A Legend of Old Persia and Other Poems | Page 8

surely take no
rest

Till I fashion this wondrous thing.
I will swear an oath to
eschew
The white wine and the red,
To eat no delicate meats
Nor
break the fair, white bread.
I will not walk in the city
But labour
here alone
In the dew and the dusk and the flush
Till the vision
smiles from the stone."
Six days he wrought at the marble,
But
cunning had left his hand,
And his fingers would not fashion
What

his soul could understand.
Six days he fasted and travailed,
Hard
was the watch to keep,
So the chisel fell from his fingers
And he
sank with a sob to sleep.
But a vision came to his slumber
Beautiful
as before,
Floating in with the moonbeam
Gliding over the floor.

It floated in with the moonbeam
And stood beside his bed,

Wonderful, white, and gracious,
And this was the word it said.

"Courage, oh! Adeimantus,
I am the perfect thing
To stand in a
shrine of jasper
And blind the eyes of a king.
I am the strange desire,

The glory beyond the dream,
The passion above the song,
The
spirit-light of the gleam.
I come to my best beloved,
Not actual,
from afar,
Fairer than hope or thought,
More beautiful than a star.

Courage, oh! Adeimantus,
Lay strength and strength to your soul.

You shall fashion surely a part
Tho' you may not grasp the whole."
Pygmalion.
Once ... I seem to remember....
Crept in the noonday heat
A boy
with a crooked shadow
Which capered along the street.
A boy
whose shadow was mocked at
By the children passing along,

Straight and tall and beautiful,
Happy with laughter and song.
So,
he envied their beauty....
He who was crooked and brown....
The
strong youths of the mountain,
The white girls of the town,
Envied
their happy meetings
And the tender words they spoke
In the
shadow of the temples,
Under the groves of oak.

And his lonely
heart was stricken
That never his lot might be
To walk with a maid
who loved him....
So quaint and crooked was he.
II
Thus was my heart once stricken
And I repined for a while,
I but a
boy in years,
Who longed for a maiden's smile.
Till once on a day
in summer
My soul was touched with a gleam,
And I woke from
my morbid fancies
Like one from an evil dream,
And knew that the
gods in their wisdom
Had made and set me apart.
Lean, misshapen,

and ugly....
No toy for a maiden's heart.
And I felt with a heart
awakened
That leapt in a riot of joy,
The heart of a wise man and
proud
Not the heart of a moody boy.
Viewing the old things anew

With an inner wonder in each:
The cloud ships driven thro' heaven,

The sea rolling into the beach,
The magic heart of the woodland,

The loves of nymph and faun,
The splendour of starlight nights,

The calm inviolate dawn.
III
Thus was my spirit quickened,
And once on a lucky day
I drew a
bird on plaster,
And modelled a horse in clay;
Kneeling under a
wall
Where a shadow fell on the street,
Eyes and mind intent
In
the midst of the noonday heat.
Eyes and mind intent....
And a
stranger passed my way,
... The shadow grew and lengthened
As he
stopped to watch my play.
He looked at the little horse,
He looked
at the winging bird;
And ere I noticed his presence
He touched me
and spoke a word:
"Hast thou the mind and will
As thou hast hand
and sight...?
Follow me if thou hast
And climb ... oh! climb to the
height."
IV
So I followed him to his workshop
And stayed there a year and a year

Working under a master
Who praised me and held me dear,
Till
at last a day arose
When, taking my hand in his own,
"You have my
knowledge," he said,
"And now you must stand alone."
And tho' I
sorrowed to leave him

My heart was ready to sing,
So first in praise
of the gods
I made for an offering
(Even as does a shepherd
His
rustic altar of sods)
Bright forms larger than human
As mortals
dream of the gods.
Then, in my strange world-worship,
The Tritons,
Lords of the Sea,
The creatures which haunt the woodland,
Happy
and shy and free,
Nymphs and satyrs and fauns
Who worship the
great god Pan,
And lastly the mighty heroes
Who fashion the mind

of man.
V
Thus thought I and thus wrought I,
And my power grew greater still.

I rose to the heights of passion
And sounded the depths of will,

Reaching out to the farthest
Winnowing down to the last,
Gazing
into the future
And diving into the past.
Higher and ever higher

Like an eagle soared my art
And I praised the most high gods
Who
made and set me apart.
And Prince and poet and painter
Travelled
to touch my hand,
The minds which had toiled and suffered,
The
minds which could understand,
Marvelling in my workshop
At the
shining forms they saw....
The children of my spirit
Born of a
higher law.
VI
But last on a day in summer
(An evil day it seems)
I thought, "I will
fashion a woman
As I have seen in dreams.
I, who never loved
woman
That breathed and spoke and moved,
Will fashion a noble
statue
To show what I could have loved;
A glorious naked figure

Untouched by time or fate,
A symbol of all that might be
And she
shall be my mate.
Not mate of my crooked body,
Lean, misshapen
and brown,
(No longer I feared my