‘The Legend of the Water Lilies’

Francis William Bourdillon. From Among the Flowers and Other Poems, 1878. Far out from land fair lilies lie, That gaze into the Eastern sky, Upon a mighty river borne, The worship of the lands of morn. Far out from land, like some soft isle, The broad green leaves are laid; And over them the lilies smile, Or bow their beauteous heads awhile, With sweetness overweighed. Yet perfect though is their repose From morns that ope to eves that close, Something there is, more deep and high, That wins upon the wistful eye; Such holiness as makes men yearn For some forgotten life’s return; Ev’n as, when heaven with stars is set, The starred snow-flakes would fain Rise to the life remembered yet, And float in heaven again. Then, flowers of wonder, let me seek, Not a presumptuous praise to speak, – Ye need no praise, – but if I may, To ease the burden of desire, By wafting lightest verse away, Sweet with the sweetness you inspire; As wafts the rich Seringa bloom, To ease her passionate love, perfume. The roughest hills take tender haze 147From distance; so my tale Comes softened down the vista’d days, Till passion’s self is pale. So not of sadness let it seem, Save like the sorrows of a dream! The sun was halfway to the West, When to the river bank there pressed, So long long back, a band of boys, Intoxicate with summer joys. Fair were they all in face and limb; But one, – all left the prize to him, For loveliness of boyish face, And sinuous body’s tender grace. With happy laughter through the sedge They burst, that hemmed the river’s edge, Parting with outstretched arms the reeds, And feathered o’er with silken seeds. And one would cast the brittle cane At other, who returned again; Or with the plumy-pointed rush Would seek the warded face to brush. So with their bare limbs rosier grown With boyish play, they pass Throughout the fringing river-zone Of tall and tangled grass, And came upon a tiny bay, Girt with a shell-set shingle-way. And there were sands that wooed their feet With warm soft kisses; for the beat Of lisping waves had left the form Of carved lips, where the sun lay warm, But now no tiniest wavelet played On all the water wide; Nor showed the line, by light or shade, Where first the sand was overlaid With crystal of the tide. For not the lightest wind went by To mar that mirror of the sky. But soon with glowing foot and palm Was shivered all the glassy calm, As each on each, with joyous shout, The flashing waters flung about, With spray that, dancing down the air, 148Made mimic rainbows everywhere. Then down the shining water-floor They wandered, seeking deeper waves, Though scarcely higher than before By foot or foot the current laves; And nigh a furlong from the land, Washed only to the waist they stand. But then, as though the water lent New life to every limb, No longer listlessly they went, But swiftly dive and swim; More like some buoyant water-birth, Than creatures wont to walk the earth. Now silver-clad one dives below, To seize his fellow ere he know; Now one will stand apart a space, A goal to which the rest shall race, But ere they touch him, turns and flies, Like hunted bird from place to place, Till to the dearest in his eyes He yields himself an easy prize. So gay it was, beneath the smile Of loving skies to play awhile; When winds above and waves beneath Seemed of a world forgot by Death. But deeper still would venture out The fairest, bravest boy; The silk-soft waters curled about His rosy shape with joy, And leaped to kiss his laughing face, And clove to give him close embrace. The water seemed itself for him To grow more firm, since he would swim, Itself to cleave a sliding way Before his lithe limbs’ easy play; Until, upon a deeper tide, He turns, to see the waters wide, That part him from his fellows’ side. They, in their eager play, forgot That he was gone, or noticed not, Till far away they heard his shout, And gazed the water o’er; 149There saw his form so far far out, And marked he now has turned about And struggles for the shore. For now his limbs a languor held, And with sharp pain the nerves rebelled; And for his boldness, growing fear Came o’er him, as beneath him clear He saw how far far under lay The sands and shells and fish at play. So not for help, – what help, alas, In time that tedious space could pass! Nor was there one of stronger limb, Nor abler than himself to swim; – But in desire of sympathy In danger and distress, Came from his lips that terror-cry, That roused their carelessness. Then heedless of the hopeless length, Forgetting toils and failing strength, Forgetting life, and breath and all, Save their despairing comrade’s call, They flung themselves in earnest race, To reach, before he sink, the place. So easily does boyhood bear, In hearts that seem so light, Such courage as Death’s self will dare, Nor count the cost of fight. O noble Sun! if heart benign As thy world-cheering smile be thine, How dark and sad with grief must seem The world to thine unclouded beam! So ceaselessly the rolling earth, With every day thou giv’st to birth, In every clime, before thine eye Bids pageantry of pain pass by. How must thou mourn for woes displayed Thine eye must see, but cannot aid! What heart can wonder, if thou call The soft rain-clouds, with tearful pall, To veil from thee the sights of pain, More sad, because to see is vain? What human heart could bear the throne, Whence must his eye behold alone All misery from zone to zone? Did not thy head untimely hide That day in earlier eventide, When helplessly thine eye beheld, From thy lone height above, Those struggling lives; how long hope swelled In their young breasts, while they rebelled Against the doom the dark waves knelled To happy life and love! For scarce the strongest swimmer came There to his fellow’s aid, When Death put forth his stronger claim, That needs must be obeyed; And downward the light body sank To sleep upon the sanded bank. There, for their weary limbs they gain To find their labour waste and vain, And see in deathly rest beneath The form that seemed too fair for death. The water, of such burial proud, Had lent the soft limbs silver shroud, And like a death-flame in calm air, Streamed, shadowing his shut eyes, his hair. Like birds that, spite of weary wing, Long hover round and round, With useless cries, far echoing, High o’er the hateful ground, When taloned hawk, or hunter’s shaft The life-blood of their mate has quaffed; So long and vainly hung the swarm On tired limbs o’er their fellow’s form, Nor for spent strength could any dare To dive where each so fain would fare; Nor yet for love would leave the place, – Gain land and life, but lose his face. So one by one his strength and breath Left powerless to the might of Death; Till, like a flowered bier, below, The sand lay strewn with forms of snow, As each bestowed for burial dower Upon their best beloved, first dead, His own bright body, fairer flower 151Than blooms in grassy graveyards shed. What god, save Love, could launch such doom, Could crave such cruel hecatomb? Ah, who can tell, when even came, Red for such guilty horror’s shame, How, one by one, by brake and fen, Through traces of the reeds uptorn, With eager eyes burst down the men, And women, seeking eldest-born, And fairest-born, and dearest-born, In vain, until the vacant morn! Then, with the light, each saw their love Laid cold, the cruel depths above, Lapped calmly in the pulseless deep, Like flowers the night-flood drowns in sleep. Then, as his own love each beheld, Cry upon cry the anguish swelled, Till bore the winds so wild a wail, As blanched the blushing morn to pale, And there were tender feet, that tore Through the resisting water-way, To the sad spoil the river bore, Now careless of its costly prey. And there were lips, whose blood was fled In hopeless kisses of the dead. Some beat in passionate woe their breast, Or rent their locks of gold, Or fain beside their dead would rest, As pale as them, and cold. In vain, in vain! What profiteth Love’s treasure in the wastes of death? What profiteth in death the sight Of that, where life has chief delight? The face, where no emotion plays, The eyes, that give not back our gaze, The hands, that cannot clasp again, – Love’s old delights, – how all in vain! And oh! last comfort! that reveals, – As one faint spark but deepens gloom, – How darkly Death all comfort steals, Love’s hands must deck for Death the tomb! So by the river bank was raised 152A monument, whereon was blazed In golden letters all the tale; And lest in time such record fail, By cunning hands was carved the base, Four-sided, with four scenes, – the race, The lonely swimmer, far from aid, The bodies on the water laid, And last, the weepers on the shore, And white limbs stilled for evermore. But a more fitting monument To those young lives the river lent. For suddenly above the spot, Far in mid-waves, where fell their fate, A cluster of bright lilies shot, And burst in blossoms delicate. And all who saw in wonder stood; And soon the legend sprung, That human was the lily-brood, Born of the souls that clung In love of boyish life to earth, Till God had given them back to birth, New-clothed in shapes as pure as they Had purely lived their passing day. So sweet a grace did fancy twine About the tearful tale, As grows around the ruined shrine The graceful ivy veil. And when the fancy fits so well, Who on its emptiness would dwell? So, Lilies fair, forgive my verse, Nor let the fancy seem O’erclouded with too dark a curse, To suit so light a theme! For spite of that your tranquil grace, And simple innocence of face; Ay, though your petals love to lie All peace, beneath the loving sky, And in the soft waves’ stillest spot To find a world that Death knows not; Still seems your peacefulness to be Not from death’s tears but terrors free; Nor you from death have passed to peace. Hence, in your sight, our hearts, that yet Go on to death, their fears forget; And in your beauties deem they see, But half unveiled, a Heaven to be.