Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, DON JUAN DECLAIMS, by JAMES ELROY FLECKER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

DON JUAN DECLAIMS, by             Poem Explanation         Poet's Biography
First Line: I am don juan, curst from age to age
Last Line: And took my hand, and I was led away.
Subject(s): Don Juan


I am Don Juan, curst from age to age
By priestly tract and sentimental stage:
Branded a villain or believed a fool,
Battered by hatred, seared by ridicule,
Noble on earth, all but a king in Hell,
I am Don Juan with a tale to tell.
Hot leapt the dawn from deep Plutonian fires
And ran like blood among the twinkling spires.
the market quickened: carts came rattling down:
Good human music roared about the town,
"And come," they cried, "and buy the best of Spain's
Great fireskinned fruits with cold and streaming veins!"
Others, "The man who'd make a lordly dish,
Would buy my speckled or my silver fish."
And some, "I stitch you raiment to the rule!"
And some, "I sell you attar of Stamboul!"
"And I have lapis for your love to wear,
Pearls for her neck and amber for her hair."
Death has its gleam. They swing before me still,
The shapes and sounds and colours of Seville!
For there I learnt to love the plot, the fight,
The masker's cloak, the ladder set for flight,

The stern pursuit, the rapier's glint of death,
The scent of starlit roses, beauty's breath,
The music and the passion and the prize,
Aragon lips and Andalusian eyes.
This day a democrat I scoured the town;
Courting, the next, I brought a princess down:
Now in some lady's panelled chamber hid
Achieved what love approves and laws forbid,
Now walked and whistled round the sleepy farms
And clasped a Dulcinea in my arms.
I was the true, the grand idealist:
My light could pierce the pretty golden mist
That hides from common souls the starrier climes:
I loved as small men do ten-thousand times:
Rose to the blue triumphant, curved my bow,
Set high the mark and brought an angel low,
And laced with that brave body and shining soul
Learnt how to live, then learnt to love the whole.
And I first broke that jungle dark and dense,
Which hides the silver house of Commonsense,
And dissipated that disastrous lie
Which makes a god of stuffless Unity,
And drave the dark behind me, and revealed
A Pagan sunrise on a Christian field.
My legend tells how once, by passion moved,
I slew the father of a girl I loved,
Then summoned -- like an old and hardened sinner --
The brand-new statue of the dead to dinner.
My ribald guests, with Spanish wine aflame,
Were most delighted when the statue came,
Bowed to the party, made a little speech,
And bore me off beyond their human reach.
Well, priests must flourish and the truth must pale:
A very pious, entertaining tale.
But this believe. I struck a ringing blow
At sour Authority's ancestral show,
And stirred the sawdust understuffing all
The sceptred or the surpliced ritual.
I willed my happiness, kept bright and brave
My thoughts and deeds this side the accursed grave.
Life was a ten-course banquet after all,
And neatly rounded by my funeral.
"Pale guest, why strip the roses from your brow?
"We hope to feast till morning." "Who knocks now?"
"Twelve of the clock, Don Juan." In came he,
That shining, tall and cold Authority,
Whose marble lips smile down on lips that pray,
And took my hand, and I was led away.





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