Nets to Catch the Wind

Elinor Wylie

This page copyright © 2002 Blackmask Online.

http://www.blackmask.com

  • BEAUTY
  • THE EAGLE AND THE MOLE
  • MADMAN'S SONG
  • THE PRINKIN' LEDDIE
  • AUGUST
  • THE CROOKED STICK
  • ATAVISM
  • WILD PEACHES
  • SANCTUARY
  • THE LION AND THE LAMB
  • THE CHURCH-BELL
  • A CROWDED TROLLEY CAR
  • BELLS IN THE RAIN
  • WINTER SLEEP
  • VILLAGE MYSTERY
  • SUNSET ON THE SPIRE
  • ESCAPE
  • THE FAIRY GOLDSMITH
  • “FIRE AND SLEET AND CANDLELIGHT”
  • BLOOD FEUD
  • SEA LULLABY
  • NANCY
  • A PROUD LADY
  • THE TORTOISE IN ETERNITY
  • INCANTATION
  • SILVER FILIGREE
  • THE FALCON
  • BRONZE TRUMPETS AND SEA WATER— ON TURNING LATIN INTO ENGLISH
  • SPRING PASTORAL
  • VELVET SHOES
  • VALENTINE

  • Produced by Suzanne L. Shell, Tom Allen, Charles Franks
    and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.



    BEAUTY





    Say not of Beauty she is good,
    Or aught but beautiful,
    Or sleek to doves' wings of the wood
    Her wild wings of a gull.


    Call her not wicked; that word's touch
    Consumes her like a curse;
    But love her not too much, too much,
    For that is even worse.


    O, she is neither good nor bad,
    But innocent and wild!
    Enshrine her and she dies, who had
    The hard heart of a child.

    THE EAGLE AND THE MOLE



    Avoid the reeking herd,
    Shun the polluted flock,
    Live like that stoic bird,
    The eagle of the rock.


    The huddled warmth of crowds
    Begets and fosters hate;
    He keeps, above the clouds,
    His cliff inviolate.


    When flocks are folded warm,
    And herds to shelter run,
    He sails above the storm,
    He stares into the sun.


    If in the eagle's track
    Your sinews cannot leap,
    Avoid the lathered pack,
    Turn from the steaming sheep.


    If you would keep your soul
    From spotted sight or sound,
    Live like the velvet mole;
    Go burrow underground.


    And there hold intercourse
    With roots of trees and stones,
    With rivers at their source,
    And disembodied bones.

    MADMAN'S SONG



    Better to see your cheek grown hollow,
    Better to see your temple worn,
    Than to forget to follow, follow,
    After the sound of a silver horn.


    Better to bind your brow with willow
    And follow, follow until you die,
    Than to sleep with your head on a golden pillow,
    Nor lift it up when the hunt goes by.


    Better to see your cheek grown sallow
    And your hair grown gray, so soon, so soon,
    Than to forget to hallo, hallo,
    After the milk-white hounds of the moon.

    THE PRINKIN' LEDDIE



    _"The Hielan' lassies are a' for spinnin'
    The Lowlan' lassies for prinkin' and pinnin';
    My daddie w'u'd chide me, an' so w'u'd my minnie
    If I s'u'd bring hame sic a prinkin' leddie.”_


    Now haud your tongue, ye haverin' coward,
    For whilst I'm young I'll go flounced an' flowered,
    In lutestring striped like the strings o' a fiddle,
    Wi' gowden girdles aboot my middle.


    In your Hielan' glen, where the rain pours steady,
    Ye'll be gay an' glad for a prinkin' leddie;
    Where the rocks are all bare an' the turf is all sodden,
    An' lassies gae sad in their homespun an' hodden.


    My silks are stiff wi' patterns o' siller,
    I've an ermine hood like the hat o' a miller,
    I've chains o' coral like rowan berries,
    An' a cramoisie mantle that cam' frae Paris.


    Ye'll be glad for the glint o' its scarlet linin'
    When the larks are up an' the sun is shinin';
    When the winds are up an' ower the heather
    Your heart'll be gay wi' my gowden feather.


    When the skies are low an' the earth is frozen,
    Ye'll be gay an' glad for the leddie ye've chosen,
    When ower the snow I go prinkin' an' prancin'
    In my wee red slippers were made for dancin'.


    It's better a leddie like Solomon's lily
    Than one that'll run like a Hielan' gillie
    A-linkin' it ower the leas, my laddie,
    In a raggedy kilt an' a belted plaidie!

    AUGUST



    Why should this Negro insolently stride
    Down the red noonday on such noiseless feet?
    Piled in his barrow, tawnier than wheat,
    Lie heaps of smoldering daisies, somber-eyed,
    Their copper petals shriveled up with pride,
    Hot with a superfluity of heat,
    Like a great brazier borne along the street
    By captive leopards, black and burning pied.


    Are there no water-lilies, smooth as cream,
    With long stems dripping crystal? Are there none
    Like those white lilies, luminous and cool,
    Plucked from some hemlock-darkened northern stream
    By fair-haired swimmers, diving where the sun
    Scarce warms the surface of the deepest pool?

    THE CROOKED STICK



    First Traveler: What's that lying in the dust?
    Second Traveler: A crooked stick.
    First Traveler: What's it worth, if you can trust
      To arithmetic?
    Second Traveler: Isn't this a riddle?
    First Traveler: No, a trick.
    Second Traveler: It's worthless. Leave it where it lies.
    First Traveler: Wait; count ten;
      Rub a little dust upon your eyes;
      Now, look again.
    Second Traveler: Well, and what the devil is it, then?
    First Traveler: It's the sort of crooked stick that shepherds know.
    Second Traveler: Some one's loss!
    First Traveler: Bend it, and you make of it a bow.
      Break it, a cross.
    Second Traveler: But it's all grown over with moss!

    ATAVISM



    I always was afraid of Somes's Pond:
    Not the little pond, by which the willow stands,
    Where laughing boys catch alewives in their hands
    In brown, bright shallows; but the one beyond.
    There, when the frost makes all the birches burn
    Yellow as cow-lilies, and the pale sky shines
    Like a polished shell between black spruce and pines,
    Some strange thing tracks us, turning where we turn.


    You'll say I dream it, being the true daughter
    Of those who in old times endured this dread.
    Look! Where the lily-stems are showing red
    A silent paddle moves below the water,
    A sliding shape has stirred them like a breath;
    Tall plumes surmount a painted mask of death.

    WILD PEACHES



    1


    When the world turns completely upside down
    You say we'll emigrate to the Eastern Shore
    Aboard a river-boat from Baltimore;
    We'll live among wild peach trees, miles from town.
    You'll wear a coonskin cap, and I a gown
    Homespun, dyed butternut's dark gold color.
    Lost, like your lotus-eating ancestor,
    We'll swim in milk and honey till we drown.


    The winter will be short, the summer long,
    The autumn amber-hued, sunny and hot,
    Tasting of cider and of scuppernong;
    All seasons sweet, but autumn best of all.
    The squirrels in their silver fur will fall
    Like falling leaves, like fruit, before your shot.



    2


    The autumn frosts will lie upon the grass
    Like bloom on grapes of purple-brown and gold.
    The misted early mornings will be cold;
    The little puddles will be roofed with glass.
    The sun, which burns from copper into brass,
    Melts these at noon, and makes the boys unfold
    Their knitted mufflers; full as they can hold,
    Fat pockets dribble chestnuts as they pass.


    Peaches grow wild, and pigs can live in clover;
    A barrel of salted herrings lasts a year;
    The spring begins before the winter's over.
    By February you may find the skins
    Of garter snakes and water moccasins
    Dwindled and harsh, dead-white and cloudy-clear.



    3


    When April pours the colors of a shell
    Upon the hills, when every little creek
    Is shot with silver from the Chesapeake
    In shoals new-minted by the ocean swell,
    When strawberries go begging, and the sleek
    Blue plums lie open to the blackbird's beak,
    We shall live well—we shall live very well.


    The months between the cherries and the peaches
    Are brimming cornucopias which spill
    Fruits red and purple, somber-bloomed and black;
    Then, down rich fields and frosty river beaches
    We'll trample bright persimmons, while we kill
    Bronze partridge, speckled quail, and canvas-back.



    4


    Down to the Puritan marrow of my bones
    There's something in this richness that I hate.
    I love the look, austere, immaculate,
    Of landscapes drawn in pearly monotones.
    There's something in my very blood that owns
    Bare hills, cold silver on a sky of slate,
    A thread of water, churned to milky spate
    Streaming through slanted pastures fenced with stones.


    I love those skies, thin blue or snowy gray,
    Those fields sparse-planted, rendering meager sheaves;
    That spring, briefer than apple-blossom's breath,
    Summer, so much too beautiful to stay,
    Swift autumn, like a bonfire of leaves,
    And sleepy winter, like the sleep of death.

    SANCTUARY



    This is the bricklayer; hear the thud
    Of his heavy load dumped down on stone.
    His lustrous bricks are brighter than blood,
    His smoking mortar whiter than bone.


    Set each sharp-edged, fire-bitten brick
    Straight by the plumb-line's shivering length;
    Make my marvelous wall so thick
    Dead nor living may shake its strength.


    Full as a crystal cup with drink
    Is my cell with dreams, and quiet, and cool....
    Stop, old man! You must leave a chink;
    How can I breathe? _You can't, you fool!_

    THE LION AND THE LAMB



    I saw a Tiger's golden flank,
    I saw what food he ate,
    By a desert spring he drank;
    The Tiger's name was Hate.


    Then I saw a placid Lamb
    Lying fast asleep;
    Like a river from its dam
    Flashed the Tiger's leap.


    I saw a Lion tawny-red,
    Terrible and brave;
    The Tiger's leap overhead
    Broke like a wave.


    In sand below or sun above
    He faded like a flame.
    The Lamb said, “I am Love”;
    “Lion, tell your name.”


    The Lion's voice thundering
    Shook his vaulted breast,
    “I am Love. By this spring,
    Brother, let us rest.”

    THE CHURCH-BELL



    As I was lying in my bed
    I heard the church-bell ring;
    Before one solemn word was said
    A bird began to sing.


    I heard a dog begin to bark
    And a bold crowing cock;
    The bell, between the cold and dark,
    Tolled. It was five o'clock.


    The church-bell tolled, and the bird sang,
    A clear true voice he had;
    The cock crew, and the church-bell rang,
    I knew it had gone mad.


    A hand reached down from the dark skies,
    It took the bell-rope thong,
    The bell cried “Look! Lift up your eyes!”
    The clapper shook to song.


    The iron clapper laughed aloud,
    Like clashing wind and wave;
    The bell cried out “Be strong and proud!”
    Then, with a shout, “Be brave!”


    The rumbling of the market-carts,
    The pounding of men's feet
    Were drowned in song; “Lift up your hearts!”
    The sound was loud and sweet.


    Slow and slow the great bell swung,
    It hung in the steeple mute;
    And people tore its living tongue
    Out by the very root.

    A CROWDED TROLLEY CAR



    The rain's cold grains are silver-gray
    Sharp as golden sands,
    A bell is clanging, people sway
    Hanging by their hands.


    Supple hands, or gnarled and stiff,
    Snatch and catch and grope;
    That face is yellow-pale, as if
    The fellow swung from rope.


    Dull like pebbles, sharp like knives,
    Glances strike and glare,
    Fingers tangle, Bluebeard's wives
    Dangle by the hair.


    Orchard of the strangest fruits
    Hanging from the skies;
    Brothers, yet insensate brutes
    Who fear each others' eyes.


    One man stands as free men stand,
    As if his soul might be
    Brave, unbroken; see his hand
    Nailed to an oaken tree.

    BELLS IN THE RAIN



    Sleep falls, with limpid drops of rain,
    Upon the steep cliffs of the town.
    Sleep falls; men are at peace again
    Awhile the small drops fall softly down.


    The bright drops ring like bells of glass
    Thinned by the wind, and lightly blown;
    Sleep cannot fall on peaceful grass
    So softly as it falls on stone.


    Peace falls unheeded on the dead
    Asleep; they have had deep peace to drink;
    Upon a live man's bloody head
    It falls most tenderly, I think.

    WINTER SLEEP



    When against earth a wooden heel
    Clicks as loud as stone and steel,
    When snow turns flour instead of flakes,
    And frost bakes clay as fire bakes,
    When the hard-bitten fields at last
    Crack like iron flawed in the cast,
    When the world is wicked and cross and old,
    I long to be quit of the cruel cold.


    Little birds like bubbles of glass
    Fly to other Americas,
    Birds as bright as sparkles of wine
    Fly in the night to the Argentine,
    Birds of azure and flame-birds go
    To the tropical Gulf of Mexico:
    They chase the sun, they follow the heat,
    It is sweet in their bones, O sweet, sweet, sweet!
    It's not with them that I'd love to be,
    But under the roots of the balsam tree.


    Just as the spiniest chestnut-burr
    Is lined within with the finest fur,
    So the stony-walled, snow-roofed house
    Of every squirrel and mole and mouse
    Is lined with thistledown, sea-gull's feather,
    Velvet mullein-leaf, heaped together
    With balsam and juniper, dry and curled,
    Sweeter than anything else in the world.
    O what a warm and darksome nest
    Where the wildest things are hidden to rest!
    It's there that I'd love to lie and sleep,
    Soft, soft, soft, and deep, deep, deep!

    VILLAGE MYSTERY



    The woman in the pointed hood
    And cloak blue-gray like a pigeon's wing,
    Whose orchard climbs to the balsam-wood,
    Has done a cruel thing.


    To her back door-step came a ghost,
    A girl who had been ten years dead,
    She stood by the granite hitching-post
    And begged for a piece of bread.


    Now why should I, who walk alone,
    Who am ironical and proud,
    Turn, when a woman casts a stone
    At a beggar in a shroud?


    I saw the dead girl cringe and whine,
    And cower in the weeping air—
    But, oh, she was no kin of mine,
    And so I did not care!

    SUNSET ON THE SPIRE



    All that I dream
      By day or night
    Lives in that stream
      Of lovely light.
    Here is the earth,
      And there is the spire;
    This is my hearth,
      And that is my fire.
    From the sun's dome
      I am shouted proof
    That this is my home,
      And that is my roof.
    Here is my food,
      And here is my drink,
    And I am wooed
      From the moon's brink.
    And the days go over,
      And the nights end;
    Here is my lover,
      Here is my friend.
    All that I
      Could ever ask
    Wears that sky
      Like a thin gold mask.

    ESCAPE



    When foxes eat the last gold grape,
    And the last white antelope is killed,
    I shall stop fighting and escape
    Into a little house I'll build.


    But first I'll shrink to fairy size,
    With a whisper no one understands,
    Making blind moons of all your eyes,
    And muddy roads of all your hands.


    And you may grope for me in vain
    In hollows under the mangrove root,
    Or where, in apple-scented rain,
    The silver wasp-nests hang like fruit.

    THE FAIRY GOLDSMITH



    Here's a wonderful thing,
    A humming-bird's wing
      In hammered gold,
    And store well chosen
    Of snowflakes frozen
      In crystal cold.


    Black onyx cherries
    And mistletoe berries
      Of chrysoprase,
    Jade buds, tight shut,
    All carven and cut
      In intricate ways.


    Here, if you please
    Are little gilt bees
      In amber drops
    Which look like honey,
    Translucent and sunny,
      From clover-tops.


    Here's an elfin girl
    Of mother-of-pearl
      And moonshine made,
    With tortoise-shell hair
    Both dusky and fair
    In its light and shade.


    Here's lacquer laid thin,
    Like a scarlet skin
      On an ivory fruit;
    And a filigree frost
    Of frail notes lost
      From a fairy lute.


    Here's a turquoise chain
    Of sun-shower rain
      To wear if you wish;
    And glimmering green
    With aquamarine,
      A silvery fish.


    Here are pearls all strung
    On a thread among
      Pretty pink shells;
    And bubbles blown
    From the opal stone
      Which ring like bells.


    Touch them and take them,
    But do not break them!
      Beneath your hand
    They will wither like foam
    If you carry them home
      Out of fairy-land.


    O, they never can last
    Though you hide them fast
      From moth and from rust;
    In your monstrous day
    They will crumble away
      Into quicksilver dust.

    “FIRE AND SLEET AND CANDLELIGHT"



    For this you've striven
      Daring, to fail:
    Your sky is riven
      Like a tearing veil.


    For this, you've wasted
      Wings of your youth;
    Divined, and tasted
      Bitter springs of truth.


    From sand unslaked
      Twisted strong cords,
    And wandered naked
      Among trysted swords.


    There's a word unspoken,
      A knot untied.
    Whatever is broken
      The earth may hide.


    The road was jagged
      Over sharp stones:
    Your body's too ragged
      To cover your bones.


    The wind scatters
      Tears upon dust;
    Your soul's in tatters
      Where the spears thrust.


    Your race is ended—
      See, it is run:
    Nothing is mended
      Under the sun.


    Straight as an arrow
      You fall to a sleep
    Not too narrow
      And not too deep.

    BLOOD FEUD



    Once, when my husband was a child, there came
    To his father's table, one who called him kin,
    In sunbleached corduroys paler than his skin.
    His look was grave and kind; he bore the name
    Of the dead singer of Senlac, and his smile.
    Shyly and courteously he smiled and spoke;
    “I've been in the laurel since the winter broke;
    Four months, I reckon; yes, sir, quite a while.”


    He'd killed a score of foemen in the past,
    In some blood-feud, a dark and monstrous thing;
    To him it seemed his duty. At the last
    His enemies found him by a forest spring,
    Which, as he died, lay bright beneath his head,
    A silver shield that slowly turned to red.

    SEA LULLABY



    The old moon is tarnished
    With smoke of the flood,
    The dead leaves are varnished
    With color like blood,


    A treacherous smiler
    With teeth white as milk,
    A savage beguiler
    In sheathings of silk,


    The sea creeps to pillage,
    She leaps on her prey;
    A child of the village
    Was murdered to-day.


    She came up to meet him
    In a smooth golden cloak,
    She choked him and beat him
    To death, for a joke.


    Her bright locks were tangled,
    She shouted for joy,
    With one hand she strangled
    A strong little boy.


    Now in silence she lingers
    Beside him all night
    To wash her long fingers
    In silvery light.

    NANCY



    You are a rose, but set with sharpest spine;
    You are a pretty bird that pecks at me;
    You are a little squirrel on a tree,
    Pelting me with the prickly fruit of the pine;
    A diamond, torn from a crystal mine,
    Not like that milky treasure of the sea
    A smooth, translucent pearl, but skilfully
    Carven to cut, and faceted to shine.


    If you are flame, it dances and burns blue;
    If you are light, it pierces like a star
    Intenser than a needlepoint of ice.
    The dexterous touch that shaped the soul of you,
    Mingled, to mix, and make you what you are,
    Magic between the sugar and the spice.

    A PROUD LADY



    Hate in the world's hand
    Can carve and set its seal
    Like the strong blast of sand
    Which cuts into steel.


    I have seen how the finger of hate
    Can mar and mold
    Faces burned passionate
    And frozen cold.


    Sorrowful faces worn
    As stone with rain,
    Faces writhing with scorn
    And sullen with pain.


    But you have a proud face
    Which the world cannot harm,
    You have turned the pain to a grace
    And the scorn to a charm.


    You have taken the arrows and slings
    Which prick and bruise
    And fashioned them into wings
    For the heels of your shoes.


    From the world's hand which tries
    To tear you apart
    You have stolen the falcon's eyes
    And the lion's heart.


    What has it done, this world,
    With hard finger tips,
    But sweetly chiseled and curled
    Your inscrutable lips?

    THE TORTOISE IN ETERNITY



    Within my house of patterned horn
    I sleep in such a bed
    As men may keep before they're born
    And after they are dead.


    Sticks and stones may break their bones,
    And words may make them bleed;
    There is not one of them who owns
    An armor to his need.


    Tougher than hide or lozenged bark,
    Snow-storm and thunder proof,
    And quick with sun, and thick with dark,
    Is this my darling roof.


    Men's troubled dreams of death and birth
    Pulse mother-o'-pearl to black;
    I bear the rainbow bubble Earth
    Square on my scornful back.

    INCANTATION



    A white well
    In a black cave;
    A bright shell
    In a dark wave.


    A white rose
    Black brambles hood;
    Smooth bright snows
    In a dark wood.


    A flung white glove
    In a dark fight;
    A white dove
    On a wild black night.


    A white door
    In a dark lane;
    A bright core
    To bitter black pain.


    A white hand
    Waved from dark walls;
    In a burnt black land
    Bright waterfalls.


    A bright spark
    Where black ashes are;
    In the smothering dark
    One white star.

    SILVER FILIGREE



    The icicles wreathing
      On trees in festoon
    Swing, swayed to our breathing:
      They're made of the moon.


    She's a pale, waxen taper;
      And these seem to drip
    Transparent as paper
      From the flame of her tip.


    Molten, smoking a little,
      Into crystal they pass;
    Falling, freezing, to brittle
      And delicate glass.


    Each a sharp-pointed flower,
      Each a brief stalactite
    Which hangs for an hour
      In the blue cave of night.

    THE FALCON



    Why should my sleepy heart be taught
    To whistle mocking-bird replies?
    This is another bird you've caught,
    Soft-feathered, with a falcon's eyes.


    The bird Imagination,
    That flies so far, that dies so soon;
    Her wings are colored like the sun,
    Her breast is colored like the moon.


    Weave her a chain of silver twist,
    And a little hood of scarlet wool,
    And let her perch upon your wrist,
    And tell her she is beautiful.

    BRONZE TRUMPETS AND SEA WATER—
    ON TURNING LATIN INTO ENGLISH



    Alembics turn to stranger things
    Strange things, but never while we live
    Shall magic turn this bronze that sings
    To singing water in a sieve.


    The trumpeters of Caesar's guard
    Salute his rigorous bastions
    With ordered bruit; the bronze is hard
    Though there is silver in the bronze.


    Our mutable tongue is like the sea,
    Curled wave and shattering thunder-fit;
    Dangle in strings of sand shall be
    Who smooths the ripples out of it.

    SPRING PASTORAL



    Liza, go steep your long white hands
    In the cool waters of that spring
    Which bubbles up through shiny sands
    The color of a wild-dove's wing.


    Dabble your hands, and steep them well
    Until those nails are pearly white
    Now rosier than a laurel bell;
    Then come to me at candle-light.


    Lay your cold hands across my brows,
    And I shall sleep, and I shall dream
    Of silver-pointed willow boughs
    Dipping their fingers in a stream.

    VELVET SHOES



    Let us walk in the white snow
      In a soundless space;
    With footsteps quiet and slow,
      At a tranquil pace,
      Under veils of white lace.


    I shall go shod in silk,
      And you in wool,
    White as a white cow's milk,
      More beautiful
      Than the breast of a gull.


    We shall walk through the still town
      In a windless peace;
    We shall step upon white down,
      Upon silver fleece,
      Upon softer than these.


    We shall walk in velvet shoes:
      Wherever we go
    Silence will fall like dews
      On white silence below.
      We shall walk in the snow.

    VALENTINE



    Too high, too high to pluck
    My heart shall swing.
    A fruit no bee shall suck,
    No wasp shall sting.


    If on some night of cold
    It falls to ground
    In apple-leaves of gold
    I'll wrap it round.


    And I shall seal it up
    With spice and salt,
    In a carven silver cup,
    In a deep vault.


    Before my eyes are blind
    And my lips mute,
    I must eat core and rind
    Of that same fruit.


    Before my heart is dust
    At the end of all,
    Eat it I must, I must
    Were it bitter gall.


    But I shall keep it sweet
    By some strange art;
    Wild honey I shall eat
    When I eat my heart.


    O honey cool and chaste
    As clover's breath!
    Sweet Heaven I shall taste
    Before my death.