Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A SONG OF CREATION: BOOK 1, CANTO 2, by CINCINNATUS HEINE MILLER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A SONG OF CREATION: BOOK 1, CANTO 2, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: From out the surge of sutro's steep
Last Line: Her cloud-topped towers of ilium.
Alternate Author Name(s): Miller, Joaquin
Subject(s): Creation


I

From out the surge of Sutro's steep,
Beyond the Gate a rock uprears,
So sudden, savage, unawares
The very billows start and leap,
As frightened at its lifted face,
So shoreless, sealess, out of place:
A sea-washed, surge-locked isle, as lone
As lorn Napoleon on his throne --
His Saint Helena throne, where still
The dazed world in dumb wonder turns
To his high throned, imperious will
And incense burns and ever burns.
Here huge sea-lions climb and cling,
Despite the surge and seethe and shock
The topmost limit of the rock,
And one is named Napoleon, king.
Behold him lord the land, the sea,
In lone, unquestioned majesty!

II

She saw, she raised alert her head
With eager face and cheery said:
"What lusty, upheaved, bull-built neck!
What lungs to lift above the roar!
What captain on his quarter-deck
To mock the sea and scorn the shore!
I like that scar across his breast,
I like his ardent, lover's zest!"

III

The huge sea-beast uprose, uprose,
As if to surely topple down;
He reached his black and bearded nose
Above his harem, gray, black, brown,
Sleek, shining, wet or steaming dry,
And mouthed and mouthed against the sky.

IV

What eloquence, what hot love pain!
What land but this, what love but his?
What isle of bliss but this and this --
To roar and love and roar again?
What land, what love but this his own,
Loud thundered from his slippery throne;
Loud thundered in his Sappho's ear,
As if she could not, would not hear.

V

At last her heart was moved and she
Raised two bright eyes to his black beard,
Then sudden turned, as if she feared,
And threw her headlong in the sea,
Another Sappho, all for love.
While Phaon towered still above --
An instant only; yet once more
That upheaved head, that great bull neck,
That sea-born, bossed, bull-throated roar --
A poise, a plunge, a flash, a fleck,
And far down, caverned in the deep,
Where sea-green curtains swing and sweep
And varicolored carpets creep,
Soft emerald or amethyst,
Two lion lovers kept sweet tryst.

VI

She looked, looked long, then smiled, then sighed,
A proud, pure soul unsatisfied,
Then sat dense grasses suddenly
And thrust a foot above the sea.
She threw her backward, arms wide out,
And up the poppy-spangled steep
O'er grass-set cushions sown in gold,
As she would sleep yet would not sleep.
She reached her wide hands fast about
And grasses, gold and manifold,
Of lowly blossoms, pink and blue,
She gathered in and laughing threw,
With bare-armed, heedless, happy grace --
Threw fragrant handfuls in his face.
And then as if to sleep she lay,
A babe nursed at the breast of May --
Lay back with wide eyes to the skies
And clouds of wondrous butterflies;
Such Mariposa blooms in air!
Such bloomy, golden, poppy hair!
And which were hers or poppy's gold
Without close care none could have told;
And which were butterflies or bloom,
To guess there was not guessing room,
The while, in quest of sweets or rest,
They fanned her face, they kissed her breast.

VII

That face like to a lilt of song --
A face of sea-shell tint, with tide
Of springtime flowing fast and strong
And fearless in its maiden pride --
Such rich rose ambushed in such hair
Of heedless, wind-kissed, poppy gold
Blown here, blown there, blown anywhere,
Soft-lifting, falling fold on fold,
As made gold poppies where she lay
Turn envious, turn green as May!
What wise face yet what wilful face,
A face that would not be denied
No more than gipsy winds that race
The sea bank in their saucy pride;
A form that knew yet only knew
The natural, the human, true.

VIII

Those two round mounds of Nineveh,
What treasures of the past they knew!
But these two round mounds here to-day
Hold treasures richer far than they,
And prophecies more truly true.
Old Nineveh's twin mounds are dust;
They only know the ghostly past;
But these two new mounds hold in trust
The awful future, hold the vast
Unbounded empire, land or sea,
Henceforth, for all eternity.
Let pass dead pasts; far wiser turn
And delve the future; love and learn.

IX

It seems she dreamed. She slept, we know,
A happy, quiet little space,
Then thrust a round limb far below
And half-way turned aside her face,
And then she threw her arms wide out
In sleep, and so reached blind about
As if for something she might find
From fortune-telling, gipsy wind.

X

The soft, warm winds from far away
Were weary, and they crept so near
They lay against her willing ear
As if they had so much to say.
And she, she seemed so glad to hear
The while she loving, sleeping lay
And dreamed of love nor dreamed of doubt,
But laughing thrust her form far out
And down the fragrant poppy steep
In playful, restless, happy sleep.
She sighed, she heaved her hilly breast,
As one who would but could not rest.

XI

How natural, how free, how fair,
The while the happy winds on wing,
As larger butterflies, laid bare
A rippled, braided rim of white
And outstretched ankles exquisite.
What arms to hold a babe at breast --
Such breast as prudist never guessed!
What shapely limbs, what everything
That makes great woman great and good --
That makes for proud, pure motherhood!

XII

Such thews as mount the steeps of morn,
Such limbs as love, not lust shall share,
Such legs as God has shaped to bear
The weight of ages, worlds unborn;
Such limbs as Lesbian shrines revealed
When comely, longing mothers kneeled;
Such thews as Phidias loved to hew,
Such limbs as Leighton loved to draw
When painting tall, Greek girls at play;
Such legs as blind old Homer saw,
As Marlowe knew but yesterday,
When Helen climbed in dreams for him
Her cloud-topped towers of Ilium.





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