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48 THE WORLD’S TRAGEDY. IST NYMPH From what a lash ! 2ND NYMPH O the monstrous travail—gape In the belly of the sky ! IST NYMPH Shall the man beget the ape, All the wine of time run dry ? 2ND NYMPH Ah ! the grisly spoil of rape Dark with vilest ecstasy ! IST NYMPH Listen, how shall life escape From such death it breedeth by ? 2ND NYMPH Hangs there not a single grape From that nightshade galaxy ?
46 THE WORLD’S TRAGEDY. Ah ! my pan, if blood suffice, Crush the world as in a vice ! IST NYMPH King of kings, the world shall bleed In the vilest vice of vices. 2ND NYMPH While the riddle thou hast ree’d Mocks them with its “ Blood suffices ”. ALEXANDER Know ye, bright ones, who I am ? I have slain a thing adored At this altar to its Lord, As a butcher kills a lamb. IST NYMPH That shall be — thou rightly fearest — Till the Balance weigh the Ram. 2ND NYMPH Men shall even slay their dearest For the sake of that slain lamb.
THE RED STAR. 49 IST NYMPH Name the sharp accursed shape, Stigma of its prodigy ! 2ND NYMPH Is it but a whirling storm ? ALEXANDER Nay ! the star is cruciform. IST NYMPH Thus the holy cross is cloven From Pan’s purpose purple-woven. Even for centuries nine and ten, Life of women — death of men ! In that sinister sad star Men shall bear the upright bar, Hanged for honesty and truth, Wisdom, courage, love, or youth. Women bear the cross-bar, living In the filth beyond believing. Svelte or buxom, fair or dark, Go to the maw of the greedy shark
… Hide from us the knowledge of This eclipse of joy and love ! ALEXANDER Is there nothing but distress In the mystic vision lurking ? IST NYMPH Ah ! but were thy loveliness With the God supremely working ! ALEXANDER Nymph, thy face is like a flower Fairer than the driven foam ! Shining like an honeycomb Is thy body — and thy soul Shoots me to the gilded goal. I shall master yet the hour. SATYRS King of Kings, we bow before Thee ; As our Master we adore Thee.
…was softer than a dove ; He was made for human love. I have given him for food To the lusty panic rood, And the obscure brotherhood. IST NYMPH So the doves of men begotten Shall be plucked, and bruised, and rotten. 2ND NYMPH So shall full-fed brothel-knaves Kick them to indecent graves In the name of the sweet Dove That is God — for God is Love. ALEXANDER See ye naught but cruelty In the infinite To-Be ? Look you, I have seen a star Threatening pestilence or war In the vault that hangs — a splash Like a scar.
…! Away to the leap to The soft-smiling pool Whose kisses shall creep to Us virginal cool ! Race and bescatter The dew in the grass ; The nymph and her satyr ! The lad and his lass !
THE GARDEN OF EROS. I5 All the boy’s undulant grace To the nymph’s fantastic face ; All the maiden’s chaste delight To the flushed hermaphrodite ; While the balanced strength of man Bears its witness unto Pan. CHRYSIS Ah, the purple vein that glows Through the eyelids as they close ! Hush ! the breeze that fans the fern Bids the midnight moon to turn. We must sleep Soft and deep : We must wake — and bathe — and burn. The company being asleep, fallen lax in mid-caress, there enter a Philosopher Heracleitus and his Disciple Chrysippus. HERACLEITU…
…by stealth, By their slenderness or sleekness. For harlot worn and blubbing baby Nineteen centuries shall see Life run horizontally. 2ND NYMPH Soul shall follow body’s station. They shall cling to degradation, Dance to the clank of the chains that eat Deep ulcers in their fettered feet. Lock love the dove in a close cage, And loose the tiger marriage : To the camel of joy be a needle’s eye, And a wolf’s-throat to monogamy. Youth’s lusty god shall turn them sick, While they dote on age’s gilded stick. Beauty shall shiver in the cold While they w…
…he ass, though the names of Charles Watts and Joseph Mc. Cabe somehow instinctively suggest themselves in this connection. The satyr and nymph crowd are mostly painted from imagination, for on my honour I hardly know so many decent people ; I painted Jesus first as a joke — the brass bottle of our braying clergy ; I developed him as a low class Jew [not knowing any South African millionnaires I took him straight out of the Gospel] and lastly I miracu- lously turned him into a real man, chiefly out of compli- ment to the distinguished fictionist…