The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Volume 1. Browning Elizabeth Barrett

      First Spirit.

      I wail, I wail! Now hear my charge to-day,

      Thou man, thou woman, marked as the misdoers

      By God's sword at your backs! I lent my clay

      To make your bodies, which had grown more flowers:

      And now, in change for what I lent, ye give me

      The thorn to vex, the tempest-fare to cleave me —

      And I wail!

      Second Spirit.

      I wail, I wail! Behold ye that I fasten

      My sorrow's fang upon your souls dishonoured?

      Accursed transgressors! down the steep ye hasten, —

      Your crown's weight on the world, to drag it downward

      Unto your ruin. Lo! my lions, scenting

      The blood of wars, roar hoarse and unrelenting —

      And I wail!

      First Spirit.

      I wail, I wail! Do you hear that I wail?

      I had no part in your transgression – none.

      My roses on the bough did bud not pale,

      My rivers did not loiter in the sun;

      I was obedient. Wherefore in my centre

      Do I thrill at this curse of death and winter? —

      Do I wail?

      Second Spirit.

      I wail, I wail! I wail in the assault

      Of undeserved perdition, sorely wounded!

      My nightingale sang sweet without a fault,

      My gentle leopards innocently bounded.

      We were obedient. What is this convulses

      Our blameless life with pangs and fever pulses?

      And I wail!

      Eve. I choose God's thunder and His angels' swords

      To die by, Adam, rather than such words.

      Let us pass out and flee.

      Adam. We cannot flee.

      This zodiac of the creatures' cruelty

      Curls round us, like a river cold and drear,

      And shuts us in, constraining us to hear.

      First Spirit.

      I feel your steps, O wandering sinners, strike

      A sense of death to me, and undug graves!

      The heart of earth, once calm, is trembling like

      The ragged foam along the ocean-waves:

      The restless earthquakes rock against each other;

      The elements moan 'round me – "Mother, mother" —

      And I wail!

      Second Spirit.

      Your melancholy looks do pierce me through;

      Corruption swathes the paleness of your beauty.

      Why have ye done this thing? What did we do

      That we should fall from bliss as ye from duty?

      Wild shriek the hawks, in waiting for their jesses,

      Fierce howl the wolves along the wildernesses —

      And I wail!

      Adam. To thee, the Spirit of the harmless earth,

      To thee, the Spirit of earth's harmless lives,

      Inferior creatures but still innocent,

      Be salutation from a guilty mouth

      Yet worthy of some audience and respect

      From you who are not guilty. If we have sinned,

      God hath rebuked us, who is over us

      To give rebuke or death, and if ye wail

      Because of any suffering from our sin,

      Ye who are under and not over us,

      Be satisfied with God, if not with us,

      And pass out from our presence in such peace

      As we have left you, to enjoy revenge

      Such as the heavens have made you. Verily,

      There must be strife between us, large as sin.

      Eve. No strife, mine Adam! Let us not stand high

      Upon the wrong we did to reach disdain,

      Who rather should be humbler evermore

      Since self-made sadder. Adam! shall I speak —

      I who spake once to such a bitter end —

      Shall I speak humbly now who once was proud?

      I, schooled by sin to more humility

      Than thou hast, O mine Adam, O my king —

      My king, if not the world's?

      Adam. Speak as thou wilt.

      Eve. Thus, then – my hand in thine —

      … Sweet, dreadful Spirits!

      I pray you humbly in the name of God,

      Not to say of these tears, which are impure —

      Grant me such pardoning grace as can go forth

      From clean volitions toward a spotted will,

      From the wronged to the wronger, this and no more!

      I do not ask more. I am 'ware, indeed,

      That absolute pardon is impossible

      From you to me, by reason of my sin, —

      And that I cannot evermore, as once,

      With worthy acceptation of pure joy,

      Behold the trances of the holy hills

      Beneath the leaning stars, or watch the vales

      Dew-pallid with their morning ecstasy, —

      Or hear the winds make pastoral peace between

      Two grassy uplands, – and the river-wells

      Work out their bubbling mysteries underground, —

      And all the birds sing, till for joy of song

      They lift their trembling wings as if to heave

      The too-much weight of music from their heart

      And float it up the æther. I am 'ware

      That these things I can no more apprehend

      With a pure organ into a full delight, —

      The sense of beauty and of melody

      Being no more aided in me by the sense

      Of personal adjustment to those heights

      Of what I see well-formed or hear well-tuned,

      But rather coupled darkly and made ashamed

      By my percipiency of sin and fall

      In melancholy of humiliant thoughts.

      But, oh! fair, dreadful Spirits – albeit this

      Your accusation must confront my