Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Matthew Arnold. 18221888747. The Forsaken Merman
COME, dear children, let us away; | |
Down and away below. | |
Now my brothers call from the bay; | |
Now the great winds shoreward blow; | |
Now the salt tides seaward flow; | 5 |
Now the wild white horses play, | |
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. | |
Children dear, let us away. | |
This way, this way! | |
Call her once before you go. | 10 |
Call once yet. | |
In a voice that she will know: | |
‘Margaret! Margaret!’ | |
Children’s voices should be dear | |
(Call once more) to a mother’s ear; | 15 |
Children’s voices, wild with pain. | |
Surely she will come again. | |
Call her once and come away. | |
This way, this way! | |
‘Mother dear, we cannot stay.’ | 20 |
The wild white horses foam and fret. | |
Margaret! Margaret! | |
Come, dear children, come away down. | |
Call no more. | |
One last look at the white-wall’d town, | 25 |
And the little grey church on the windy shore. | |
Then come down. | |
She will not come though you call all day. | |
Come away, come away. | |
Children dear, was it yesterday | 30 |
We heard the sweet bells over the bay? | |
In the caverns where we lay, | |
Through the surf and through the swell, | |
The far-off sound of a silver bell? | |
Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, | 35 |
Where the winds are all asleep; | |
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam; | |
Where the salt weed sways in the stream; | |
Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round, | |
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground; | 40 |
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine, | |
Dry their mail, and bask in the brine; | |
Where great whales come sailing by, | |
Sail and sail, with unshut eye, | |
Round the world for ever and aye? | 45 |
When did music come this way? | |
Children dear, was it yesterday? | |
Children dear, was it yesterday | |
(Call yet once) that she went away? | |
Once she sate with you and me, | 50 |
On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea, | |
And the youngest sate on her knee. | |
She comb’d its bright hair, and she tended it well, | |
When down swung the sound of the far-off bell. | |
She sigh’d, she look’d up through the clear green sea. | 55 |
She said, ‘I must go, for my kinsfolk pray | |
In the little grey church on the shore to-day. | |
‘Twill be Easter-time in the world—ah me! | |
And I lose my poor soul, Merman, here with thee.’ | |
I said, ‘Go up, dear heart, through the waves. | 60 |
Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves.’ | |
She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay. | |
Children dear, was it yesterday? | |
Children dear, were we long alone? | |
‘The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan. | 65 |
Long prayers,’ I said, ‘in the world they say. | |
Come,’ I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay. | |
We went up the beach, by the sandy down | |
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-wall’d town. | |
Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still, | 70 |
To the little grey church on the windy hill. | |
From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers, | |
But we stood without in the cold-blowing airs. | |
We climb’d on the graves, on the stones worn with rains, | |
And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes. | 75 |
She sate by the pillar; we saw her dear: | |
‘Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here. | |
Dear heart,’ I said, ‘we are long alone. | |
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.’ | |
But, ah! she gave me never a look, | 80 |
For her eyes were seal’d to the holy book. | |
Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door. | |
Came away, children, call no more. | |
Come away, come down, call no more. | |
Down, down, down; | 85 |
Down to the depths of the sea. | |
She sits at her wheel in the humming town, | |
Singing most joyfully. | |
Hark what she sings: ‘O joy, O joy, | |
For the humming street, and the child with its toy. | 90 |
For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well. | |
For the wheel where I spun, | |
And the blessèd light of the sun.’ | |
And so she sings her fill, | |
Singing most joyfully, | 95 |
Till the shuttle falls from her hand, | |
And the whizzing wheel stands still. | |
She steals to the window, and looks at the sand; | |
And over the sand at the sea; | |
And her eyes are set in a stare; | 100 |
And anon there breaks a sigh, | |
And anon there drops a tear, | |
From a sorrow-clouded eye, | |
And a heart sorrow-laden, | |
A long, long sigh | 105 |
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden, | |
And the gleam of her golden hair. | |
Come away, away, children. | |
Come children, come down. | |
The hoarse wind blows colder; | 110 |
Lights shine in the town. | |
She will start from her slumber | |
When gusts shake the door; | |
She will hear the winds howling, | |
Will hear the waves roar. | 115 |
We shall see, while above us | |
The waves roar and whirl, | |
A ceiling of amber, | |
A pavement of pearl. | |
Singing, ‘Here came a mortal, | 120 |
But faithless was she: | |
And alone dwell for ever | |
The kings of the sea.’ | |
But, children, at midnight, | |
When soft the winds blow; | 125 |
When clear falls the moonlight; | |
When spring-tides are low: | |
When sweet airs come seaward | |
From heaths starr’d with broom; | |
And high rocks throw mildly | 130 |
On the blanch’d sands a gloom: | |
Up the still, glistening beaches, | |
Up the creeks we will hie; | |
Over banks of bright seaweed | |
The ebb-tide leaves dry. | 135 |
We will gaze, from the sand-hills, | |
At the white, sleeping town; | |
At the church on the hill-side— | |
And then come back down. | |
Singing, ‘There dwells a loved one, | 140 |
But cruel is she. | |
She left lonely for ever | |
The kings of the sea.’ |