Classic and Contemporary Poetry
EPISTOLA AD DAKYNS, by THOMAS EDWARD BROWN Poet's Biography First Line: Dakyns, when I am dead Last Line: Three places, dakyns. Alternate Author Name(s): Brown, T. E. Subject(s): Avon (river), England; Death; Rivers; Dead, The | ||||||||
DAKYNS, when I am dead, Three places must by you be visited, Three places excellent, Where you may ponder what I meant, And then pass on -- Three places you must visit when I'm gone. Yes, meant, not did, old friend! For neither you nor I shall see the end, And do the thing we wanted: Natheless three places will be haunted By what of me The earth and air Shall spare, And fire and sea Let be -- Three places only, Three places, Dakyns I The first is by the Avon's side, Where tall rocks flank the winding tide. There come when morning's virgin kiss Awakes from dreams the clematis, And every thorn and briar is set As with a diamond coronet -- There come, and pause upon the edge, And I will lean in every ledge, And melt in grays, and flash in whites, And linger in a thousand lights; And yield in bays, and urge in capes, And fill the old familiar shapes; And yearn in curves, and strain to meet The pensive pressure of your feet And you shall feel an inner sense, A being kindred and intense; And you shall feel a strict control, A something drawing at your soul, A going out, a life suspended, A spirit with a spirit blended. And you shall start as from a dream, While I, withdrawing down the stream, Drift vaporous to the ancient sea, A wraith, a film, a memory -- Three places, Dakyns. II The next is where a hundred fells Stand round the Lake like sentinels, Where Derwent, like a sleeping beauty, Girdled with that watchful duty, At Skiddaw's foot securely lies, And gives her bosom to the skies. O, come! and I will bid the moon All subtle harmonies attune That live in shadows and in heights, A mystic chorus of delights. O, come where many an island bevels Its strand to meet the golden levels! O, lay your heart upon each line, So diamond-cut and crystalline, That seams the marble of the mere, And smoothes all trouble, calms all fear, With that sweet natural straightness, free From effort or inconstancy. O, draw your thought with all its passion Along the melancholy fashion Of forms accentuate with the beat Of the great Master's rhythmic feet. But when upon the finest verge The sense no further flight can urge, When the full orb of contemplation Is stretched, a nameless tribulation Shall sway the whole, a silent stress Borne in upon that loveliness; A burden as of human ills, A human trouble in the hills; A quickening pulse in earth and sky, And you shall know that it is I -- Three places, Dakyns. III The next is where God keeps for me A little island in the sea, A body for my needs, that so I may not all unclothed go, A vital instrument whereby I still may commune with the sky, When death has loosed the plaited strands, And left me feeling for the lands. Even now between its simple poles It has the soul of all my souls. But then -- whatever I have been, Whatever felt, whatever seen, Whatever guessed, or understood, The tones of right, the tints of good, The loves, the hates, the hopes, the fears, The gathered strength of all my years -- All that my life has in me wrought Of complex essence shall be brought And wedded to those primal forms That have their scope in calms and storms, Attuned to the swells and falls Of Nature's holy intervals. And, old coeval use surviving, No need shall be for any striving, No need from point to point to press, And swell the growing consciousness, But in a moment I shall sit Sphered in the very heart of it. And every hill from me shall shoot, And spread as from a central root, And every crag and every spur To me its attitude refer; And I shall be the living heart, And I shall live in every part, With elemental cares engrossed, And all the passion of the coast. Come then, true Dakyns, be the test Most meet to make me manifest! Come, and immediate recognise To all your moods the dumb replies. Or stretch across a kindly void The golden life-chords unalloyed With thought, and instant they shall wake The music they were made to make. Thus shall you grow into a sense Of islandhood, not taking thence Some pretty surfaces and angles, Tricking your soul, as with fine spangles A savage studs his wampum belt, But patient till the whole is felt, And you become incorporate Into an undivided state. Then shall your body be as dead; And you shall take to you instead The system of the natural powers, The heath that blooms, the cloud that lowers, The antithesis of things that bide, The cliff, the beach, the rock, the tide -- The lordly things, whose generous feud Is but a fixed vicissitude. Wherefore, O Maughold, if he come, If Dakyns come, Let not a voice be dumb In any cave; Fling up the wave In wreaths of giddy spray; O'er all the bay Flame out in gorse around the "kern," And let his heart within him burn, Until he gains the slope Where, in the "sure and certain hope," Sleep the long rows: Then let him quench the fiery gleams In Death's gray shadow of repose, As one who dreams He knows not what, and yet he knows I have her there That was a bud so rare. But, Bradda, if he come to you, I charge you to be true! Sit not all sullen by the sea, But show that you are conscious it is he. It is no vulgar tread That bends the heath: Broad be the heavens spread Above, the sea beneath Blue with that blue! And let the whispering airs Move in the ferns. By those strong prayers Which rent my heart that day as lightning rends a cloud, And rips it till it glares To open view: by all the vows I vowed, I charge you, and I charge you by the tears And by the passion that I took From you, and flung them to the vale, And had the ultimate vision, do not fail! Three places only -- Three places, Dakyns. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A FRIEND KILLED IN THE WAR by ANTHONY HECHT FOR JAMES MERRILL: AN ADIEU by ANTHONY HECHT TARANTULA: OR THE DANCE OF DEATH by ANTHONY HECHT CHAMPS D?ÇÖHONNEUR by ERNEST HEMINGWAY NOTE TO REALITY by TONY HOAGLAND A SERMON AT CLEVEDON; GOOD FRIDAY by THOMAS EDWARD BROWN |
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