THE FIRST VISION OF HELEN
by: Stephen Vincent Benét (1898-1943)
- Argument--Itys, nurtured by centaurs, meets and falls in love with Helen of Troy, before her marriage with Menelaus. What befell therefrom.
- lowly blanch-handed Dawn, eyes half-awake,
- Upraised magnificent the silver urn,
- Heaped with white roses at the trembling lip,
- Flowers that burn with crystalline accord
- And die not ever. Like a pulsing heart
- Beat from within against the fire-loud verge
- A milky vast transparency of light
- Heavy with drowning stars; a swimming void
- Of august ether, formless as the cloud,
- And light made absolute. The mountains sighed,
- Turning in sleep. Dawn held the frozen flame
- And instant high above the shaggy world,
- Then, to the crowing of a thousand cocks,
- Poured out on earth the unconquerable sun!
- The centaurs awoke! they aroused from their beds of pine,
- Their long flanks hoary with dew, and their eyes, deep-drowned
- In the primal slumber of stones, stirred bright to the shine!
- And they stamped with their hooves and their gallop abased the ground!
- Swifter than arrowy birds in an eager sky,
- White-browed kings of the hills where old Titans feast,
- --Cheiron ordered the charge with a neighing cry,
- And the thousand hunters tramped like a single beast!
- Beautiful monstrous dreams they seemed as they ran,
- Trees come alive at the nod of a god grown mute!
- Their eyes looked up to the sun like a valiant man;
- Their bows clashed shrill on the loins and limbs of the brute!
- Laughing, rejoicing, white as a naked birch,
- Slim as a spear in a torrent of moving towers,
- Itys, the prince, ran gay in the storm of their search,
- Silverly shod on feet that outstripped the Hours!
- Over by Sparta bays a horn!
- Ohé, Helena!
- Over by Sparta bays a horn!
- And the black hound grins to his milk-teeth torn;
- And the tall stag wishes he'd never been born!
- Helena hunts on the hills!
- Past the Eurotas the chase sweeps hot!
- Ohé, Helena!
- Past the Eurotas the chase sweeps hot!
- And the pack has nosed a royal slot!
- And a white-armed girl has a magic lot!
- Helena hunts on the hills!
- Echoed at Elis the dogs give tongue!
- Ohé, Helena!
- Echoed at Elis the dogs give tongue!
- The stag flees on but his mort is sung!
- And the world and Helen are very young!
- Helena hunts on the hills!
- Down by Argos the flight is stayed!
- Ohé, Helena!
- Down by Argos the flight is stayed!
- And proud blood stifles the reeking blade!
- And they cut the tongue for the golden maid!
- Helena hunts on the hills!
- Over in Troy by a kingly door,
- Ohé, Helena!
- Over in Troy by a kingly door,
- Hector's sword is asleep from war!
- "Wait!" whines the bitter steel, "Two years more!"
- Helena hunts on the hills!
- So the two molten clamors fused a space
- As silver marries brass to make a bell,
- Then thrust apart and vanished, save for some
- Faint interlocking tentacles of sound
- That chimed to Itys. Something halted him
- From the swift gallop and the embracing air,
- Put in him troubling languor, drove him out
- To rest beside a round coin of a pool,
- Casually flung among a cloud of pines.
- He dreamed as a dog dreams, uneasily.
- The dreams blow North and South.
- Pitiless-bright they gleam.
- Send, Zeus, a flower across my mouth!
- The wing of a silver dream!
- The visions smoke from the deep,
- Bannering East and West.
- Guide, Zeus, the stumbling old feet of Sleep,
- That bring a dream to my breast!
- I have gazed in immaculate eyes!
- My soul is a flame astream!
- Zeus, strike swift from the raging skies,
- That I may die with my dream!
- He waked and saw two hounds, tugging their leash,
- Burst through the covert, and heard laughter bell
- Like a clear stream as Helen followed them.
- They drank, were quiet. Itys stood at gaze;
- Seeing in all things one miraculous face,
- And how her tunic left one bright breast bare,
- And how she smoothed her hair back with one hand....
- But very presently he was aware
- That some one not himself possessed his voice
- And used it now to talk with--babbling words
- Foolish and laughable to that still Beauty.
- Tempest from the valiant sky,
- Music of the shaken reed,
- Can a thousand kisses buy
- You and April, mine indeed?
- Fling the dice and let them lie!
- Not a joy from all your mind
- Will you toss me, beggar's dole,
- And you never would be kind
- Though I kissed your very soul!
- Race the courses up the wind!
- Queen of desperate alarms,
- Though Destruction be the priest
- That must bring me to your arms,
- He shall wed our bones at least!
- Life was vintage, borage-crowned,
- Pour the cup upon the ground!
- Vines grow in my garden;
- Blossoms a snake in size.
- Sun warms and knife-winds harden,
- Till the silk-stained globes arise;
- And men peer over the hedges
- With fury come in their eyes.
- Pears grow in my garden;
- Honey a wild bee clips.
- Robbers afraid of pardon,
- The princes steal from their ships,
- And pluck the fruit of iniquity
- And take it not from their lips.
- Fate grows in my garden;
- Black as a cypress shoot.
- Sleepily smiles the warden,
- Guarding the gorgeous loot,
- Seeing the Tree, Deliciousness,
- And the tall lords dead at its root!
- Their lips broke from the kiss. Helena sighed,
- Then started up, afraid. Straight toward the pool
- Rending the brake with hounds, shouting aloud,
- Crashed like a cast spear the returning chase.
- "Itys!" she said, "My brothers. They will kill."
- He looked down at his hands that held no sword.
- Helena's hounds belled answer to their pack.
- Swift as a closing hand, unreal as dream,
- Danger shut down around them.
- "Dear" he said.
- Pollux, the shining-speared, burst through the leaves.
- * * *
- After the slaying, wide-eyed Helen paused
- To clasp the dead hands loosely, and unhook
- A swaying torque of gold from the white neck
- That it might burn, a sun, between her breasts.
- --The chase passed with hot noon, and in the cool
- A straying centaur came, snuffed the new blood
- And, seeing Itys dead, neighed in loud fear;
- Calling the hairy tramplers of the woods
- To mourn their friend with strange solemnities.
- Close his eyes with the coins; bind his chin with the shroud;
- Carry this clay along, in the time of the westing cloud;
- Lay you the cakes beside, for the three-mouthed dog of Hell;
- Slain on the grass in fight, surely his end is well.
- Love was the wind he sought, ignorant whence it went;
- Now he has clasped it close, silent and eloquent;
- Slow as the stream and strong, answering knee to knee,
- Carry this clay along--it is more wise that we.
- The chanting died away upon the hills,
- Sobbingly slow.
- And Night reversed the urn;
- Drawing all sunlight back to the hot deeps,
- And leaving the high heavens full of stars.
"The First Vision of Helen" is reprinted from Heavens and Earth: A Book of Poems. Stephen Vincent Benet. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1920. |
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