And,
sweetest
thoughts
Of forgone Eden!
Of forgone Eden!
Elizabeth Browning
thy love
Shall chant itself its own beatitudes
After its own life-working. A child's kiss
Set on thy sighing lips shall make thee glad;
A poor man served by thee shall make thee rich;
A sick man helped by thee shall make thee strong;
Thou shalt be served thyself by every sense
Of service which thou renderest. Such a crown
I set upon thy head,--Christ witnessing
With looks of prompting love--to keep thee clear
Of all reproach against the sin forgone,
From all the generations which succeed.
Thy hand which plucked the apple I clasp close,
Thy lips which spake wrong counsel I kiss close,
I bless thee in the name of Paradise
And by the memory of Edenic joys
Forfeit and lost,--by that last cypress tree,
Green at the gate, which thrilled as we came out,
And by the blessed nightingale which threw
Its melancholy music after us,--
And by the flowers, whose spirits full of smells
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 their 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 forgone 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, holdest Heaven
Broadly over our heads.
[_The CHRIST is gradually transfigured, during the following phrases of
dialogue, into humanity and suffering. _
_Eve. _ O Saviour Christ,
Thou standest mute in glory, like the sun!
_Adam. _ We worship in Thy silence, Saviour Christ!
_Eve. _ Thy brows grow grander with a forecast woe,--
Diviner, with the possible of death.
We worship in Thy sorrow, Saviour Christ!
_Adam. _ How do Thy clear, still eyes transpierce our souls,
As gazing _through_ them toward the Father-throne
In a pathetical, full Deity,
Serenely as the stars gaze through the air
Straight on each other!
_Eve. _ O pathetic Christ,
Thou standest mute in glory, like the moon!
Shall chant itself its own beatitudes
After its own life-working. A child's kiss
Set on thy sighing lips shall make thee glad;
A poor man served by thee shall make thee rich;
A sick man helped by thee shall make thee strong;
Thou shalt be served thyself by every sense
Of service which thou renderest. Such a crown
I set upon thy head,--Christ witnessing
With looks of prompting love--to keep thee clear
Of all reproach against the sin forgone,
From all the generations which succeed.
Thy hand which plucked the apple I clasp close,
Thy lips which spake wrong counsel I kiss close,
I bless thee in the name of Paradise
And by the memory of Edenic joys
Forfeit and lost,--by that last cypress tree,
Green at the gate, which thrilled as we came out,
And by the blessed nightingale which threw
Its melancholy music after us,--
And by the flowers, whose spirits full of smells
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 their 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 forgone 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, holdest Heaven
Broadly over our heads.
[_The CHRIST is gradually transfigured, during the following phrases of
dialogue, into humanity and suffering. _
_Eve. _ O Saviour Christ,
Thou standest mute in glory, like the sun!
_Adam. _ We worship in Thy silence, Saviour Christ!
_Eve. _ Thy brows grow grander with a forecast woe,--
Diviner, with the possible of death.
We worship in Thy sorrow, Saviour Christ!
_Adam. _ How do Thy clear, still eyes transpierce our souls,
As gazing _through_ them toward the Father-throne
In a pathetical, full Deity,
Serenely as the stars gaze through the air
Straight on each other!
_Eve. _ O pathetic Christ,
Thou standest mute in glory, like the moon!
