The scientists say, little one,
That a bird develops far
Beyond man’s imperfection.
Who knows what we can learn,
Now that we, too, have wings?
He turns to the Woodcarver pointing to the pigeons:
I MIND me of one spring morning,
When first I saw them whirl
In their Winged Parliament;
’Twas May, and Venice was bridal.
Bridal she always was,
The fragile, aged city
That keeps beauty within
Her shadowy tragic heart.
’Twas May and Venice was bridal.
Golden light on the housetops,
Limpid green on the water;
Palaces gleamed and thrilled,
Pallidly swimming and breaking
Into a lovely destruction,
At every passing of oars
Along their circling mirror.
The American, a look of ineffable regret on his face, recapitulates the beauty of Venice:
Ripples on white steps breaking,
Wistaria over the doorways,
A bright bird high in a window,
Carved heads on colonnades,
Musing statues smiling
Through the tangles of a vine.
In a hundred broken trances,
A thousand flickering candles,
In glooms of the sanctuary
And burst of the priests strong song,
In processions of Corpus Christi;
A thousand broken reflections,
Sweet cries of melon vendors,
Swish of oars and of barges;
A scented warmth with the plashing
Of sinuous gondolas,
Black and gold on the color,
Fastened at the traghetti
Lolling on freshening tides,
White was the Della Salute,
Bubbling with many towers.
On the fluttering Giudecca,
Bright with its tatters and patches,
The solemn Redentore.
On the ancient hooded Rialto
Merchants clamoring still;
On the shifting Schiavoni,
Fluttering tourists and children,
Eager, impressed and caught
In enchantment older than love.
Venice the aged queen,
Took them upon her knees,
And showed them her fabulous book
Of melting picture-dreams,
Of saints and gods and kings,
Of martyrs, Doges, and Popes,
Of painters and architects;
Told them her amorous tales
Of adventure and emprise,
Of sea-fogs covering deeds,
Strange and wicked and old,
Of gallants in muffling cloaks,
Of the lions’ mouths in the square;
Told them her amorous tales,
Saying, “All ends in Beauty,”
And sent them out from her courts—
Whispering, “All ends in Beauty.”
Venice in delicate age,
Beauty in power and age,
Age like frost on the grass,
Age like the age of the tree,
Like a fountain that never dries—
Such was Venice that morn—
And the doves over it all!
The American suddenly turns, and shakes his fist in the direction of the booming of the guns. He faces the other two men demanding tensely:
Rheims had beauty like that.
France had beauty like that.
Belgium had beauty like that.
What is the doom of the world?
What must our science teach?
What must religion work?
What is it men need to know,
Before beauty like this
Can be spared to the hungry world,
That needs to drink of the cup
Of Beauty for its life?
The Bersagliere looks up; the cut on his forehead bleeds less freely but he holds his ragged handkerchief to it. As he speaks, he motions toward the unfinished Christ lying on the table—his voice a gutteral whisper.
The Bersagliere: