Part 1 (1/2)
The Coast of Bohemia.
by Thomas Nelson Page.
PREFACE
One who after writing prose all his life suddenly essays to launch a volume of verse, must know something of the feeling with which an old-time sailor after coasting only his native sh.o.r.es found himself setting sail into an unknown sea.
The author of this little volume knows quite as well as the most experienced mariner the temerity of sailing an untried main in so frail a bark. But he is willing, if the Fates so decree, to go down with the unnumbered sail of that great fleet which have throughout the ages faced the wide ocean of oblivion, merely for the thrill of being for a brief s.p.a.ce on its vast waters.
Since Horace, secure in the double endowment of genius and of an Emperor's favor, wrote scornfully how hated of G.o.ds and men was middling verse, no one has ever doubted the fact--perhaps, not even one of all the myriads who have dared to brave that bitter scorn. The explanation then for the production of so much of the despised matter must be that there is for the minor poet also a music that the outer world does not catch--an inner day which the outer world does not see.
It is this music, this light which, for the most part, is for the lesser poet his only reward. That he has heard, however brokenly, and at however vast a distance, s.n.a.t.c.hes of those strains which thrilled the souls of Marlowe and Milton and Keats and Sh.e.l.ley, even though he may never reproduce one of them, is moreover a sufficiently high reward.
T. N. P.
THE COAST OF BOHEMIA
.... ”Few, few are they: Perchance, among a thousand, one Thou shouldest find, for whom the sun Of Poesy makes an inner day.”
--_The Medea of Euripides--Way's Translation._
DEDICATION
TO F. L. P.
As one who wanders in a lonely land, Through all the blackness of a stormy night, Now stumbling here, now falling there outright, And doubts if it be worse to stir or stand, Not knowing what abysses yawn at hand, What torrents roar beyond some beetling height; Yet scales the top to find the dawn in sight, And Earth kissed into radiance with its wand: So, wandering hopeless in the darkness, I, Scarce recking whither led my painful way, Or whether I should faint or strive to prove If 'yond the mountain-top some path might lie, Climbed boldly up the steep, and lo! the Day Broke into pearl and splendor in thy love.
THE COAST OF BOHEMIA
There is a land not charted on all charts; Though many mariners have touched its coast, Who far adventuring in those distant parts, Meet s.h.i.+p-wreck there and are forever lost; Or if they e'er return, are soon once more Borne far away by hunger for that magic sh.o.r.e.
Its mystic mountains on the horizon piled, Some mariners have glimpsed when driven far Out of life's measured course by tempests wild, Or lured therefrom by the erratic star They chose as pilot, till their errant guide Drew them resistlessly within its witching tide.
For oft, they tell, who know its sapphire strand The golden haze enfolding it hangs low, And those who careless steer may miss the land, Embosomed in the sunset's purple glow, Its lights mistaken for the evening stars, Its music for the surf-beat on its golden bars.
Young Jason found it when he dauntless sought The golden fleece by Colchis' perilous stream, And in his track full many an argonaut Hath found the rare fleece of his golden dream, And at the last, Ulysses-like, surcease From Sorrow's dole and Labor's heavy prease.
One voyager charted it for every age, From azure rim to starry mountain core.
A nameless player on the World's great stage, He spread his sails, adventured to that sh.o.r.e And reared a pharos with his art sublime, Like Ilion's song-wrought towers, to beacon every clime.
The great adventurers reached it when they brake Columbus-led into the unknown West, And those who followed in their s.h.i.+ning wake, But left no trace of where their keels have pressed; Yet have through stress of storm and tempests' rage Won by his quenchless light a happy anchorage.
There rest the heroes of lost causes lorn, On their calm brows more fadeless chaplets far Than all their conquerors' could e'er adorn, When shone effulgent Fame's ascendant star; There fallen patriots reap the glorious prize Of deathless memory of their precious sacrifice.
There many a dream-faced maid and matron dwells, From Argive Helen on through gliding time; There drink the poets draughts from crystal wells, And choir high music to their harps sublime: And there the great philosophers discourse Divine Philosophy in due and tranquil course.
There not alone the great and lofty sing; But silent poets too find there the song They only sang in dreams when wandering Amazed and lost amid the earthly throng; Their hearts unfettered all from worldly fears.
Attuned to meet the s.p.a.cious music of the spheres: