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Dance, Clarion Air

Christopher Fry (1907–2005)

 

Dance, clarion air,

Shine, stones on the shore swept in music by the ocean,

Shine, till all this island is a crown.

 

This island, and these realms and territories

Remembering all that human is,

Sound with love and honour for a Queen.

O morning light, enfold a morning throne.

 

 

Hymn to St. Cecilia

W. H. Auden (1907–1973)

 

I

 

In a garden shady this holy lady

With reverent cadence and subtle psalm,

Like a black swan as death came on

Poured forth her song in perfect calm:

And by ocean’s margin this innocent virgin

Constructed an organ to enlarge her prayer,

And notes tremendous from her great engine

Thundered out on the Roman air.

 

Blonde Aphrodite rose up excited,

Moved to delight by the melody,

White as an orchid she rode quite naked

In an oyster shell on top of the sea;

At sounds so entrancing the angels dancing

Came out of their trance into time again,

And around the wicked in Hell’s abysses

The huge flame flickered and eased their pain.

 

Blessed Cecilia, appear in visions

To all musicians, appear and inspire:

Translated Daughter, come down and startle

Composing mortals with immortal fire.

 

II

 

I cannot grow;

I have no shadow

To run away from,

I only play.

 

I cannot err;

There is no creature

Whom I belong to,

Whom I could wrong.

 

I am defeat

When it knows it

Can now do nothing

By suffering.

 

All you lived through,

Dancing because you

No longer need it

For any deed.

 

I shall never be

Different. Love me.

 

Blessed Cecilia, appear in visions

To all musicians, appear and inspire:

Translated Daughter, come down and startle

Composing mortals with immortal fire.

 

III

 

O ear whose creatures cannot wish to fall,

O calm of spaces unafraid of weight,

Where Sorrow is herself forgetting all

The gaucheness of her adolescent state,

Where Hope within the altogether strange

From every outworn image is released,

And Dread born whole and normal like a beast

Into a world of truths that never change:

Restore our fallen day: O re-arrange.

 

O dear white children casual as birds,

Playing among the ruined languages,

So small beside their large confusing words,

So gay against the greater silences

Of dreadful things you did: O hang the head,

Impetuous child with the tremendous brain,

O weep, child, weep, O weep away the stain,

Lost innocence who wished your lover dead,

Weep for the lives your wishes never led.

 

O cry created as the bow of sin

Is drawn across our trembling violin.

 

O weep, child, weep, O weep away the stain.

 

O law drummed out by hearts against the still

Long winter of our intellectual will.

 

That what has been may never be again.

 

O flute that throbs with the thanksgiving breath

Of convalescents on the shores of death.

 

O bless the freedom that you never chose.

 

O trumpets that unguarded children blow

About the fortress of their inner foe.

 

O wear your tribulation like a rose.

 

Blessed Cecilia, appear in visions

To all musicians, appear and inspire:

Translated Daughter, come down and startle

Composing mortals with immortal fire.

 

 

Silence and Music

Ursula Wood (1911–2007)

 

Silence, come first.

 

I see a sleeping swan, wings closed and drifting where the water leads, a winter moon, a grove where shadows dream, a hand outstretched to gather hollow reeds.

 

The four winds in their litanies can tell all of earth’s stories as they weep and cry, the sea names all the treasure of her tides—the birds rejoice between earth and sky.

 

Voices of grief and from the heart of joy; so near to comprehension do we stand that wind and sea and all of winged delight lie in the octaves of man’s voice and hand, and music wakes from silence where it slept.

 

 

 

Seven Poems of Robert Bridges

Robert Bridges (1844–1930)

 

I Praise the Tender Flower

 

I praise the tender flower, 

That on a mournful day 

Bloomed in my garden bower 

And made the winter gay. 

Its loveliness contented 

My heart tormented. 

I praise the gentle maid 

Whose happy voice and smile 

To confidence betrayed 

My doleful heart awhile. 

And gave my spirit deploring 

Fresh wings for soaring. 

The maid for very fear 

Of love I durst not tell: 

The rose could never hear, 

Though I bespake her well: 

So in my song I bind them 

For all to find them. 

 

 

I Have Loved Flowers that Fade

 

I have loved flowers that fade,

Within whose magic tents

Rich hues have marriage made

With sweet unmemoried scents:

A honeymoon delight,—

A joy of love at sight,

That ages in an hour:—

My song be like a flower!

 

I have loved airs, that die

Before their charm is writ

Along a liquid sky

Trembling to welcome it.

Notes, that with pulse of fire

Proclaim the spirit’s desire,

Then die, and are nowhere:—

My song be like an air!

 

Die, song, die like a breath,

And wither as a bloom:

Fear not a flowery death,

Dread not an airy tomb!

Fly with delight, fly hence!

’Twas thine love’s tender sense

To feast; now on thy bier

Beauty shall shed a tear.

 

 

My Spirit Sang All Day

 

My spirit sang all day

            O my joy.

Nothing my tongue could say,

            Only My joy!

 

My heart an echo caught—

            O my joy—

And spake, Tell me thy thought,

            Hide not thy joy.

 

My eyes gan peer around,—

            O my joy—

What beauty hast thou found?

            Shew us thy joy.

 

My jealous ears grew whist;—

            O my joy—

Music from heaven is’t,

            Sent for our joy?

 

She also came and heard;

            O my joy,

What, said she, is this word?

            What is thy joy?

 

And I replied, O see,

            O my joy,

’Tis thee, I cried, ’tis thee:

            Thou art my joy.

 

 

Clear and Gentle Stream

 

Clear and gentle stream!

Known and loved so long,

That hast heard the song

And the idle dream

Of my boyish day;

While I once again

Down thy margin stray,

In the selfsame strain

Still my voice is spent,

With my old lament

And my idle dream,

Clear and gentle stream!

 

Where my old seat was

Here again I sit,

Where the long boughs knit

Over stream and grass

A translucent eaves:

Where back eddies play

Shipwreck with the leaves,

And the proud swans stray,

Sailing one by one

Out of the stream and sun,

And the fish lie cool

In their chosen pool.

 

Many an afternoon

Of the summer day

Dreaming here I lay;

And I know how soon,

Idly at its hour,

First the deep bell hums

From the minster tower,

And then evening comes,

Creeping up the glade,

With her lengthening shade,

And the tardy boon

Of her brightening moon.

 

Clear and gentle stream!

Ere again I go

Where thou dost not flow,

Well does it beseem

Thee to hear again

Once my youthful song,

That familiar strain

Silent now so long:

Be as I content

With my old lament

And my idle dream,

Clear and gentle stream.

 

 

Nightingales

 

Beautiful must be the mountains whence ye come,

And bright in the fruitful valleys the streams, wherefrom

Ye learn your song:

Where are those starry woods? O might I wander there,

Among the flowers, which in that heavenly air

Bloom the year long!

 

Nay, barren are those mountains and spent the streams:

Our song is the voice of desire, that haunts our dreams,

A throe of the heart,

Whose pining visions dim, forbidden hopes profound,

No dying cadence nor long sigh can sound,

For all our art.

Alone, aloud, in the raptured ear of men

We pour our dark nocturnal secret; and then,

As night is withdrawn,

From these sweet-springing meads and bursting boughs of May,

Dream, while the innumerable choir of day

Welcome the dawn.

 

 

Haste On, My Joys!

 

Haste on, my joys! your treasure lies

            In swift, unceasing flight.

O haste: for while your beauty flies

            I seize your full delight.

Lo! I have seen the scented flower,

            Whose tender stems I cull,

For her brief date and meted hour

            Appear more beautiful.

 

O youth, O strength, O most divine

            For that so short ye prove;

Were but your rare gifts longer mine,

            Ye scarce would win my love.

Nay, life itself the heart would spurn,

            Did once the days restore

The days, that once enjoyed return,

            Return—ah! nevermore.

 

 

Wherefore To-Night So Full of Care

 

Wherefore tonight so full of care,

My soul, revolving hopeless strife,

Pointing at hindrance, and the bare

Painful escapes of fitful life?

Shaping the doom that may befall

By precedent of terror past:

By love dishonoured, and the call

Of friendship slighted at the last?

By treasured names, the little store

That memory out of wreck could save

Of loving hearts, that gone before

Call their old comrade to the grave?

 

O soul, be patient: thou shalt find

A little matter mend all this;

Some strain of music to thy mind,

Some praise for skill not spent amiss.

Again shall pleasure overflow

Thy cup with sweetness, thou shalt taste

Nothing but sweetness, and shalt grow

Half sad for sweetness run to waste.

O happy life! I hear thee sing,

O rare delight of mortal stuff!

I praise my days for all they bring,

Yet are they only not enough.

 

 

Lachrimae Antiquae (Flow, My Tears)

 

Flow, my tears, fall from your springs!
Exiled for ever let me mourn;
Where night’s black bird her sad infamy sings,
There let me live forlorn.

Down, vain lights, shine you no more!
No nights are dark enough for those
That in despair their last fortunes deplore.
Light doth but shame disclose.

Never may my woes be relieved,
Since pity is fled;
And tears and sighs and groans my weary days
Of all joys have deprived.

From the highest spire of contentment
My fortune is thrown;
And fear and grief and pain for my deserts
Are my hopes, since hope is gone.

Hark! you shadows that in darkness dwell,
Learn to contemn light.
Happy, happy they that in hell
Feel not the world’s despite.

 

 

White-Flowering Days

Edmund Blunden (1896–1974)

 

Now the white-flowering days,

The long days of blue and golden light,

Wake nature’s music round the land; now plays

The fountain of all sweetness; all our ways

Are touched with wonder, swift and bright.

 

This is the star, the bell

While fields of emerald rise, and orchards flower

Brown nooks with white and red, this is the spell

Of timeless dream; Avilion, happy dell!

The legendary lovely bower.

 

Now the bold children run

By wild brooks and woods where year on year

Tall trembling bluebells take their stand; now none

Is bloomless, none quite songless; such a sun

Renews our journey far or near.

 

Old England of the shires,

Meadowy land of heath and forest ground,

And lawny knoll, land of gray towers and spires,

Fairly thy season sings our hearts’ desires,

Fulfilled in queenly beauty, youngly crowned.

 

 

Come Again! Sweet Love Doth Now Invite

 

Come again! 
Sweet love doth now invite
Thy graces that refrain
To do me due delight,
To see, to hear, to touch, to kiss, to die,
With thee again in sweetest sympathy.

Come again! 
That I may cease to mourn
Through thy unkind disdain;
For now left and forlorn
I sit, I sigh, I weep, I faint, I die
In deadly pain and endless misery.

But alas, 
My faith is ever true,
Yet will she never rue
Nor yield me any grace;
Her eyes of fire, her heart of flint is made,
Whom tears nor truth may once invade.

Gentle Love, 
Draw forth thy wounding dart,
Thou canst not pierce her heart;
For I, that do approve
By sighs and tears more hot than are thy shafts
Did tempt while she for triumph laughs.