With Its Quietness. Ishtar. I Am The Goddess Ishtar, And Thou Art My Servant. Wilt Any Of Thou Help Me? Vashti. Am I Then One Whom Gods May Help? I Am By Men Judged Hateful: Surely I Am Thereby Made Over To The Demons, And Not Thine. Ishtar. Yet Art Thou Mine, Because Thou Knowest Well Thou Disobeyest Me. Vashti. How Do I So? Ishtar. I Am The Goddess Of The Power Of Women, And Passion In The Hearts Of Men Is My Divinity. Vashti. Yea, Then I Disobey Thee. Ishtar. And Yet Thou Shalt Not Fear Me Wronging Thee: Tell Me, O Thou Despair, Whither Thou Goest? Vashti. Thy Taunt Goes Past Me; I Am Not Despair. Ishtar. Verily, But Thou Art. Is Not Thy Mind A Hot Revolter From The Service Due To My Divinity, Passion In Men'S Hearts? Is There Aught Else That Thou Mayst Serve? Thou Knowest There Is Naught Else: Therefore Thou Art Despair. Vashti. That I Am Infamous, I Know. But Even Now, Now When I Learn I Am To Gods No More Than To The Lust Of Men, I Will Not Be Despair. Ishtar. Who Means So Greatly To Serve Pride, That The Service Of The World Is A Thing Loath'D, Is Desperate, Avoided By Mankind, Unpleasing To The Gods. We, Who Look Down, Know That The World And Pride May Both Be Served. Yet Also That It Was Too Hard For Thee We Know, And Pardon. Thou Shalt Tell Me Now Why Thou Refusest The Life Given Thee. Vashti. Because I Will Not, Woman Should Be Sin Amid Man'S Life. You Gods Have Given Man Desire That Too Much Knows Itself; And Thence He Is All Confounded By The Pleasure Of Us. How Sweetly Doth The Heart Of Man Begin Desiring Us, How Like Music And The Green First Happiness Of The Year! But This Can Grow To Uncontrollably Crowding Lust, Beyond All Power Of Delight To Utter, Thence Inwardly Turned To Anger And Detesting! Till, Looking On Us With Strange Eyes, Man Finds We Are Not His Desire: It Was But Sex Inflamed, So That It Roused The Breaking Forth Of Secret Fury In Him, Consuming Life, Yea, Even The Life That Would Reach Up To Know The Heaven Of Gods Above It. Ishtar. And What, For This, Dost Thou Refuse? Vashti. I Refuse Woman'S Beauty! Not Merely To Be Feasting With Delight Man'S Senses, I Refuse; But Even His Heart I Will Not Serve. Are We To Be For Ever Love'S Passion In Man, And Never Love Itself? Always The Instrument, Never The Music? Ishtar. I Have Not Done With Man.--Thou Sayest True, Women Are As A Sin In Life: For That The Gods Have Made Mankind In Double Sex. Sin Of Desiring Woman Is To Be The Knowledgeable Light Within Man'S Soul, Whereby He Kills The Darken'D Ache Of Being. But Shall I Leave Him There? Or Shall I Leave Woman Amid These Hungers? Nay: I Hold The Rages Of These Fires As A Soft Clay Obedient To My Handling; There Shall Be Of Man Desiring, And Of Woman Desired, A Single Ecstasy Divinely Formed, Two Souls Knowing Themselves As One Amazement. All That Thou Hatest To Arouse In Man Prepareth Him For This; And Thou Thyself Art By Thy Very Hate Prepared: Wherefore The Gods Forgive Thee, Seeing What Comes Of Thee. Behold Now! Of My Godhead I Will Make Thy Senses Burn With Vision, Storying The Spirit Of Woman Growing From Loved To Love. The First Vision: Helen. Helen Am I, A Name Astonishing The World, A Fame That Rings Against The Sky, Like An Alarm Of Brass Smitten To Sound The News Of War Against The Stone Of Mountains. I Move In Power Through The Minds Of Men, And Have No Power To Hold My Power Back. Men'S Passions Fawn Upon My Feet, As Waves That Fiercely Fawn After The Going Wind; But Not As The Wind, Shaking Off The Foam Of The Pursuing Lust Of The Moaning Waves, And Over The Clamour Of The Evil Seas' Monstrous Word Running Lightly, Unhurt. They Fawn Upon Me, All The Lusts Of The World, Bewildering My Steps With Straining Close, And Breathe Their Horrible Spittle Against Me. Passions Cry Round Me With The Yelling Cry Of Dogs Chained And Starving And Smelling Blood. Yea, For Through Me The World Becomes A Den Of Insane Greed. In Helpless Beauty I Stand Alone In The Midst Of Dreadful Adoration; And, Round Me Thronged, The Fawning, Fawning Lusts Open Their Throats Upon Me And Whine And Lick My Feet With Dripping Tongues, Or Gaze To Pant Hot Hunger In My Face. For I Am Made To Set Their Hearts Grim To Possess My Life, And With An Anger Of Love Devour My Beauty; And Yet To Seal Up In Their Mastered Hearts The Rage, And Bring Them In Croucht Worship Down Before Me, Bent With Impotent Desire. A Quiet Place The World Was Ere I Came A Strife, A Dream Of Fire, Into Its Sleep; And With Their Senses Ended Men'S Delights. But I Struck Through Their Senses Burning News Of Impossible Endless Things, And Mixt Wild Lightning Into Their Room Of Darkness.--Then Agony, And A Craving For Delight Escaping Sensual Grasp, Began In Men; And The Agony Was Poison In The Health Of Sweet Desire.--The Joy Of Me Men Tried To Compass With Strange Frenzy And Desire Made New With Cunning. But Still At My Feet The Lusts They Tarr On Me Crouch Down And Fawn And Snarl To Be So Fearful Of Their Prey. I See Men'S Faces Grin With Helpless Lust About Me; Crooked Hands Reach Out To Please Their Hot Nerves With The Flower Of My Skin; I See The Eyes Imagining Enjoyment, The Arms Twitching To Seize Me, And The Minds Inflamed Like The Glee-Kindled Hearts Of Fiends. And Through The World The Fawning, Fawning Lusts Hound Me With Worship Of A Ravenous Yearning: And I Am Weary Of Maddening Men With Beauty. The Second Vision: Sappho. Into How Fair A Fortune Hath Man'S Life Fallen Out Of The Darkness!--This Bright Earth Maketh My Heart To Falter; Yea, My Spirit Bends And Bows Down In The Delight Of Vision, Caught By The Force Of Beauty, Swayed About Like Seaweed Moved By The Deep Winds Of Water: For It Is All The News Of Love To Me. Through Paths Pine-Fragrant, Where The Shaded Ground Is Strewn With Fruits Of Scarlet Husk, I Come, As If Through Maidenhood'S Uncertainty, Its Darkness Coloured With Strange Untried Thoughts; Hither I Come, Here To The Flowery Peak Of This White Cliff, High Up In Golden Air, Where Glowing Earth And Sea And Divine Light Are In Mine Eyes Like Ardour, And Like Love Are In My Soul: Love'S Glowing Gentleness, The Sunny Grass Of Meadows And The Trees, Towers Of Dark Green Flame, And That White Town Where From The Hearths, A Fragrance Of Burnt Wood, Blue-Purple Smoke Creeps Like A Stain Of Wine Along The Paved Blue Sea: Yea, All This Kindness Lies Amid Salt Immeasurable Flowing, The Power Of The Sea, Passion Of Love. I, Sappho, Have Made Love The Mastery Most Sacred Over Man; But I Have Made It A Safety Of Things Gloriously Known, To House His Spirit From The Darkness Blowing Out Of The Vast Unknown: From Me He Hath The Wilful Mind To Make His Fortune Fair. Yea, Here I Stand For The Whole Earth To See How Life, Breathing Its Fortune Like Sweet Air, Mixing It With The Kindled Heart Of Man, May Utter It Proud Against The Double Truth Of Darkness Fronting Him And Following Him, In A Prevailing, Burning, Marvellous Lie! And It Is Love Kindles The Burning Of It, The Quivering Flame Of Spoken-Forth Desire, Which Man Hath Made His Place Within The World,-- Love, Learnt Of Sappho! And Not Only Bright With Gladness: I Have Devised An Endless Pain, The Fearful Spiritual Pain Of Love, To Hold In A Firm Fire, Unalterably Bright, The Shining Forth Of SpirIt's Imagination Declared Against The Investing Dark, A Light Of Pain And Joy, Equal For Man And Woman. The Third Vision: Theresa. Come, Golden Bridegroom, Break This Mortal Night, Five Times Chained With Darkness Of My Senses. At Last Now Visit My Desire, And Turn Thy Feet, And The Flaming Path Of Thy Feet, Unto These Walls Lockt Round Me Like A Death. Death I Would Have Them Till Thou Comest; Yea, The Earthly Stone Whereof Man'S Fortune Here Is Made, Strongly Into Deliberate Death I Have Built About My Soul, To Fend Its Life From Gazes Of The World. I Am Too Proud To Endure The World'S Desire Of My Beauty; I Know Myself Too Marvellous In Love To Be The Joy Of Aught That Thou Hast Made: I Am To Be Bride Of Thee, Of The World'S Maker. O God, The Heart I Have From Thee, The Heart Uttering Itself In An Endless Word Of Love, Is Sealed Up In The Stone Of Worldly Night: Set Hitherward The Flaming Way Of Thy Feet, Break My Night, And Enter In Unto Me. Come, Wed My Spirit; And Like As The Sea, Into The Shining Spousal Ecstasy Of Sun And Wind, Riseth In Cloudy Gleam, So Let The Knowing Of My Flesh Be Clouds Of Fire, Mounting Up The Height Of My Spirit, Fire Clouding With Flame The Marriage Hour Wherein My Spirit Keeps Thy Dreadful Light Away From Heaven In A Bridal Kiss,-- Fire Of Bodily Sense In Spiritual Glee Held, As Fire Of Water In Sunlit Air. Ah God, Beautiful God, My Soul Is Wild With Love Of Thee. Hitherward Turn Thy Feet, Turn Their Golden Journeying Towards This Night,-- This Night Of Cavernous Earth; And Now Let Shine These Walls Of Stone, Against Thy Nearing Love, Like Pure Glass Smitten By The Power Of The Sun; And Let Them Be, In Thy Descending Love, Like Glass In A Furnace, Falling Molten Down, Back From Thy Burning Feet Streaming And Flowing, Leaving Me Naked To Thy Bright Desire.-- Enjoy Me, God, Enjoy Thy Bride To-Night. Vashti. Too Well I Know The First, The Scarlet Clad; And She, That Was In Shining White And Gold, Was As The Sound Of Bees And Waters, At Last Heard By One Long Closed In The Dins Of Madness. But What Was She, The Black-Robed, With The Eyes So Fearfully Alight, The Last Who Spoke? Ishtar. Take None Of These For Perfect: They Are Moods Purifying My Women To Become My Unexpressive, Uttermost Intent.-- As Music Binds Into A Strict Delight The Manifold Random Sounds That Shake The Air, Even So Fashioned Must I Have The Being That Fills With Rushing Power The Boundless Spirit: Amidst It, Musically Firm, A Joy That Is A Fiery Knowledge Of Itself, Thereby Self-Continent, A Globed Fire. And She Who Gave Thee Wonder, Is The Sign Of Those Who Firmest, Brightest Hold Their Being Fastened And Seized In One Enjoyed Desire. Yet Even They Are But A Making Ready For What I Perfectly Intend: In Them Joy Of Self-Bound Desire Hath Burnt Itself To Extreme Purity; I Am Free Thereby To Work My Meaning Through Them, My Divinity. Yea, Such Clean Fire In Man And Such In Woman To Mingle Wonderfully, That The Twain Become A Moment Of One Blazing Flame Infinitely Upward Towering, Far Beyond The Boundless Fate Of Spirit In The World. But In The Way To This Are Maladies And Anguish; And As A Perilous Bridge Over The Uncontrolled Demanding World, Virginity, Passionate Self-Possessing, Must Build Itself Supreme, Unbreakable. --I Leave Thee: As Thou Mayst, Be Comforted By Prophecy Of What I Mean In Life. Against Thee Is Not Heaven, And Thou Must Endure The Hatred Men Will Throw Upon Thee. * * * * * The Shining Place Where Ishtar Looked At Her Empty The Queen Beheld; And Into Mist The Glory Fainted, And The Stars Came Through Untroubled. Into The Night The Queen Went On.