism for imperialism it is in essence has been developing in recent times; and it seems it shall have its day and contri bute its share of experimentation towards the goal we are speaking of. I am of course referring to what has been frankly and aptly termed as the Dictatorship of the Proletariate. It is an attempt to cut across all other boundaries and unities of human groupingsracial, national, religious, even familial. It seeks to unify and consolidate one whole stratum of humanity in a single stream-lined steel-frame organisation. At least that was the ideal till yesterday; there seems to be growing here too a movement towards decentralisation. Naturally, even as an organisation that is top-heavy is bound to topple down in the end, likewise an organisation that is bottom-heavy, that is to say, restricts to that portion only of its body all sap and dynamism, is also bound to deteriorate and disintegrate. A tree does not live by its branches and leaves and flowers alone, no doubt, nor does it live by its roots alone.
   A different type of wider grouping is also being experimented upon nowadays, a federal grouping of national units. The nation is taken in this system as the stable indivisible fundamental unit, and what is attempted is a free association of independent nations that choose to be linked together because of identity of interests or mutual sympathy in respect of ideal and culture. The British Empire is a remarkable experiment on this line: it is extremely interesting to see how an old-world Empire is really being liquidated (in spite of a Churchill) and transformed into a commonwealth of free and equal nations. America too has been attempting a Pan-American federation. And in continental Europe, a Western and an Eastern Block of nations seem to be developing, not on ideal lines perhaps at present because of their being based upon the old faulty principle of balance of power hiding behind it a dangerously egoistic and exclusive national consciousness; but that may change when it is seen and experienced that the procedure does not pay, and a more natural and healthier approach may be adopted.

07.04 - The Triple Soul-Forces, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  I topple down the thrones of tyrant kings:
  A cry comes from proscribed and hunted lives

1.038 - Impediments in Concentration and Meditation, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  Major impediments to yoga have been stated to be nine, according to the aphorism of Patanjali. We have been trying to observe the nature of these obstacles, and every one of them seems to have some connection with the other, perhaps one following the other in some mysterious manner. Finally, certain conditions may arise in the mind which may topple down all our effort namely, perception of illusions which can be easily mistaken for realities. Pressures exerted on the mind, which cannot be avoided in the earlier stages at least, set up certain psychological reactions, and these reactions appear as forms, shapes, colours, sounds and sensations of touch, etc., which cannot be easily discovered in their essentiality. The mind gets mixed up with these conditions, and there can be a subtle erroneous feeling that perhaps one is touching the borderl and of Reality. But the visions and these experiences need not necessarily be of that nature. They can be merely kicks given back by mental conditions themselves, and these states are referred to by Patanjali in this sutra as bhrantidarshana (I.30) perception of illusions.
  Everything that we see, and anything that we feel, need not necessarily be true. But everything passes for reality when it gets identified with consciousness. This is the difficulty of the whole matter. Yet, intelligently, one should be able to compare these experiences with the characteristics of Reality, and thereby know whether they are real or not. There should be a very clear philosophical background of perception in order that the intelligence of the seeker may not be duped by these experiences, because when there is even a flash of the vision of Reality, there will be such a transformation brought about in oneself that one can see in one's own personal life a reflection of those features which can be discovered only in Reality.&nbs.
  --
  Then Patanjali goes on to tell us that there can be another obstacle alabdhabhumikatva, which means to say the incapacity to fix the point of attention. However much we may try, we will not know where to concentrate the mind. There will be either experimentation with various ideas and ideals for the purpose of concentration, not knowing which is good and which is better, or there will be a total inability to fix the mind at all. Due to continued exertion of the mind for a protracted period in the practice of meditation, it may become so tired that it may refuse to act further, just as we sometimes see horses becoming exhausted by pulling carts. Perhaps from not having been fed for some days and from working in the hot sun, they refuse to move further in spite of their being whipped any number of times. They may even topple the cart, or they may move backwards, so that the driver does not know what they will do. It is possible that the mind can also resort to these devices when it is exhausted due to the fatigue of practice.
  This is also an important aspect of the practice of meditation. It should not entail any kind of exhaustion of spirit or fatigue of the body or the mind. Whenever we work we are likely to get exhausted, but it is essential to remember that meditation is not a work it is not an activity which can exhaust us or tire us. Also, there is a possibility of one's getting tired of anything which is extraneous to one's own essential nature. It is not easy to get tired of one's own self, although we can get tired of others. We can get tired of anything that is not essentially a part of our own nature. But meditation is nothing but an attempt to manifest our own nature in greater and greater degrees, rather than engage ourselves in an activity for the purpose of the achievement of an ulterior motive. Meditation is not an action in the ordinary sense of the term and, therefore, it is not supposed to bring about fatigue, either of the body or of the mind. If we feel exhaustion or fatigue after meditation, it can be safely concluded that there has been some kind of mistake in the choice of the ideal of meditation or in the method that has been adopted in meditation.

1.03 - To Layman Ishii, #Beating the Cloth Drum Letters of Zen Master Hakuin, #unset, #Zen
  (translated "poisonous insects"). In Tso-chuan (Tso's Narrative), the oldest of the Chinese narrative histories, we read: "Chao-meng asked, 'What is the meaning of the word ku?' The physician answered, 'It refers to anything that causes excess, agitation, delusion, or trouble. The ideograph ku represents a jar filled with insects. The grub that insinuates its way into grain stock is also a destructive ku insect. In the Book of Changes, women who seduce men and the wind that topples trees in the mountains are also described as ku.'" The word also occurs in the records of the Sung master Hsu-t'ang: "There was a custom in the Fu-chien District prevalent since the T'ang dynasty of throwing various insects such as venomous snakes, lizards, and spiders together, waiting until only one of them remained alive, and then mixing its venom and blood into a potion to ward off evil spirits or to kill people by casting a magic spell on them" (Dictionary of Zen Sayings, 121). In the Yuan dynasty medical treatise I-fang tai ch'eng lun: "It is said that people living in the mountain fastnesses of Min-kuang put three kinds of poisonous insects into a container and bury it in the ground on the fifth day of the fifth month. They allow the insects to devour each other until only one remains, called a ku.
  They extract the poison from this insect, and when they want to harm someone, they put it into their food or drink."

1.06 - The Breaking of the Limits, #On the Way to Supermanhood, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  So we looked intently right and left: where is me, who is me?... There is no me! Not a trace, not a single ripple of it. What is the use? There is this little shadow in front, which appropriated and piled up feelings, thoughts, powers, plans, like a beggar afraid of being robbed, afraid of destitution; it hoarded desperately on its island, yet kept dying of thirst, a perpetual thirst in the middle of the lovely sheet of water; it kept building lines of defense and fortresses against that overwhelming vastness. But we left the leaden island; we let the stronghold fall, which was not so strong as all that. We entered another current that seemed inexhaustible, a treasure giving itself unsparingly: why should we hold back anything from the present minute when at the next one there were yet other riches? Why should we think or plan anything when life organized itself according to another plan, which foiled all the old plans and, sometimes, for a second, in a sort of ripple of laughter, let us catch a glimpse of an unexpected marvel, a sudden freedom, a complete disengagement from the old program, a light and unfettered little law that opened all doors, toppled the ineluctable consequences and all the old iron laws with the flick of a finger, and left us stunned for a minute, on the threshold of an inconceivable expanse of sunlight, as though we had stepped into another solar system which is perhaps not a system at all as if breaking the mechanical limits inside had caused the same breaking of the mechanical limits outside. Maybe because the Machinery we are facing is one and the same: The world of man is what he thinks it; its laws are the result of his own constraint.
  Yet this other way of being is not without logic, and that logic is what we should try to capture, if possible, if we want to pass consciously into the other state, not only in our inner life but in our outer one as well. We must know the rules of the passage.

1.078 - Kumbhaka and Concentration of Mind, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  There is a constant pressure felt within every individual due to an outgoing tendency which manifests itself continuously, right from birth onwards until the dissolution of the body. This outgoing tendency is the activity of the prana. It is an energy which seeks an outward expression, like a rushing stream which can flow only in one direction and its flow cannot be stopped because of the vehemence of the movement. It will topple down whatever is in its way and push onward due to the force of its flow. Likewise is the work of this energy within us called the prana. It is an impetuous urge directing itself in some particular fashion known to itself alone.
  Together with its movement, it drags with itself all that is within us our feelings, our thoughts, our emotions and what not so that we are extrovert personalities throughout. We can think nothing inwardly; everything is outside. The moment we wake up in the morning, we begin to peep through our eyes into the external world and look at the atmosphere which is around us, incapable of knowing what is inside us. This is the great harassment that is caused by what is called the prana. Though it is the principle of life without it no one can exist and live it is also a direct medium of distress of every kind due to the incapacity of the mind to settle in itself, which is what we call lack of peace of mind.

1.10 - Harmony, #On the Way to Supermanhood, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  But wrong thoughts, too, are a surprising source of discoveries. As a matter of fact, more and more, he realizes that this kind of distinction is meaningless. What, in the end, is not for our own good? What does not ultimately turn out to be our greater good? The wrong paths are part of the right one and pave a broader way, a larger view of our indivisible estate. The only wrong is not to see; it is the vast grayness of the terra incognita of our limited maps. And we indeed limit our maps. We have attributed those thoughts, feelings, reactions and desires to the little Mississippi flowing through our lands, to the thriving Potomac rivers lined with stone buildings and fortresses and indeed, they have got into the habit of running through those channels, cascading here or there, boiling a little farther below, or disappearing into our marshes. It is a very old habit, going back even before us or the ape, or else a scarcely more recent one going back to our schooldays, our parents or yesterday's newspaper. We have opened paths, and the current follows them it follows them obstinately. But for the demechanized seeker, the meanders and points of entry begin to become more visible. He begins to distinguish various levels in his being, various channeling centers, and when the current passes through the solar plexus or through the throat, the reactions or effects are different. But, mostly, he discovers with surprise that it is one and the same current everywhere, above or below, right or left, and those which we call thought, desire, will or emotion are various infiltrations of the same identical thing, which is neither thought nor desire nor will nor anything of the sort, but a trickle, a drop or a cataract of the same conscious Energy entering here or there, through our little Potomac or muddy Styx, and creating a disaster or a poem, a millipede's quiver, a revolution, a gospel or a vain thought on the boulevard we could almost say at will. It all depends on the quality of our opening and its level. But the fundamental fact is that this is an Energy, in other words, a Power. And thus, very simply, quite simply, we have the all-powerful source of all possible changes in the world. It is as we will it! We can tune in either here or there, create harmony or cacophony; not a single circumstance in the world, not one fateful event, not one so-called ineluctable law, absolutely nothing can prevent us from turning the antenna one way or the other and changing this muddy and disastrous flood into a limpid stream, instantly. We just have to know where we open ourselves. At every moment of the world and every second, in the face of every dreadful circumstance, every prison we have locked ourselves alive in, we can, in one stroke, with a single cry for help, a single burst of prayer, a single true look, a single leap of the little flame inside, topple all our walls and be born again from top to bottom. Everything is possible. Because that Power is the supreme Possibility.
  But if we believe only in our little Mississippi or our little Potomac, it is clearly hopeless. And we do indeed believe passionately, millennially in the virtue of our old ways. They also hold an immense power that of habit. It is remarkable, for they seem as solid as concrete, as convincing as all the old reasons of the world, the old habits of flowing in one direction or another, as irrefutable as Newton's apple, and yet, for the eye beginning to lose its scales, as unsubstantial as a cloud one blows on them and they fall away. This is the mental Illusion, the formidable illusion that is blinding us.

1.12 - The Sociology of Superman, #On the Way to Supermanhood, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  There are no material problems, ever; there are only inner problems. And if Truth is not there, even the millions will rot on the spot. It is a fabulous experience every minute, a test of Truth and, even more marvelously, a test of the power of Truth. Step by step he learns to discover the effectiveness of Truth, the supreme effectiveness of a clear little second he enters a world of continuous little marvels. He learns to trust Truth, as if all those blows, blunders, conflicts and confusion were leading him knowingly, patiently, but relentlessly to take the right attitude, to discover the true lever, the true look, the cry of truth that topples walls and makes every possibility blossom amid the impossible chaos. It is an accelerated transmutation, multiplied by the resistance of each one as much as by the goodwill of each one as if, truly, both resistance and goodwill, good and evil, had to be changed into something else, another will, a will-vision of Truth that decides the gesture and action at each instant. This is the only law of the City of the Future, its only government: a clear vision that accords with the total Harmony, and spontaneously translates the perceived Truth into action. The fakers are automatically eliminated by the very pressure of the Force of Truth, driven out, like fish, by a sheer excess of oxygen. And if one day these ten or fifty could build a single little pyramid of truth, whose every stone has been laid with the right note, the right vibration, simple love, a clear look and a call to the future, the whole city would actually be built, because they would have built the being of the future in themselves. And perhaps the whole earth would find itself changed by it, because there is only one body, because the difficulty of the one is the difficulty of the world, the resistance and darkness of the other are the resistance and darkness of the whole world, and because that insignificant little enterprise of a tiny city under the stars may be the very Enterprise of the world, the symbol of its transmutation, the alchemy of its pain, the possibility of a new earth by the single transfiguration of one piece of earth and one piece of mankind.
  It is therefore probable that for a long time this City under construction will be a place where negative possibilities will be exacerbated as much as the positive ones, under the relentless pressure of the beacon of Truth. And falsehood is skilled at holding on to insignificant details, resistance at sticking to everyday trifles, which become the very sign of refusal. Falsehood knows how to make great sacrifices. It can follow a discipline, extol an ideal, collect merit badges and Brownie points, but it betrays itself in the insignificant that is its last refuge. It is really in matter that the game is played out. This City of the Future is a battlefield, a difficult adventure. What is decided over there with machine guns, guerrilla warfare and glorious deeds is decided here with sordid details and an invisible warfare against falsehood. But a single victory won over petty human egoism is more pregnant with consequences for the earth than the rearranging of all the frontiers of Asia, for this frontier and this egoism are the original barbed wire that divides the world.

1.15 - The Transformed Being, #On the Way to Supermanhood, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  This genesis of the supramental being is not really a distinct stage; it is intimately mingled with that of the superman, and only the mind forces us to draw partitioning lines. Actually, it is a long journey through lives and ages, body after body, the slow growth of a little fire within, no bigger than a firefly, which was already hidden in the atom, the stone, the plant, and which has become conscious of itself in man, which has grown through struggle and pain, experience after experience in a brown skin or a white one, under this latitude or another, which has emerged in the mind as a cold ray, split the darkness into a thousand contradictory beams, which has beat in the heart like a warm little flame, struggled and striven against wind and tide, toiled in love and toiled in grief and toiled in pleasure; which has pierced this shell of life, shone for nothing, pure, like an autumn bonfire on the shores of the world, searched here and searched there, kindled its flame with a thousand nothings that never made plenitude, set the days and hours ablaze, taken in the minutes, the big gestures and the small, the cold seasons and the hot, until there was a single season of fire, a single song of flame here and there. And it has become the body of our body, the heart of our heart, the high thought springing from the white flamings of the Spirit, the pure vision piercing the pain of appearances, the pure love like a vermillion snow upon the sad fields of the earth, the pure music, the pure rhythm attuned to everything it has become our body of prayer for the world, our body of light for mankind, our ardent body for the earth's future, our living pyre for matter's transfiguration. And the deeper it plunged into that dense darkness, that negation in the depths, that pettiness of a thousand gestures and heartbeats for nothing and routines of death, the brighter it became, the more it shone, the more golden it glowed like a sun, became concrete, as if it were on the verge of an ultimate transfusion, a golden invasion of matter, one last cry of love that would topple the walls and bring forth the living glory of the new body, of the Master of all this evolution. O Fire... the flaming rays of thy might rush abroad on every side violently, says the Veda. The Flame with a hundred treasures... O Son of the body... Thou foundest the mortal in a supreme immortality.52
  One day he will emerge, the Master of the long journey of fire, the goal of all those sufferings, the epitome of the ages. And the whole earth will be changed by it, seized by its irresistible ray of joy and beauty, won over to the smile by a smile. And all the shadows will be dispelled, as though they had never existed.
  --
  And they will topple our walls.

19.11 - Old Age, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   I have found Thee, O Maker of the house! Thou wilt not build me a house again. All the beams are broken, the top dome has toppled down. The mind is freed of all its obscure innate movements: desires have ended.
   [10]

1f.lovecraft - At the Mountains of Madness, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   obviously toppled outward rather than inwarda fortunate happening,
   since otherwise the ramp might have been shattered and the whole

1f.lovecraft - The Challenge from Beyond, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   upward. Yukth reared and toppled, his entrails spilling on the floor.
   In an instant Campbell was streaking for a door. His speed was amazing,

1f.lovecraft - The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   strength of fear, so that the victim toppled at once into that gaping
   well which rumour holds to reach down to the hellish Vaults of Zin

1f.lovecraft - The Haunter of the Dark, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   topple, lest things be stirred that ought to rest forever in their
   black abyss.

1f.lovecraft - The Man of Stone, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
   is well melted todayand the first bird that drank toppled over as if
   he were shot. I picked him up a second later, and he was a perfect

1.lovecraft - Psychopompos- A Tale in Rhyme, #Lovecraft - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  Pallid and bruisd, from out his toppled walls
  The panting bailiff with his good wife crawls:

1.pbs - A Vision Of The Sea, #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
  Is settling, it topples, the leeward ports dip;
  The tigers leap up when they feel the slow brine

1.pbs - Oedipus Tyrannus or Swellfoot The Tyrant, #Shelley - Poems, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #Fiction
  Of the State slopes, its very bases topple,
  The boldest turn their backs upon themselves!

1.wby - The Hour Before Dawn, #Yeats - Poems, #William Butler Yeats, #Poetry
  They toppled over; "Were it not
  I have a lucky wooden shin

1.wby - To A Young Beauty, #Yeats - Poems, #William Butler Yeats, #Poetry
  Soon topples down the hill.
  You may, that mirror for a school,

1.whitman - Song of Myself, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  I go hunting polar furs and the seal, leaping chasms with a pike-pointed staff, clinging to topples of brittle and blue.
  I ascend to the foretruck,

1.whitman - Song Of Myself- XXXIII, #Whitman - Poems, #unset, #Zen
  I go hunting polar furs and the seal, leaping chasms with a pike- pointed staff, clinging to topples of brittle and blue.
  I ascend to the foretruck,

2.14 - The Unpacking of God, #Sex Ecology Spirituality, #Ken Wilber, #Philosophy
  With "No more Ascent!" the infinite vertical yearning toppled forward, and that correct intuition of infinity was now misplaced and displaced onto the horizons of a temporal and agitated and insatiable hunger for all things material and "natural," a hunger driven by the same power of infinite yearning, but now under the gaze of a different God.
  And there remains the modern-and the postmodern-mind. People had, and have, two basic choices in these modern times: myth or naturalism. Remain at a mythic level of development, and embrace this or that imperialistic fundamentalism with its (promised and frustrated) Ascent; or evolve to rationality, shed the myths, and embrace a world of pure Descent, basking in the shadows, never getting metaphysical sunburn of any imaginable variety, "tracing science then with modesty thy guide," but seeking always to reform the phenomena, tinker with the shades, eat the shadows, endlessly.

3.03 - The Soul Is Mortal, #Of The Nature Of Things, #Lucretius, #Poetry
  May topple down upon it? But indeed
  For an immortal, perils are there none.

4.03 - The Senses And Mental Pictures, #Of The Nature Of Things, #Lucretius, #Poetry
  Would topple down; but even our very life
  Would straightaway collapse, unless we dared

6.04 - The Plague Athens, #Of The Nature Of Things, #Lucretius, #Poetry
  Began to topple. From the mouth the breath
  Would roll a noisome stink, as stink to heaven

Aeneid, #unset, #Anonymous, #Various
  are severed from their hinges, topple out.
  Force cracks a breach; the Danaans storm and pour
  --
  with his forehoofs, then topples down upon
  the fallen rider and entangles him;
  --
  pines high as stars are toppled; wedges split,
  without a stop, the oak and scented cedar;
  --
  so many bodies of brave men; he topples
  so many, half-dead; as he wheels ahead,
  --
  his race of Latin kingsis toppled by
  Aeneas with a rock and whirling stone,
  --
  you fall, whom Argive troops could never topple,
  nor he who cut down Priam's lands, Achilles.

Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (text), #Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  cottage began to topple over, the man ran out of it to save his life, and he began to swear saying, "Let
  this miserable cottage be destroyed. What is it to me?"!

The Act of Creation text, #The Act of Creation, #Arthur Koestler, #Psychology
  as if he were bound to topple over any moment. He is held up by
  another, hardly visible, branch of a tree which rises behind him, and

WORDNET



--- Overview of verb topple

The verb topple has 2 senses (first 1 from tagged texts)
                    
1. (4) tumble, topple ::: (fall down, as if collapsing; "The tower of the World Trade Center tumbled after the plane hit it")
2. topple, tumble, tip ::: (cause to topple or tumble by pushing)










--- Grep of noun topple
stopple



IN WEBGEN [10000/15]

Wikipedia - Statue of Edward Colston -- Statue in Bristol, England, toppled 2020
Wikipedia - Tower Toppler
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1926832.Toppler
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18358531.Steve_Topple
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/File:Bishop_Absalon_topples_the_god_Svantevit_at_Arkona.PNG
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/ToppleYourKings
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ToppledStatue
Camelot (1967) ::: 6.7/10 -- G | 2h 55min | Adventure, Fantasy, Musical | 25 October 1967 (USA) -- The story of the marriage of England's King Arthur to Guinevere. The plot of illegitimate Mordred to gain the throne and Guinevere's growing attachment to Sir Lancelot, threaten to topple Arthur and destroy his "round table" of knights. Director: Joshua Logan Writers:
Che: Part One (2008) ::: 7.2/10 -- Not Rated | 2h 14min | Biography, Drama, History | 24 January 2009 -- Che: Part One Poster In 1956, Ernesto 'Che' Guevara and a band of Castro-led Cuban exiles mobilize an army to topple the regime of dictator Fulgencio Batista. Director: Steven Soderbergh Writers: Peter Buchman (screenplay), Ernesto 'Che' Guevara (memoir "Reminiscences of the Cuban Revolutionary War")
https://dnd4.fandom.com/wiki/Topple_over
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Quinn_Hightopple
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Roderik_Hilltopple
https://skiesofarcadia.fandom.com/wiki/Topple_Rocks
Topple
Topple Tower



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