A DRAMA OF EXILE.
73
Did follow softly, plucking us behind
Back to the gradual banks and vernal bowers
And fourfold river-courses:—by all these,
I bless thee to the contraries of these;
I bless thee to the desert and the thorns,
To the elemental change and turbulence,
And to the roar of the estranged beasts,
And to the solemn dignities of grief,—
To each one of these ends,—and to this end
Of Death and the hereafter!
Eve.I accept
For me and for my daughters this high part,
Which lowly shall be counted. Noble work
Shall hold me in the place of garden-rest;
And in the place of Eden's lost delight,
Worthy endurance of permitted pain;
While on my longest patience there shall wait
Death's speechless angel, smiling in the east
Whence cometh the cold wind. I bow myself
Humbly henceforward on the ill I did,
That humbleness may keep it in the shade.
Shall it be so? Shall I smile, saying so?
O seed! O King! O God, who shalt be seed,—
What shall I say? As Eden's fountains swelled
Brightly betwixt their banks, so swells my soul
Betwixt Thy love and power!
And, sweetest thoughts
Of foregone Eden! now, for the first time
Since God said "Adam," walking through the trees,
I dare to pluck you, as I plucked erewhile
The lily or pink, the rose or heliotrope,
So pluck I you—so largely—with both hands,—
And throw you forward on the outer earth
Wherein we are cast out, to sweeten it.
Adam. As Thou, Christ, to illume it, boldest Heaven
Broadly above our heads.
[The Christ is gradually transfigured during the following
phrases of dialogue, into humanity and suffering.
Back to the gradual banks and vernal bowers
And fourfold river-courses:—by all these,
I bless thee to the contraries of these;
I bless thee to the desert and the thorns,
To the elemental change and turbulence,
And to the roar of the estranged beasts,
And to the solemn dignities of grief,—
To each one of these ends,—and to this end
Of Death and the hereafter!
Eve.I accept
For me and for my daughters this high part,
Which lowly shall be counted. Noble work
Shall hold me in the place of garden-rest;
And in the place of Eden's lost delight,
Worthy endurance of permitted pain;
While on my longest patience there shall wait
Death's speechless angel, smiling in the east
Whence cometh the cold wind. I bow myself
Humbly henceforward on the ill I did,
That humbleness may keep it in the shade.
Shall it be so? Shall I smile, saying so?
O seed! O King! O God, who shalt be seed,—
What shall I say? As Eden's fountains swelled
Brightly betwixt their banks, so swells my soul
Betwixt Thy love and power!
And, sweetest thoughts
Of foregone Eden! now, for the first time
Since God said "Adam," walking through the trees,
I dare to pluck you, as I plucked erewhile
The lily or pink, the rose or heliotrope,
So pluck I you—so largely—with both hands,—
And throw you forward on the outer earth
Wherein we are cast out, to sweeten it.
Adam. As Thou, Christ, to illume it, boldest Heaven
Broadly above our heads.
[The Christ is gradually transfigured during the following
phrases of dialogue, into humanity and suffering.
