Saul

First publ. as a fragment in B & P vii (DR & L), 6 Nov. 1845, and repr., with two added lines and a few other changes, in 1849. Our text is 1845. B. completed the poem, changed the alternating long and short lines into a single long line (perhaps as a result of EBB.’s suggestion: see below, 11. 77–80n.), and placed it in M&(1855). Our main headnote and annotation will be provided for the complete poem; the only notes to this text are those derived from EBB.’s criticisms (Wellesley MS; all her comments are from this source) and a record of the substantive variants between 1845 and 1849. B. mentions the poem to EBB. in a letter of 3 May 1845 as ‘one of my Dramatic Romances’ which ‘I should like to show you one day’ (LK 55), implying that it was already drafted up to the point at which it breaks off in 1845. A date in the early spring seems likely. Said Abner, “At last thou art come! “Ere I tell, ere thou speak,— “Kiss my cheek, wish me well!” Then I wished it, And did kiss his cheek: 5 And he, “Since the King, oh my friend, For thy countenance sent, Nor drunken nor eaten have we; Nor, until from his tent Thou return with the joyful assurance 10 The king liveth yet, Shall our lip with the honey be brightened, —The water, be wet. “For out of the black mid-tent’s silence, A space of three days, 15 No sound hath escaped to thy servants, Of prayer nor of praise, To betoken that Saul and the Spirit Have gone their dread ways. “Yet now my heart leaps, O beloved! 20 God’s child, with his dew On thy gracious gold hair, and those lilies Still living and blue As thou brak’st them to twine round thy harp-strings, As if no wild heat 25 Were raging to torture the desert!” Then I, as was meet, Knelt down to the God of my fathers, And rose on my feet, And ran o’er the sand burnt to powder. 30 The tent was unlooped; I pulled up the spear that obstructed, And under I stooped; Hands and knees o’er the slippery grass-patch— All withered and gone— 35 That leads to the second enclosure, I groped my way on, Till I felt where the foldskirts fly open; Then once more I prayed, And opened the foldskirts and entered, 40 And was not afraid; And spoke, “Here is David, thy servant!” And no voice replied; And first I saw nought but the blackness; But soon I descried 45 A something more black than the blackness —The vast, the upright Main-prop which sustains the pavilion,— And slow into sight Grew a figure, gigantic, against it, 50 And blackest of all;— Then a sunbeam, that burst thro’ the tent-roof, Showed Saul. He stood as erect as that tent-prop; Both arms stretched out wide 55 On the great cross-support in the centre That goes to each side: So he bent not a muscle but hung there As, caught in his pangs And waiting his change the king-serpent 60 All heavily hangs, Far away from his kind, in the Pine, Till deliverance come With the Spring-time,—so agonized Saul, Drear and black, blind and dumb. 65 Then I tuned my harp,—took off the lilies We twine round its chords Lest they snap ‘neath the stress of the noontide —Those sunbeams like swords! And I first played the tune all our sheep know, 70 As, one after one, So docile they come to the pen-door Till folding be done —They are white and untorn by the bushes, For lo, they have fed 75 Where the long grasses stifle the water Within the stream’s bed; How one after one seeks its lodging, As star follows star Into eve and the blue far above us, 80 —So blue and so far! Then the tune for which quails on the cornland Will leave each his mate To follow the player; then, what makes The crickets elate 85 Till for boldness they fight one another: And then, what has weight To set the quick jerboa a-musing Outside his sand house —There are none such as he for a wonder— 90 Half bird and half mouse! —God made all the creatures and gave them Our love and our fear, To show, we and they are his children, One family here. 95 Then I played the help-tune of our Reapers, Their wine-song, when hand Grasps hand, eye lights eye in good friendship, And great hearts expand, And grow one in the sense of this world’s life; 100 And then, the low song When the dead man is praised on his journey— “Bear, bear him along “With his few faults shut up like dead flowrets; “Are balm-seeds not here 105 “To console us? The land has got none such “As he on the bier— “Oh, would we might keep thee, my brother!” And then, the glad chaunt Of the marriage,—first go the young maidens— 110 Next, she whom we vaunt As the beauty, the pride of our dwelling: And then, the great march When man runs to man to assist him And buttress an arch 115 Nought can break‥ who shall harm them, our brothers? Then, the chorus intoned As the Levites go up to the altar In glory enthroned— But I stopped here—for here, in the darkness, 120 Saul groaned: And I paused, held my breath in such silence! And listened apart— And the tent shook, for mighty Saul shuddered,— And sparkles ‘gan dart 125 From the jewels that woke in his turban —At once with a start All the lordly male-sapphires, and rubies Courageous at heart; So the head, but the body still moved not,— 130 Still hung there erect. And I bent once again to my playing, Pursued it unchecked, As I sang, “Oh, our manhood’s prime vigour! —No spirit feels waste, 135 No muscle is stopped in its playing, No sinew unbraced,— And the wild joys of living! The leaping From rock up to rock— The rending their boughs from the palm-trees,— 140 The cool silver shock Of a plunge in the pool’s living water— The hunt of the bear, And the sultriness showing the lion Is couched in his lair: 145 And the meal—the rich dates—yellowed over With gold dust divine, And the locust’s-flesh steeped in the pitcher— The full draught of wine, And the sleep in the dried river channel 150 Where tall rushes tell The water was wont to go warbling So softly and well,— How good is man’s life here, mere living! How fit to employ 155 The heart and the soul and the senses For ever in joy! Hast thou loved the white locks of thy father Whose sword thou didst guard When he trusted thee forth to the wolf hunt 160 For glorious reward? Didst thou see the thin hands of thy mother Held up, as men sung The song of the nearly-departed, And heard her faint tongue 165 Joining in while it could to the witness ‘Let one more attest, ‘I have lived, seen God’s hand thro’ that life-time, ‘And all was for best …’ Then they sung thro’ their tears, in strong triumph, 170 Not much,—but the rest! And thy brothers—the help and the contest, The working whence grew Such result, as from seething grape-bundles The spirit so true— 175 And the friends of thy boyhood—that boyhood With wonder and hope, And the promise and wealth in the future,— The eye’s eagle scope,— Till lo, thou art grown to a monarch, 180 A people is thine! Oh, all, all the world offers singly, On one head combine, On one head the joy and the pride, Even rage like the throe 185 That opes the rock, helps its glad labour, And lets the gold go— And ambition that sees a sun lead it— Oh, all of these—all Combine to unite in one creature 190—Saul!” (End of Part the First.)