8 THE STAR AND THE GARTER
I spend a fraction of the day
Plying the art of manicure.
But always beats the heart: the more
I polish, tint, or carve, I ask
Strength from the heart’s too generous store
To bend my fingers to the task.
Cease: Iam broken: nought remains.
The brain’s electric waves are still ;
No blood beats eager in the veins ;
The mind sinks deathward, and the will.
It is no figure of boy’s speech,
Lover’s enthusiasm, rhyme
Magniloquent of bard, to reach
Truth through the husk of space and time:
No truth is more devout than this:
‘€In you I live: I live in you.”
Had Latmos not known Artemis,
Where were the faint lights of that dew
Of Keats? O maiden moon of mine,
Imperial crescent, rise and shine !
XVI.
I was a fool to hide it. Here
Phantoms arise and disappear,
Obedient to the master’s wand.
The incense curls like a pale frond
Of some grey garden glory about
This room ; I take my sceptre out,
My royal crown; invoke, evoke
These phantoms in the glimmering smoke ;
And you shall see—and take no hurt—
The very limb yon garter girt.
XVII.
IT AMaman. Consider first
What we may learn, if but we will,
From that small lecture I rehearsed
With very Huxley’s strength and skill
And clarity. What do I mean,
Admitting manhood? This: to-day
I fed on oysters, ris-de-veau,
Beefsteak and grapes. Will you repay
My meal with anger, rosy grow
With shame because instead of you
I went to feed chez Lavenue?!
The habit anthropophagous,
Nice as it is, is not for us.
I love you: will you share my life,
Become my mistress or my wife?
Agreed : but can your kisses feed me?
Is it for dinner that you need me?
But think : it is for you I eat.
Even as the object that I see,
The brain ’tis pictured in ; the beat
Of nerves that mean the picture are
Not like it, but dissimilar.
How can a nervous current be
Like that Velasquez? So I find
Dinner a function of the mind,
Not like you, but essential to
(Even it) my honest love of you.
Consider then yon broidered toy
In the same aspect ! Steals no joy
Glittering beneath the sad pale face?
XVITI.
STILL grave, my budding Arahat?
I see the crux of my disgrace
Lies in the mad idea that—that !—
Is not dissimilar, usurps
The very function I have given
Blissful beyond the bliss of heaven—
Aha! there is a bird that chirps
Another song. Here’s paint and brush
And canvas. I will paint anon
The limb yon garter once was on ;
Sketch you a nude—my soul—and nude
The very human attitude
We all assume—or else are posers.
Such winners are the surest losers.
I paint her picture, recognise—
Dare you ?—one glimmer of her eyes
Like yours, one shimmer of her skin
Like that your flesh is hidden in,
One laugh upon her lips enough
Like yours for me to recollect,
1 A famous restaurateur in the Place de
Rennes.