The House of the Titans and other Poems

O, no, I was not wanton with that man. But to his imaginations, yes. I made Myself a hundred natures. It is writ, My myriad girlhood, in that printed page. Or was it I? Did I but play the part His magic plotted for me? Did he know That his imaginations lived in me And swayed me to be one of their own kind, To act the bawd for whom an emperor Might cast his world away: or it might be A maid to whom the world had never come, All innocent upon a fairy isle. Yet at the court of the great queen I had But one disdainful face, however many Wild hearts might beat within me: and high lords And admirals, who had wrecked Armadas, were Wrecked on a flinty look. O, I remember. My heart swoons to think upon that hour, When a young learned gentleman, his head Dizzy with gaudy words that had caught fire From sun and moon, importuned me to know The latest prince of speech. And I was swept, Half laughing and half scornful, to my fate. Yet I had not been one hour in the room Ere I was lit by many torches, and Knew, being in that humble lodging house, That I had come unto a lordlier court Than the great queen's, a court where kings and princes Robeless could awe by their own majesty, Or, being bare to the spirit, seemed as low As if they had not legions at their call. And there were elves that frolicked in his thought, And giddy knaves whose very sins seemed rooted In a wild nature, and might win them heaven To make laughter for angels. I knew a man Who held these very knaves had much to teach us As the apostles: and we would lose less Missing the queen of the dawn out of the myths, Juno, with grave eyes under heavenly brows And proud, starred peacocks, than if his rascal Jack Had never lived in story. Not at once Did I know all. No man will ever know The mystery of his being, of multitudes Within one spirit. Yet I knew from the first That they were with him, incorporeal real, Taking immortal bodies from sweet sounds, Leaping into our thought as gay moon, A slippery dancer, reels from wave to wave. He had hardly spoken ere a spirit of his Had flashed within me, and I had made answer Out of its nature. He turned upon me eyes So wonder-wise, so humorous kind, that I Was melted from my art of dignity And became once more the laughing girl who ran Under her father's elms, who knew no rank But life; jesting with folly; with her wit Pelting both lords and grooms. O, the sweet play, When all the delicate spirit's aflame, and points With its own fire the airy rapier, nor knows In that obscurity of delight the end That it desires, the point in the other's breast. For we are both half fearing and half faining The exquisite anguish of our pierc'ed heart. So flashed our speech. The first of many times. I had not more easily as a small child Told my heart stories than I could to him Tell everything in thought, as if he were An ampler, wiser heart-nurse to myself. And though I was all love I shrank from that, The mating of lips and body, lest having all I should have less than love; in the king's bed Be absent from his court. And when I was Within myself, the angels of wisdom and love Held passionate council in me. I was rent By images of love and by their martyrdoms, For I had buried many an image deep In the heart's doubt what would be noble to do. And for there was that warfare in me the girl Was ripened to full woman. I looked back Upon the woman I had been before As she upon her childhood. I was I think The only creature that by flesh and blood Entered the court of his spirit: and all others Came through some crystal mystic gate unto The throne of his heart as vassals might, and left Not tribute of pearl, ivory or gold But breathed their very spirits into him That he would dress as emperors and clowns, Play one against another. I do believe The mighty dead from unimagined homes Dreamed back their greatness and their frailty, The very lion front that awed the world, Shaking it by the thunder of words that fell From the imperious heaven of the high will. And how could it be other? We are not gods To create life, and only what is given us Order and rule. I know it, I, that was A glowing mirror to him, would sometimes, Ere he had spoken, find living in myself His latest imagination, the very trick Of its mad mood, and hear it afterwards Dressed in the actor's body cry on a stage. If it was so with me, might he not be A hostel for all life? For some design, I know not what. Perhaps that we who play Upon our surfaces might pry more deep In our rich mystery, the way be pointed That life must travel. I thought it so, that he Was magicked by the gods for their design, And I was handmaid to it. O how frail The instruments the gods must use in us! There came to the queen's court their masterpiece, A boy that stayed the breath, all glow and fire, Unflawed, so airy ivory of limb He might have leaped from an archangel's dream. And was it destiny that two such wonders Of soul and body should meet, be to each other Mystery and enchantment: beauty that had No soul but beauty itself: and the wise soul, Baffled in reading where there was not mind, Fell into dreaming, and at last was stayed On the body's miracle. And I grew sick Seeing the dawn of an unnatural love, The kind that marred the Grecian genius, and closed The nobleness of mind that had begun With Homer's tale. I cried upon myself As all corrupt to so misread the eyes That rested on the boy, or the sweet words. But when I knew that I had not misread, O, what heart shaking, what deep fountains of scorn Or pity broke out like madness. I lay awake Buffeted by fierce winds from heaven and hell, Searching the blackness of my night for God. And knew not whether God or devil counseled, Self love, or love that crucifies itself, Or anguish of long stemmed desire to have What passes from it. But I thought to stay That love unnatural test his spirit's walls Should thicken, and there be a solitude In that high court. And I used every art Of heart and body and gave the body to him, And had no joy in giving. The holy fires Whereof the Elohim compounded us If they glow not to one pure breathing, but Are all disordered, war in us and burn us By hurt of beauty or love, or wisdom cries, A mourner in the thick of erring delight. And he to whom I was no mystery, But a dear friend, stayed not his heart on me, For that infinitude of his wide mind, Searching ever for the undiscovered heart, Wandered away from me unto that one Beautiful, baleful and uncharted star Of boyhood. I knew my sacrifice was vain And a new madness shook me, making me All pitiless, with a mad woman's will To win her way even if soul be lost. And all affections in me made bitter, changed In dark reverse unto their opposites. I was as one who hears an angel sing To a sweet lute, then turns to her dark angel To sing the same song to the trembling strings, And pure and holy are made poisonous. When we are maddened, and the goblins in us Riot in incredible loves and hates I do not know if god or demon guides The storm while we are blinded. I was not The same although I moved to the same end. For now I was all hopeless in love, yet played With all my woman's art upon the boy, Meeting him in palace chambers or In garden alleys. I was I know not what Unconquered and rich wonder to his youth That had won all easily before, but now Met but a lovely mockery when he prayed; And the unravished beauty was to him, As with that other, the sole star of the heart. And so I drew him, half forgetting at times My purpose, for he was a masterpiece Of heaven, and how sweet to play with, till My purpose and some wildness in my blood Conspired together. I yielded to him, became A mistress unto two, one godlike in mind And one, the outer image of a god. And in intoxication of conquest the boy Wore all a victor's airs with me until Even rumor had no further secrets to tell. And then at last one day I met the other And he had known, and never was there face So ravaged, and my heart in every beat Let rain a drop all fiery red. There was I know not what wild pity in my eyes, And the god knows that at no other time Was I so lost from myself, so terribly his. Yet at his anguished words I wore the air Of one bred in the gay court of the world Above the ceremony by which the herd Order their ways, one who took carelessly This love or that, and knew no obligation But to win fuel to keep high one's fire. He could not read me, my heart-aching humor - For I was not then in his heart that never Misread, but only an apparition to his eyes - When I likened myself to him, the myriad minded Who gathered knaves and heroes with like love To snatch the inmost secret of them, so I Seeking as rich a wisdom, must, being woman, Who win only by the body, search the soul At its full tide in the completeness of love, When, to the vigilant spirit, it is quick With all it is. And I had not yet won Spirits enough to be a mate for him Learned in so many hearts. He threw at me A single word. I, who had masked my soul As the proud queen of harlots to deceive, Was yet angered he should be credulous, And all that was still virginal in me, And all my passion he should be deceived, Cried furiously in bitter and wild speech That spurned him. When god and devil through one voice Cry the same words they scorch with double fire. And he, the mighty seer, looked for a moment Upon me as if spirit and sense in him Were sundered. With no other word he went. He saw me never again. Yet I was victor Slaying the unnatural with the natural love. And I do think for all my bruised heart I was more happy than he. I can but guess From that he made the bitter Troilus speak Of Cressid in how many blazing fires His anger burned me. Still I dreamed of that Rich court so many colored once. But now, O, what dark travelers scourged to that dark house Brought as unto the nether sovereignty Tribute of raving madness, guilt and fear, Unto that one whose fearful artistry With pigments of midnight, eclipse and fire Could make them visible for ever. And yet I think that I, who had vanished from his eyes, Was still within him. For he, who painted me In many scarlet dyes, came ere the end To breathe forgiveness. I had once imagined For his delight myself to be a maid Bred on a fairy isle who knew not man, And I played for him with what innocence The maid would greet a lover who came to her. And at the last he had fondled in his thought My tender fantasy, and made himself An enchanter with spirits at his command And they had loved each other. So I think That he had come to know himself and me. O, why are we not certain of our fate! There was another dread enchanter imagined. A circle in the kingdom of the dead, Where sinful lovers, who are blown about In an eternal storm, cling to each other. I thought that I, even on that stormy air, Would have eternal joy were I the one To whom his hands clung in the eternal shade. And brooding on that poet's tale I dreamt That I was so blown about with one Who held to me, but when I saw his face It was not the face I loved, but was the face Beautiful, mad, hopeless, of that boy. And I awoke. I had been weeping in sleep And all my pillow was a wetness of tears.