In the name of Time

IN THE NAME OF TIME
OTHER WORKS BY MICHAEL FIELD
A TRAGEDY BY MICHAEL FIELD THE POETRY BOOKSHOP 35 DEVONSHIRE ST. THEOBALDS RD. LONDON W.C. MCMXIX
“In the Name of Time.”— The Winter’s Tale , iv, I, chorus .
ἅπανθ᾽ ὁ μακρὸς κἀναρίθμητος χρόνος φύει τ᾽ ἄδηλα καὶ φανέντα κρύπτεται: κοὐκ ἔστ᾽ ἄελπτον οὐδέν, ἀλλ᾽ ἁλίσκεται χὠ δεινὸς ὅρκος χαἰ περισκελεῖς φρένες.
Sophocles—Ajax 646.
Quoted from R. C. Trevelyan’s Translation on the Cover.
Cardinals, Nobles, Monks, Servants.
IN THE NAME OF TIME A TRAGEDY
Scene: Paris. A Hall in the Royal Palace.
Carloman is pacing backward and forward: he pauses by a crucifix set up at the further end of the hall .
Thou sayest truly that I am—a King He said Who laid His life down on the Cross: So will I be, a King. I will possess The great reality. I war and govern, I can strike hard as Charles the Hammerer; Men say I have my father’s qualities, And in the brief months of my sovereignty The infidel has recognised my blood: But this is nothing! Phantom-Emperors Have made the throne phantasmal. I have felt In Zacharias, the great Pope, a force That spreads like spring across the world. No more Will I be petty marshal to a crew That hack and murder, while the royal faces Of wandering martyrs scintillate and thrill. There is a glorious Betterness at work Amid the highways and the solitudes; I would be with it—in obscurity, No matter!—with the river as it shapes Its cisterns in the hills or where the wind First draws its silver volumes to a voice: Behind, at the beginning, from within: A cry, a pang—what shall respond to it, Who help me? I have fiery thoughts of God, I would attempt Him. In the wilderness Maybe He will unbosom.