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

“Boniface urged me, Este could not wait,”

The chieftain stammered; “let me die in peace —

“Forget me! Was it I who craved increase

“Of rule? Do you and Friedrich plot your worst

“Against the Father: as you found me first

“So leave me now. Forgive me! Palma, sure,

“Is at Goito still. Retain that lure —

“Only be pacified!”

The country rung

With such a piece of news: on every tongue,

How Ecelin’s great servant, congeed off,

Had done a long day’s service, so, might doff

The green and yellow, and recover breath

At Mantua, whither, — since Retrude’s death,

(The girlish slip of a Sicilian bride

From Otho’s house, he carried to reside

At Mantua till the Ferrarese should pile

A structure worthy her imperial style,

The gardens raise, the statues there enshrine,

She never lived to see) — although his line

Was ancient in her archives and she took

A pride in him, that city, nor forsook

Her child when he forsook himself and spent

A prowess on Romano surely meant

For his own growth — whither he ne’er resorts

If wholly satisfied (to trust reports)

With Ecelin. So, forward in a trice

Were shows to greet him. “Take a friend’s advice,”

Quoth Naddo to Sordello, “nor be rash

“Because your rivals (nothing can abash

“Some folks) demur that we pronounced you best

“To sound the great man’s welcome; ‘t is a test,

“Remember! Strojavacca looks asquint,

“The rough fat sloven; and there ‘s plenty hint

“Your pinions have received of late a shock —

“Outsoar them, cobswan of the silver flock!

“Sing well!” A signal wonder, song ‘s no whit

Facilitated.

Fast the minutes flit;

Another day, Sordello finds, will bring

The soldier, and he cannot choose but sing;

So, a last shift, quits Mantua — slow, alone:

Out of that aching brain, a very stone,

Song must be struck. What occupies that front?

Just how he was more awkward than his wont

The night before, when Naddo, who had seen

Taurello on his progress, praised the mien

For dignity no crosses could affect —

Such was a joy, and might not he detect

A satisfaction if established joys

Were proved imposture? Poetry annoys

Its utmost: wherefore fret? Verses may come

Or keep away! And thus he wandered, dumb

Till evening, when he paused, thoroughly spent,

On a blind hill-top: down the gorge he went,

Yielding himself up as to an embrace.

The moon came out; like features of a face,

A querulous fraternity of pines,

Sad blackthorn clumps, leafless and grovelling vines

Also came out, made gradually up

The picture; ‘t was Goito’s mountain-cup

And castle. He had dropped through one defile

He never dared explore, the Chief erewhile

Had vanished by. Back rushed the dream, enwrapped

Him wholly. ‘T was Apollo now they lapped,

Those mountains, not a pettish minstrel meant

To wear his soul away in discontent,

Brooding on fortune’s malice. Heart and brain

Swelled; he expanded to himself again,

As some thin seedling spice-tree starved and frail,

Pushing between cat’s head and ibis’ tail

Crusted into the porphyry pavement smooth,

— Suffered remain just as it sprung, to soothe

The Soldan’s pining daughter, never yet

Well in her chilly green-glazed minaret, —

When rooted up, the sunny day she died,

And flung into the common court beside

Its parent tree. Come home, Sordello! Soon

Was he low muttering, beneath the moon,

Of sorrow saved, of quiet evermore, —

Since from the purpose, he maintained before,

Only resulted wailing and hot tears.

Ah, the slim castle! dwindled of late years,

But more mysterious; gone to ruin — trails

Of vine through every loophole. Nought avails

The night as, torch in hand, he must explore

The maple chamber: did I say, its floor

Was made of intersecting cedar beams?

Worn now with gaps so large, there blew cold streams

Of air quite from the dungeon; lay your ear

Close and ‘t is like, one after one, you hear

In the blind darkness water drop. The nests

And nooks retain their long ranged vesture-chests

Empty and smelling of the iris root

The Tuscan grated o’er them to recruit

Her wasted wits. Palma was gone that day,

Said the remaining women. Last, he lay

Beside the Carian group reserved and still.

The Body, the Machine for Acting Will,

Had been at the commencement proved unfit;

That for Demonstrating, Reflecting it,

Mankind — no fitter: was the Will Itself

In fault?

His forehead pressed the moonlit shelf

Beside the youngest marble maid awhile;

Then, raising it, he thought, with a long smile,

“I shall be king again!” as he withdrew

The envied scarf; into the font he threw

His crown

Next day, no poet! “Wherefore?” asked

Taurello, when the dance of Jongleurs, masked

As devils, ended; “don’t a song come next?”

The master of the pageant looked perplexed

Till Naddo’s whisper came to his relief.

“His Highness knew what poets were: in brief,

“Had not the tetchy race prescriptive right

“To peevishness, caprice? or, call it spite,

“One must receive their nature in its length

“And breadth, expect the weakness with the strength!”

— So phrasing, till, his stock of phrases spent,

The easy-natured soldier smiled assent,

Settled his portly person, smoothed his chin,

And nodded that the bull-bait might begin.

Table of Contents

And the font took them: let our laurels lie!

Braid moonfern now with mystic trifoly

Because once more Goito gets, once more,

Sordello to itself! A dream is o’er,

And the suspended life begins anew;

Quiet those throbbing temples, then, subdue

That cheek’s distortion! Nature’s strict embrace,

Putting aside the past, shall soon efface

Its print as well — factitious humours grown

Over the true — loves, hatreds not his own —

And turn him pure as some forgotten vest

Woven of painted byssus, silkiest

Tufting the Tyrrhene whelk’s pearl-sheeted lip,

Left welter where a trireme let it slip

I’ the sea, and vexed a satrap; so the stain

O’ the world forsakes Sordello, with its pain,

Its pleasure: how the tinct loosening escapes,

Cloud after cloud! Mantua’s familiar shapes

Die, fair and foul die, fading as they flit,

Men, women, and the pathos and the wit,

Wise speech and foolish, deeds to smile or sigh

For, good, bad, seemly or ignoble, die.

The last face glances through the eglantines,

The last voice murmurs, ‘twixt the blossomed vines,

Of Men, of that machine supplied by thought

To compass self-perception with, he sought

By forcing half himself — an insane pulse

Of a god’s blood, on clay it could convulse,

Never transmute — on human sights and sounds,

To watch the other half with; irksome bounds

It ebbs from to its source, a fountain sealed

Forever. Better sure be unrevealed

Than part revealed: Sordello well or ill

Is finished: then what further use of Will,

Point in the prime idea not realized,

An oversight? inordinately prized,

No less, and pampered with enough of each

Delight to prove the whole above its reach.

“To need become all natures, yet retain

“The law of my own nature — to remain