FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT
AND OTHER POEMS
By Coningsby Dawson
New York: Henry Holt and Company
1914
TO
JOHN KEATS
WHO, IN EXCUSE FOR A LIKE OCCASION,
WROTE:
"WERE I DEAD, I SHOULD LIKE A BOOK DEDICATED TO ME."
A WARNING TO THE READER
Here thou shalt find grave thought—the shade of thine Most is of earth, some little all divine. By hands God-given, mine, this tower doth thrive; Thine are the clouds which round my turrets drive.
CONTENTS
[ FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT ]
[ TO A YOUNG GIRL WHO SAID SHE WAS NOT BEAUTIFUL ]
[ TO ENGLAND'S GREATEST SATIRIST ]
[ FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD ]
FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT
I
(October, 1504)
[Someone sings in the street below]
Fair-fleeting Youth must snatch at happiness,
He knows not if To-morrow curse or bless,
Nor round what bend upon his travel-way
The bandit Death lurks armed—of Yesterday
His palely featured griefs he knows too well;
Therefore with jests To-day, come Heaven, come Hell,
He plucks with either hand what joys he may.
Joy is a flower
White-leafd or red,
None knows which colour
Till it is dead:
White gives forth fragrance
Pure as God's breath;
Red in its dying
Yields the gatherer death.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
So 'tis Lorenzo's song they sing to-night,
That haunting song which long years since he sang
When, with his gallants through the torch-
smirched dusk,
He laughing rode toward the Carnival,
And young girls loosened all abroad their hair
And flung up petals through the cool moonlight,
Some of which falling rested on his face,
Some of which falling covered up his eyes;
And girls there were who kissed his drooping
hands
And clasped his stirrups, begging him to stay,
To halt one little moment, stay with them:
"Life is so short. Delay with us a while."
But he rode on, and sang of joy and love.
Lorenzo il Magnifico is dead;
His lips are silent, and he now could halt
Oh, endlessly, if one of those fair maids
Should come to him imploring him to stay.
For twelve slow years within the sacristy
Of San Lorenzo he has never waked,
But has the rest he could not find in life—
Ungrateful now, because postponed too long.
If one should steal to him from out the past
And bending down should whisper low his name,
He would not hearken. True, she would be old,
As are all maids of that spent gala-night;
So, if he heard her, he would only smile,
For he loved only beauty in his day.
II
[ Someone sings in the street below]
Fair-fleeting Youth wends ever to the West,
He, like the sun, too soon must sink to rest.
Stars of Remorse, fast-following on his track,
Moon of Old-Age, can nothing turn ye back f
Ah, soon the golden Day'll have spent his breath!
Then comes the drear, eventless Night of Death
When Youth, no longer young, all joys must lack.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
"Then comes the drear, eventless Night of Death!"
'Tis true, for who in Tuscany to-day
Dares breathe the Medicean name aloud?
When a man dies, the watchers by the bed
Close down his eye-lids, so is he once dead;
Twice dead is he whose mem'ry men dang down
To dark oblivion when his soul is fled.
Florence forgets her singer, but his song
Still echoes through her streets on autumn nights,
And pausing at the door of some old friend,
Bids him remember all the hope he had
In spacious days, before Lorenzo died . . .
It seems Lorenzo's soul crept back to earth
Re-seeking Joy he coveted in life,
Seeking the happiness he never found.
Yet, was his labour lost? Did he not find?
He sang one song which lingers in men's hearts
And, having sung, he surely solved his quest.
Who of Joy's seekers finds the flower itself,
And plucking, knows the snow-white from the red?
Not I, for I've been truant in my search;
I've pluck't the mauve of Honour and the green
Of cloistered Knowledge, yellow of Romance,
The blue which feigns a deep Tranquillity,
Scarlet of Boldness, purple of Despair,
Orange of Idleness which flaunts the sun,
And indigo of wizard Heresy—
And gray which gives to Weariness unrest.
Perchance I've clutched within this eager hand
The Death of Joy—the fatal flower of blood.
I know not. This I know, I have not trod
The quiet vale where grows the flower of white.
Like an unwise distiller of perfume
I've blended each new fragrance as it came,
Made something perfect for a day—two days;
Then ruined all by adding something fresh.
First I would be a scholar, so I learned
Latin and Greek, and Mathematic Law.
Then I would be a poet, so I wrote
"Chi non puô quel che vuol, quel che puo voglia;
Che quel che non si puô folle è volere.
Adunque saggio l'uomo è da tenere,
Che da quel che non puô sua vogler toglia."
I could not live the wisdom which I taught,
So I must be a master of design
And studied sculpture with Verocchio,
Verocchio who had his dusty shop
On Amo's banks in grand Lorenzo's time.
Thither, while yet a boy, I did resort
And out of terra-cotta caused to smile
Women whose beauty ne'er hath been surpassed,
Nor equalled in the flesh for Man's delight.
Still not content, I'd be an architect
And renovate this battered world for God,
Hurling across steep valleys, mile on mile
Through cloudland, spans of marble aqueduct;
Leading chained rivers from the mountain-heights
Down to the plains where men are wont to toil,
There I would cause these Samsons of the crags,
Scenting the sea, whose waves are unconfined,
To shake themselves as once at other times,
And rush in frenzy forward turning mills.
So would each city echo to the hum
Of loom, and web, and swift-revolving wheels.
Then, when prosperity had reached its height
And merhants cavilled at each other's gains,
I'd frame for them the iron beasts of war
And hound than on to harry and destroy—
And when our world was fallen, who but I,
Da Vinci, should stand forth to raise it up?
These were my dreams; I thought myself divine—
All this was long ago, when I was young.
Next I would make me wings, and I would fly
As do the morning birds straight t'ward the sun,
Piercing the mists, rise far above the clouds
To seek out where God walks and whom He loves.
I made me wings, but had not strength to fly.
Still discontent and tethered to this world,
I strove to wrench the secret out of Life,
And swept the far horizon of the stars
If there, at least, I might discern some sign
To tell me whence souls come, to where depart.
I, in my overhaste, pursued too far,
Seeking that vague and fabled Paradise
Where Adam and his many sons sing chaunts,
While Eve walks through them pale and deified.
I missed my track in pathless swamps of Time,
I chilled my hands against the cold-dead stars,
And lost my mind in unremembered Past,
Remote from God and out of human sight.
Lastly I took to painting down my thoughts,
And pictured for the King of Portugal
That fatal meadow in the Eden Land,
Where Man's first sweet and deadly sin was
wrought.
I, in this art, all others did excel;
Yet with success I was not satisfied
But hourly craved for the impossible—
To fashion men as real as flesh and blood.
To-day I'd toil with fire in my brain
And paint away the faults of yesterday,
And shadow forth the dreams of yesternight,
And so on through long months and weary years
Till, losing heart, I'd toss my brush aside
Leaving the thing unfinished as it was—
Adding this broken promise to my last.
There's Raphael with his wide unanxious eyes,
He does his work as though it were his play;
He never talks of fame, but sings the while
He paints the Virgin with Lord Jesus Christ—
Goes to the door, throws kisses to a child,
Goes to the window, smiles to some slim girl,
And so returns and flashes kiss and smile
Into the canvas quaking 'neath his brush,
Creating thus a masterpiece sublime.
And then there's surly Michelangelo
Who chisels Davids through the death-long night,
And paints Last Judgments through the livelong
day,
Pantingly running, pace on pace with Fame,
Racing dean-limbed toward his goal in life.
But I, poor changeling, wake, and dream, and
wake,
And dream again, retarded by desire.
I was eight years in painting at Milan
A fresco for the monks of Dominic—
And even this I hear's begun to fade;
It was a picture of that sacred feast
Our Saviour gave before he went to die.
Ten years I laboured on the Sforza horse
Which should have been my monument through
Time.
I built it huge and true in every line,
Studied anatomy to make it strong,
And set on top Francesco with his sword;
But, when the time for casting had arrived
And I had done one perfect work at last,
The hungry French across the border came,
Bringing their Gascons, who got drunk and shot
The clay of my poor Titan into space.
So were ten years of strenuous effort lost;
And now I'm painting Mona Lisa's face . . .
[Someone sings in the street below]
Seize then thy gladness ere it turns to dust,
Youth can make all acts lovely, all deeds just;
Heed not the tyrant, lean Morality,
But steer thy passion down to the purple sea,
Through winding hills where Beauty hath her home
And calls to travellers, until thou come
Unto the Deep of Lovés Satiety.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
Ha-ha, my passion to the purple sea!
And yet, I'd go if Mona Lisa'd come.
We two, close-seated in one crimson boat
Would drift the yellow waters of Romance,
Glide down its stream through hills of mystery
Where Beauty roams, of which the song hath
sung,
Nor ever speak of where that tide should end.
We'd dip no oars, we'd set no hurrying sail,
But swept on the full current of desire
Would steer our course with unimpeded hands,
Watching the pleasure in each other's eyes.
Ah well, 'tis vain to talk! Two-thirds of life
Till now I've spent in spotless purity—
Affection's been retarded by desire
As has my work; my dreams have far excelled
The beauty God moulds into human shape.
The sweet perfection of the womankind
Who haunt my brain, has held me back from love.
This . . . this was so till Mona Lisa came.
Four years I've painted when it was her day,