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Home  »  Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century  »  Christina Catherine Fraser-Tytler (Mrs. Edward Liddell) (1848– )

Alfred H. Miles, ed. Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907.

By Songs in Minor Keys (1884). I. Absolution

Christina Catherine Fraser-Tytler (Mrs. Edward Liddell) (1848– )

TWO loved a few years since, and read anew

The mysteries of God; and earth and sky

Were but reflections of a great I AM,

Whose name was Love: for Love is God, they said,

And thought it were the same as God is Love.

So they smiled on in a large land of smiles,

Where, as of old, the blind man with half-sight

Saw men as trees before him: and their feet

Went airily along on untouched earth,

And birds were angels, and to love was life.

And with the eyes of children that first see,

And know it, so they saw and wondered much

How they had ever lived so blind before.

And then the real awakening came—the day

When, children still, they learned to see beyond

The mazy borders of the land of Love;

Saw more than men as trees, and learnt to know

The harder after-lesson of “I feel.”

All life not fair—all men not true; some hard,

And some as pitiless as hail from heaven.

And a gaunt figure called the World strode up,

And came between them, and the gods of earth

Lift up themselves and asked for human hearts,

And theirs were offered on the golden shrine.

They parted, as the old tales run; and none

But God and such as part can tell the woe

Of the long days that moaned themselves away

Like billows beating on a sandy shore,

Whose song is ever of long Death and Time—

For ever breaking their full hearts, and still

Upgathering all the weight of woe again

To break for ever. But billows that are tired

Sink down at last into a patient calm,

Seeing their breaking fruitless. And so she,

Wed to another, with the child she bore

Rocked her old sorrow into fitful sleep,

And prayed the Holy Mother bless the child

And keep him safe, heart-whole from love and grief.

So many years rolled by: when on a day

The sun of warmer countries beating strong

Upon the Roman’s city, filled the dome

Of Peter as with fire from God. And there

Within, alone in that great solitude,

Keeping his watch for any lambs might seek

There to be shriven of their sins and set

Anew upon the highway of their God,

A priest, unseen, with his long wand outstretched.

Silence reigned speaking. And to his heart and God

The Father spake. When, lo, there swayed far off

The outer curtain, and there came the tread

Of swift light feet along the marble way.

A woman, fair with beauty of full life;

Girlish in all her movements, yet with pain

Of Holy Mother by the Holy Rood

On the sweet face from which she cast the veil

And looked about her. But the beckoning wand

Called to her mutely—and she paused and knelt.

“Father, canst understand my English tongue?

Yea! then I thank my God, for I am sad,

And burthened so with sin, I cannot walk

With head erect among my fellow-men,

And I am stranger here, and would confess.

“Father, it was no sin; it seemed not so

When it was near me, in that time long past;

But good thoughts, held beyond their time, are sin,

And good thoughts asked of us by God may turn

To foul corruption if we hold them here.

Listen to me. A long, long time gone by

I loved. Start not. My love was free; no chain

Bound me to suffer. All the world was mine,

And over it there flushed the rosy light

Of a first love—God knows how true and pure

Father, a love that holy men like you

Need never shrink from. Such a love, as but

To taste the blessedness of loving so

Were heaven on earth. But then to hear and see

He loved me was a tale too great, too dear,

For mortal heart to bear alone, and beat.

And so God thought to make us one—for I

Had died, but that his heart could share with me

In part the joyfulness, the too-much bliss.

“Father, when just my weaker soul had grown

To lean its fulness on him—when the times

And seasons passed unseen, because that I

Felt only constant summer by my side—

Then—they came between us. Had he died

He still was mine hereafter. Christ Himself

Has His own bride, the Church. But I was wed,

And he passed from me to I know not where.

“Father, the years have passed. I thought that I

Had learnt so well the lesson—to forget.

But Memory listens, as a wakeful child,

And all the more the watcher bids him sleep,

He opens wide his eyes, and makes reply,

And will not sleep for bidding. It is so,

Father, with me. And in my children’s eyes

I see reproaches; and their baby-hands

That wreathe me seem to say, ‘You are not true,

Not a true mother, for your life is past:

You only love us somewhere in a dream.’

“Father, he lives—my husband. And his love

Speaks too reproaches. For when he can smile,

I cannot, as good wives should do, smile back,

And lie myself to gladness. I turn there,

My God! to those long days have burnt their brand

Into my heart. When I could live: before,—

O Father! that ‘before!’—that great, great gulf

That yawns between us! Ah, I hear you start!

Did you speak, Father? I am vile, but now

Shrive me—I dare not take my load away!

“Stay! there is one stain more. If I should see

His face again—on this side of the grave,

My God! and if he called me, ‘Will you come?’

I sometimes think I could not choose but go!

Pray for me, Father—I have told you all.

But God is gracious—do not you be hard—

But answer, Father, and then shrive me so!”

There was a long, long silence as she knelt.

And then, at length, a voice as of the wind

Moaning a little in a wooded place,

Came to her softly.

“Daughter, be thou still

And patient. It is the great God’s will.

I, too, have suffered: had a love like thine,

But long, long since have laid its fetters by.

Daughter, go home. It were not well to stay

Longer in this blest place—we two—alone.

I shrive thee so—from sin! Pray thou for me,

As I for thee. In heaven—hereafter—

Who knows?—I yet may speak with thee again!”

She moved, she rose, and passed forth from the place,

With heart made gladder. And the curtain fell,

As the soft footsteps on the marble died.

It was the silence only and his God

That heard a moan beyond the outstretched wand:

A long, long sigh, as of a spirit fled.

And then, in broken whispers, came at length:

“Into Thy hands, my God! the gate is past—

Death hath no longer sting, and Life hath nought

For me to fear or shrink from any more.

My God, I thank Thee! Thine the power, the might,

That held my breath, and made me more than man!

If I have suffered my full meed of pain,

Let me go hence! And on the other side

Show me Thy Bride! that I may fill my soul

And have no aching there—nor any part

In looking earthwards—back to earthly things!”

That night in Rome a heavy bell tolled slow

In convent walls. And cowlèd brothers prayed

For Brother Francis, entered into rest.