Robert Browning - The Complete Poems of Robert Browning - 22 Poetry Collections in One Edition

Again the world of good thoughts left for me.

There were bright troops of undiscovered suns.

Each equal in their radiant course. There were

Clusters of far fair isles, which ocean kept

For his own joy, and his waves broke on them

Without a choice. And there was a dim crowd

Of visions, each a part of the dim whole.

And a star left his peers and came with peace

Upon a storm, and all eyes pined for him,

And one isle harboured a sea-beaten ship,

And the crew wandered in its bowers, and plucked

Its fruits, and gave up all their hopes for home.

And one dream came to a pale poet’s sleep,

And he said, “I am singled out by God,

“No sin must touch me.” I am very weak,

But what I would express is, — Leave me not,

Still sit by me — with beating breast, and hair

Loosened — watching earnest by my side,

Turning my books, or kissing me when I

Look up — like summer wind. Be still to me

A key to music’s mystery, when mind fails,

A reason, a solution and a clue,

You see I have thrown off my prescribed rules:

I hope in myself — and hope, and pant, and love —

You’ll find me better — know me more than when

You loved me as I was. Smile not; I have

Much yet to gladden you — to dawn on you.

No more of the past — I’ll look within no more —

I have too trusted to my own wild wants —

Too trusted to myself — to intuition.

Draining the wine alone in the still night,

And seeing how — as gathering films arose,

As by an inspiration life seemed bare

And grinning in its vanity, and ends

Hard to be dreamed of, stared at me as fixed,

And others suddenly became all foul,

As a fair witch turned an old hag at night.

No more of this — we will go hand in hand,

I will go with thee, even as a child,

Looking no further than thy sweet commands.

And thou hast chosen where this life shall be —

The land which gave me thee shall be our home,

Where nature lies all wild amid her lakes

And snow-swathed mountains, and vast pines all girt

With ropes of snow — where nature lies all bare,

Suffering none to view her but a race

Most stinted and deformed — like the mute dwarfs

Which wait upon a naked Indian queen.

And there (the time being when the heavens are thick

With storms) I’ll sit with thee while thou dost sing

Thy native songs, gay as a desert bird

Who crieth as he flies for perfect joy,

Or telling me old stories of dead knights,

Or I will read old lays to thee — how she,

The fair pale sister, went to her chill grave

With power to love, and to be loved, and live.

Or will go together, like twin gods

Of the infernal world, with scented lamp

Over the dead — to call and to awake —

Over the unshaped images which lie

Within my mind’s cave — only leaving all

That tells of the past doubts. So when spring comes,

And sunshine comes again like an old smile,

And the fresh waters, and awakened birds,

And budding woods await us — I shall be

Prepared, and we will go and think again,

And all old loves shall come to us — but changed

As some sweet thought which harsh words veiled before;

Feeling God loves us, and that all that errs,

Is a strange dream which death will dissipate;

And then when I am firm we’ll seek again

My own land, and again I will approach

My old designs, and calmly look on all

The works of my past weakness, as one views

Some scene where danger met him long before

Ah! that such pleasant life should be but dreamed!

But whate’er come of it — and tho’ it fade,

And tho’ ere the cold morning all be gone

As it will be; — tho’ music wait for me,

And fair eyes and bright wine, laughing like sin,

Which steals back softly on a soul half saved;

And I be first to deny all, and despise

This verse, and these intents which seem so fair;

Still this is all my own, this moment’s pride,

No less I make an end in perfect joy.

E’en in my brightest time, a lurking fear

Possessed me. I well knew my weak resolves,

I felt the witchery that makes mind sleep

Over its treasures — as one half afraid

To make his riches definite — but now

These feelings shall not utterly be lost,

I shall not know again that nameless care,

Lest leaving all undone in youth, some new

And undreamed end reveal itself too late:

For this song shall remain to tell for ever,

That when I lost all hope of such a change

Suddenly Beauty rose on me again.

No less I make an end in perfect joy,

For I, having thus again been visited,

Shall doubt not many another bliss awaits,

And tho’ this weak soul sink, and darkness come,

Some little word shall light it up again,

And I shall see all clearer and love better;

I shall again go o’er the tracts of thought,

As one who has a right; and I shall live

With poets — calmer — purer still each time,

And beauteous shapes will come to me again,

And unknown secrets will be trusted me,

Which were not mine when wavering — but now

I shall be priest and lover, as of old.

Sun-treader, I believe in God, and truth,

And love; and as one just escaped from death

Would bind himself in bands of friends to feel

He lives indeed — so, I would lean on thee;

Thou must be ever with me — most in gloom

When such shall come — but chiefly when I die,

For I seem dying, as one going in the dark

To fight a giant — and live thou for ever,

And be to all what thou hast been to me —

All in whom this wakes pleasant thoughts of me,

Know my last state is happy — free from doubt,

Or touch of fear. Love me and wish me well!

RICHMOND,

October 22, 1832.

Je crains biers que mon pauvre ami ne soit pas toujours parfaitement compris dans ce qui reste à lire de cet étrange fragment — mais it est moins propre que tout autre à éclaircir ce qui de sa nature ne peut jamais être que songe et confusion. D’ailleurs je ne sais trop si en cherchant à mieux co-ordonner certaines parties l’on ne courrait pas le risque de nuire au seul mérite auquel une production si singulière peut prétendre — celui de donner une idée assez précise du genre qu’elle n’a fait que ébaucher. — Ce début sans prétention, ce remuement des passions qui va d’abord en accroissant et puis s’appaise par degrés, ces élans de l’âme, ce retour soudain sur soi-même. — Et par dessus tout, la tournure d’esprit toute particulière de mon ami rendent les changemens presque impossibles. Les raisons qu’il fait valoir ailleurs, et d’autres encore plus puissantes, ont fait trouver grâce à mes yeux pour cet écrit qu’autrement je lui eusse conseillé de jeter au feu. — Je n’en crois pas moins au grand principe de toute composition — à ce principe de Shakespeare, de Raffaelle, de Beethoven, d’où il suit que la concentration des idées est dûe bien plus à leur conception, qu’a leur mise en execution … j’ai tout lieu de craindre que la première de ces qualités ne soit encore étrangère à mon ami — et je doute fort qu’un redoublement de travail lui fasse acquérir la seconde. Le mieux serait de brûler ceci; mais que faire?

Je crois que dans ce qui suit il fait allusion à un certain examen qu’il fit autrefois de l’âme ou plutôt de son âme, pour découvrir la suite des objets auxquels il lui serait possible d’atteindre, et dont chacun une fois obtenu devait former une espèce de plateau d’ou l’on pouvait aperçevoir d’autres buts, d’autres projets, d’autres jouissances qui, à leur tour, devaient être surmontés. Il en résultait que l’oubli et le sommeil devaient tout terminer. Cette idée que je ne saisis pas parfaitement lui est peutêtre aussi intelligible qu’à moi.