The Great Mirror of Same-Sex Love - Poetry - 72. ...Still when his pilgrim words return...

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Vincent Benson

from The Temple of Friendship

 

 

from A Song of a Song

 

O the trees die down in the autumn,

And the leaves are off the spray;

But I have a flower that will not pass,

When bloom has passed away.

 

O the ivied wall may molder

And the ivy-fingers green

Unclasp; but I have a tendril

That clasps, and is unseen.

 

And the winter world is dark,

And the frost is over the knoll:

But it cannot freeze my sunny flower,

It cannot touch my soul.

 

O I have a song within me,

And it longs to sing of the years:

And it rises high in the sunshine,

But fall again in tears. [i]

 

 

The Hearth Knoweth

 

Perfect he was not, nor would I contend

That others have not passed his virtue’s line

With ample margin: but, as friend with friend,

I have not found his equal, nor he mine.

So said himself one evening in sweet June,

When up the pleasant lane alone we walked,

Drinking the stillness in, and a thin moon

Eyed us askance, yet loving, as we talked

Of things that neither ever told his soul

Till he had told his friend, nor thought the half

Alone; together, could not shrink the whole,

Nor fear the selfish mockery of a laugh.

That was our nature’s link. I ask no more.

O Death, Death, Death, why is he gone before? [ii]

 

 

Mnemosyne

 

Still when at morn his pilgrim words return,

Which lit the wings of love with golden foil,

Some way more clearly know I to discern

Those beauties which no earth can ever soil.

The Ice-King’s frosted fingers on the pane

Weave not so silver-bright a tracery

As those bright words which like a silver rain

Trace him in crystals on my memory.

Living, while I shall live, and then comes death,

And takes my picture from me?—Nay, I know

That it shall blend with that undying breath

Which lives beyond small world and little woe:

Such words, once said, a deathless sweet content,

Such thought, once mused, a force that ne’er is spent. [iii]

 

 

Whom the Gods Love

 

Cover him, bright as ever

The winter roses bloom;

Lay out their younger fellow

Within the darkened room.

 

Bring just that sprig of heather,

A breath from his wild hill!

Lay sword and spur beside him

And leave the brave boy still.

 

The freshening morn of April

Unclasped him with a sigh;

The eve of torn November,

Received him home to die.

 

He left with life to venture,

His face in smiled was set.

He came with life behind him,

The smile is living yet.

 

He would not feel his sorrows,

But for another’s grieve.

Upon so bright a picture

Earth dare no sorrow leave.

 

Bring down his hand entwining

That ruffled ring of hair.

Call in his faithful sentry

And leave him sleeping there. [iv]

 

 

The Many-Headed Multitude

 

Art thou more blest for worldly much ado?

Shall we less kind to general notice seem?

Then, if that touch me, I’ll for pardon sue

To him whose havior I thus disesteem:

Who made his friends against acquaintance voice,

And found their faults, but not by tongue malign;

Nay, in such contradictions did rejoice,

To say ‘Ye scorn him, then I’ll bind him mine.

For having found him in all matters true,

Save that I feared he was too popular,

Your condemnation now condemneth you,

And lights the zenith brilliance of his star:

And this shall to our arms but blazon give,

Lest we as dull and carpet knights should live.’ [v]

 

 

The Trappings and the Suits of Woe

 

I need no black to prick the memory

That could not falter since I met thee first;

Thou crav’st no tombstone as a debt from me,

Whose debts by that could never be reversed:

No bubble ceremony thee can please,

Who all thy life did’st ceremony shun –

No vaunt of funeral, no common fees,

Can pleasure thee whose even glass is run.

No wreath, no lettered narrative of woe,

Save only perhaps to tell them ‘He is dead!’

No circumstance, no dark memorial show

To draw him following, who alway led.

Give to the body, for the body grows,

But never think the soul hath aught with those. [vi]

 

 

The Officer’s Grave

 

Lay the earth light above him,

And volley the last salute:

And let who knew him love him,

And who knew not, be mute.

 

With arms reversed, unweeping,

We soldiers turn away;

And leave the strong man sleeping,

Who missed his call today.

 

We shall not find a brother

We e’er shall love so true;

‘Tis long before another

Will love the men he knew

 

So kindly, firmly, knighting

Us peers, himself above:

Who won his medals fighting,

But won his men by love. [vii]

 

 

The Thoughts of Man

 

O when I sent the summer’s last red rose

To bear good speed to thee, and dear regret

That thou shouldest spur afield to front our foes,

With joy thy courage was so firmly set –

Had I a thought to see thee honored pass

Into the tomb, to hear the volleyed roar,

And know the bannered body in the grass

Was once my friend, and now is mine no more:

At least on earth, where I am bid to stay,

And grapple with the inevitable truth,

And will not from my dusty post away,

Nor give thee manly my unmanly ruth?

O, not a thought: for to my loving eye

Thou wast too glorious, too bright, to die. [viii]

 

 

The Challenge

 

And if Death asks me ‘Art thou still untaught?’

With drying lips I’ll answer, ‘Even so.

Take thou my books, my pen, my treasured thought,

My robes, my gold, my things of outward show.

Strip and have done with this o’erplastering clay,

But near my soul, no lanky finger draw –

Else with thy royal self I’ll havoc play,

And Love-in-Death thrice throw thee on the floor.

Unhandle me, thou masked, cold deceit;

‘Tis thy appearance, not thy stuff, that kills.

Thou wast no terror to my friend: unmeet

That I, his friend, should dread thy passing chills.’

Nor had I fear for him when he was gone,

Nor shall I fear when I am called anon. [ix]

 

 

from The Star of Love

 

Just so much light in heaven that one may see

Four taper spires of stone,

And that dislimned, majestic, wealth of tree,

Tall, dense, and lone;

And I to thee

My heart’s sweet moan,

Dearest of all things dear, outpour,

And love thee absent but the more.

 

Just so much silence in the night to hear

The night’s low songs of rest;

Just so much love that cannot prove it’s peer

Within my breast;

Just so much fear,

That time may wrest

From me agaze on yon warm eye,

It’s dearest emblem – and I sigh. [x]

 

 

Timon

 

They passed away, the friends, the day

Of love, the youth so fair;

They left me lorn, before the morn,

They left me to my care.

I prayed for death, but ere the breath

Was spent in me, foredone,

O’er crimson hill, o’er sparkling rill

Came up the glorious sun.

 

The ocean’s roar did slowly pour

A peace into my breast:

Eternity was in that sea.

Nor I, nor sea, could rest:

And yet I knew within the blue,

And understandeth the foam,

There was a tide that I should ride,

There was a setting home. [xi]

 

 

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Epigraph

To my Friend

Jon G. Findlay

 

Music and poetry in birth are twins;

And I, well knowing how thou lov’st first,

Am fain to set, by music’s sister nursed,

My humble music to songs within.

Nor have I failed, though little praise I win,

Shall I but touch in all thy heart one chord

Which rings, as some lost harmony restored,

To make sweet music of the soul begin.

Nor lay I here presumingly a claim

To be a poet for my labor spent;

Yet, could I love again, would not repent

The inward choice, though still denied the name.

Enough that we, who care not for the fame,

Be each other’s poet, and content.

—Vincent Benson, [xii]

1903