THE STRAYED REVELLER TO ULYSSES
by: Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)
- HE Gods
are happy.
- They turn on all sides
- Their shining eyes:
- And see, below them,
- The Earth, and men.
-
- They see Tiresias
- Sitting, staff in hand,
- On the warm, grassy
- Asopus' bank:
- His robe drawn over
- His old, sightless head:
- Revolving inly
- The doom of Thebes.
-
- They see the Centaurs
- In the upper glens
- Of Pelion, in the streams,
- Where red-berried ashes fringe
- The clear-brown shallow pools;
- With streaming flanks, and heads
- Rear'd proudly, snuffing
- The mountain wind.
-
- They see the Indian
- Drifting, knife in hand,
- His frail boat moor'd to
- A floating isle thick matted
- With large-leav'd, low-creeping melon-plants,
- And the dark cucumber.
- He reaps, and stows them,
- Drifting--drifting:--round him,
- Round his green harvest--plot,
- Flow the cool lake-waves:
- The mountains ring them.
-
- They see the Scythian
- On the wide Stepp, unharnessing
- His wheel'd house at noon.
- He tethers his beast down, and makes his meal,
- Mares' milk, and bread
- Bak'd on the embers:--all around
- The boundless waving grass-plains stretch, thick-starr'd
- With saffron and the yellow hollyhock
- And flag-leav'd iris flowers.
- Sitting in his cart
- He makes his meal: before him, for long miles,
- Alive with bright green lizards,
- And the springing bustard fowl,
- The track, a straight black line,
- Furrows the rich soil: here and there
- Clusters of lonely mounds
- Topp'd with rough-hewn,
- Grey, rain-blear'd statues, overpeer
- The sunny Waste.
-
- They see the Ferry
- On the broad, clay-laden
- Lone Chorasmian stream: thereon,
- With snort and strain,
- Two horses, strongly swimming, tow
- The ferry-boat, with woven ropes
- To either bow
- Firm-harness'd by the mane:--a Chief,
- With shout and shaken spear
- Stands at the prow, and guides them: but astern,
- The cowering Merchants, in long robes,
- Sit pale beside their wealth
- Of silk-bales and of balsam-drops,
- Of gold and ivory,
- Of turquoise-earth and amethyst,
- Jasper and chalcedony,
- And mild-barr'd onyx stones.
- The loaded boat swings groaning
- In the yellow eddies.
- The Gods behold them.
-
- They see the Heroes
- Sitting in the dark ship
- On the foamless, long-heaving,
- Violet sea:
- At sunset nearing
- The Happy Islands.
-
- These things, Ulysses,
- The wise Bards also
- Behold and sing.
- But oh, what labour!
- O Prince, what pain!
-
- They too can see
- Tiresias:--but the Gods,
- Who give them vision,
- Added this law:
- That they should bear too
- His groping blindness,
- His dark foreboding,
- His scorn'd white hairs;
- Bear Hera's anger
- Through a life lenthen'd
- To seven ages.
-
- They see the Centaurs
- On Pelion:--then they feel,
- They too, the maddening wine
- Swell their large veins to bursting: in wild pain
- They feel the biting spears
- Of the grim Lapithae, and Theseus, drive,
- Drive crashing through their bones: they feel
- High on a jutting rock in the red stream
- Alcmena's dreadful son
- Ply his bow:--such a price
- The Gods exact for song;
- To become what we sing.
-
- They see the Indian
- On his mountain lake:--but squalls
- Make their skiff reel, and worms
- In the unkind spring have gnaw'd
- Their melon-harvest to the heart: They see
- The Scythian:--but long frosts
- Parch them in winter-time on the bare Stepp,
- Till they too fade like grass: they crawl
- Like shadows forth in spring.
-
- They see the Merchants
- On the Oxus' stream:--but care
- Must visit first them too, and make them pale.
- Whether, through whirling sand,
- A cloud of desert robber-horse has burst
- Upon their caravan: or greedy kings,
- In the wall'd cities the way passes through,
- Crush'd them with tolls: or fever-airs,
- On some great river's marge,
- Mown them down, far from home.
-
- They see the Heroes
- Near harbour:--but they share
- Their lives, and former violent toil, in Thebes,
- Seven-gated Thebes, or Troy;
- Or where the echoing oars
- Of Argo first
- Startled the unknown Sea.
-
- The old Silenus
- Came, lolling in the sunshine,
- From the dewy forest coverts,
- This way, at noon.
- Sitting by me, while his Fauns
- Down at the water side
- Sprinkled and smooth'd
- His drooping garland,
- He told me these things.
-
- But I, Ulysses,
- Sitting on the warm steps,
- Looking over the valley,
- All day long, have seen,
- Without pain, without labour,
- Sometimes a wild-hair'd Maenad;
- Sometimes a Faun with torches;
- And sometimes, for a moment,
- Passing through the dark stems
- Flowing-rob'd--the belov'd,
- The desir'd, the divine,
- Belov'd Iacchus.
-
- Ah cool night-wind, tremulous stars!
- Ah glimmering water--
- Fitful earth-murmur--
- Dreaming woods!
- Ah golden-hair'd, strangely-smiling Goddess,
- And thou, prov'd, much enduring,
- Wave-toss'd Wanderer!
- Who can stand still?
- Ye fade, ye swim, ye waver before me.
- The cup again!
-
- Faster, faster,
- O Circe, Goddess,
- Let the wild thronging train,
- The bright procession
- Of eddying forms,
- Sweep through my soul!
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