Starved Rock

by Edgar Lee Masters

THE DREAM OF TASSO

O Earth that walls these prison bars—O Stones

Which shut my body in—could I be free

If these fell and the grated door which groans

For every back scourged hither oped for me?

Freedom were what to travel you, O Earth,

When my heart makes its daily agony?

And longing such as mine cannot ungirth

Its bands and its mortality o'erleap.

Our life is love unsatisfied from birth,

Our life is longing waking or asleep,

And mine has been a vigil of quick pain.

O Leonora, thus it is I keep

Grief in my heart and weariness of brain.

How did I know these chains and bars are wrought

Of frailer stuff than space, that I could gain

In earth no respite, but a vision brought

The truth, O Leonora? It was this:

I dreamed this hopeless love, so long distraught

Was never caged, but from the first was bliss,

And moved like music from the meeting hour

To the rapt moment of the earliest kiss

Bestowed upon your hands, to gathering flower

Of lips so purely yielded, the embrace

Tender as dawn in April when a shower

Quenches with gentleness each flowering place;

So were your tears of gladness—so my hands

Which stroked your golden hair, your sunny face,

Even as flying clouds o'er mountain lands

Caress with fleeting love the morning sun.

Now I was with you, and by your commands.

Your love was mine at last completely won,

And waited but the blossom. How you sang,

Laughed, ran about your palace rooms and none

Closed doors against me, desks and closets sprang

To my touch open, all your secrets lay

Revealed to me in gladness—and this pang

Which I had borne in bitterness day by day

Was gone, nor could I bring it back, or think

How it had been, or why—this heart so gay

In sudden sunshine could no longer link

Itself with what it was.

Look! Every room

Had blooms your hands had gathered white and pink,

And drained from precious vases their perfume.

And fruits were heaped for me in golden bowls,

And tapestries from many an Asian loom

Were hung for me, and our united souls

Shone over treasure books—how glad you were

To listen to my epic, from the scrolls

Of Jerusalem, the holy sepulcher.

Still as a shaft of light you sat and heard

With veilèd eyes which tears could scarcely blur,

But flowed upon your cheek with every word.

And your hand reached for mine—you did not speak,

But let your silence tell how you were stirred

By love for me and wonder! What to seek

In earth and heaven more? Heaven at last

Was mine on earth, and for a sacred week

This heaven all of heaven.

So it passed

This week with you—you served me ancient wine.

We sat across a table where you cast

A cloth of chikku, or we went to dine

There in the stately room of heavy plate.

Or tiring of the rooms, the day's decline

Beheld us by the river to await

The evening planet, where in elfin mood

You whistled like the robin to its mate,

And won its answering call. Then through the wood

We wandered back in silence hand in hand,

And reached the sacred portal with our blood

Running so swift no ripples stirred the sand

To figures of reflection.

Once again

Within your room of books, upon the stand

The reading lights are brought to us, and then

You read to me from Plato, and my heart

Breathes like a bird at rest; the world of men,

Strife, hate, are all forgotten in this art

Of life made perfect. Or when weariness

Comes over us, you dim the lamp and start

The blue light back of Dante's bust to bless

Our twilight with its beauty.

So the time

Passes too quickly—our poor souls possess

Beauty and love a moment—and our rhyme

Which captures it, creates the illusion love

Has permanence, when even at its prime

Decay has taken it from the light above,

Or darkness underneath.

I must recur

To our first sleep and all the bliss thereof.

How did you first come to me, how confer

On me your beauty? That first night it was

The blue light back of Dante, but a blur

Of golden light our spirits, when you pass

Your hand across my brow, our souls go out

To meet each other, leave as wilted grass

Our emptied bodies. Then we grow devout,

And kneel and pray together for the gift

Of love from heaven, and to banish doubt

Of change or faithlessness. Then with a swift

Arising from the prayer you disappear.

I sleep meanwhile, you come again and lift

My head against your bosom, bringing near

A purple robe for me, and say, "Wear this,

And to your chamber go." And thus I hear,

And leave you; on my couch, where calm for bliss

I wait for you and listen, hear your feet

Whisper their secret to the tapestries

Of your ecstatic coming—O my sweet!

I touched your silken gown, where underneath

Your glowing flesh was dreaming, made complete

My rapture by upgathering, quick of breath,

Your golden ringlets loosened—and at last

Hold you in love's embrace—would it were Death!...

For soon 'twixt love and sleep the night was past,

And dawn cob-webbed the chamber. Then I heard

One faintest note and all was still—the vast

Spherule of heaven was pecked at by a bird

As it were to break the sky's shell, let the light

Of morning flood the fragments scattered, stirred

By breezes of the dawn with passing night.

We woke together, heard together, thrilled

With speechless rapture! Were your spirit's plight

As mine is with this vision, had I willed

To torture you with absence? Would I save

Your spirit if its anguish could be stilled

Only among the worms that haunt the grave?

My dream goes on a little: Day by day,

These seven days we lived together, gave

Our spirits to each other. With dismay

You watched my hour's departure. On you crept

Light shadows after moments sunny, gay.

But when the hour was come, you sat and wept,

And said to me: "I hear the rattling clods

Upon the coffin of our love." You stepped

And stood beside the casement, said "A god's

Sarcophagus this room will be as soon

As you have gone, and mine shall be the rod's

Bitterness of memory both night and noon

Amid the silence of this palace." So

I spoke and said, "If you would have the boon—

O Leonora, do I live to know

This hope too passionate made consummate?—

Yet if it be I shall return, nor go

But to return to you, and make our fate

Bound fast for life." How happy was your smile,

Your laughter soon,—and then from door to gate

I passed and left you, to be gone awhile

Around Ferrara.

In three days, it seemed,

I came again, and as I walked each mile

Counting to self—my feet lagged as I dreamed—

And said ten miles, nine miles, eight miles, at last

One mile, so many furlongs, then I dreamed

Your reading lamps were lighted for me, cast

Their yellow beams upon the mid-night air.

But oh my heart which stopped and stood aghast

To see the lamp go out and note the glare

Of blue light set behind the Dante mask!

Who wore my robe of purple false and fair?

Who drank your precious vintage from the flask

Roman and golden whence I drank so late?

Who held you in his arms and thus could ask?

Receive your love? Mother of God! What fate

Was mine beneath the darkness of that sky,

There at your door who could not leave or wait,

And heard the bird of midnight's desolate cry?

And saw at last the blue light quenched, and saw

A taper lighted in my chamber—why

This treachery, Leonora? Why withdraw

The love you gave, or eviler, lead me here,

O sorceress, before whom heaven's law

Breaks and is impotent—whose eyes no tear

Of penitence shall know, whose spirit fares

Free, without consequence, as a child could sear

Its fellow's hands with flame, or unawares,

Or with premeditation, and then laugh and turn

Upon its play. For you, light heart, no snares

Or traps of conscience wait, who thus could spurn

A love invited.

Thus about your lawn

I listened till the stars had ceased to burn,

But when I saw the imminence of the dawn

And heard our bird cry, I could stand no more,

My heart broke and I fled and wandered on

Down through the valley by the river's shore.

For when the bird cried, did you wake with him?

Did you two gaze as we had gazed before

Upon that blissful morning? I was dim

Of thought and spirit, by the river lay

Watching the swallows over the water skim,

And plucking leaves from weeds to turn or stay

The madness of my life's futility,

Grown blank as that terrific dawn—till day

Flooded upon me, noon came, what should be?

Where should I go? What prison chains could rest

So heavily on the spirit, as that free,

But vast and ruined world?

O arrowed breast

Of me, your Tasso! And you came and drew

The arrows out which kept the blood repressed,

And let my wounds the freer bleed: 'Twas you

By afternoon who walked upon an arm

More lordly than mine is. You stopped nor knew,

I saw him take your body lithe and warm

Close to his breast, yes, even where we had stood

Upon our day, embraced—feed on the charm

Of widened eyes and swiftly coursing blood.

I watched you walk away and disappear

In the deep verdure of the river wood,

Too faint to rise and fly, crushed by the fear

Of madness, sudden death!

This was my dream,

From which I woke and saw again the sheer

Walls of my prison, which no longer seem

The agony they did, even though the cell

Is the hard penalty and the cursed extreme

Hate in return for love. But oh you hell,

You boundless earth to wander in and brood—

Great prison house of grief in which to dwell,

Remembering love forgotten, pride subdued,

And love desired and found and lost again.

That is the prison which no fortitude

Can suffer, and the never dying pain

From which the spacious luring of the earth

Tempts flight for spirit freedom, but in vain!

Ah Leonora! Even from our birth

We build our prisons! What are walls like these

Beside the walls of memory, or the dearth

Of hope in all this life, the agonies

Of spiritual chains and gloom? I suffer less,

Imprisoned thus, than if the memories

Of love bestowed and love betrayed should press

Round my unresting steps. And I send up

To heaven thanks that spared that bitterness,

That garden of the soul's reluctant cup!

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