"The wreck of all that's solid, big and fine," The skipper groaned. "Ten years ago, to dine With Sark redeemed whole months in ports like this. I never met a man so grand with dreams. . . . Jove! When he talked, his eyes would send out gleams Brighter than island fireflies. But his wife, She'd squat there like a Carib-stone. No word From her; just sullenness that sneered 'Absurd!' Yet she was handsome in some nameless way. . . . And now he's drinking, slacking, slipping down To God knows what; still, miles above this town. Tell him I sent you. Patois is his forte -- One of a score. He'll lend you any books You need, and -- don't confuse him with his looks!" The townsfolk bored me, so I looked up Sark One night. The weeds around his bungalow Blotted the path. The garden seemed to grow Haphazard; branches struck my face, one sweet, Too sweet, a frangipani's. The whole porch Was snarled with vines. No lights. I flashed my torch, Made out the door and knocked. A shuffling step, And I was greeted with a slattern's "Well?" A reddish wrapper was the woman's shell: Her face I never really saw; her voice, My business stated, rasped me with a "There!" A finger as abruptly pointing where A shadowy figure lounged. I coughed. It rose Yawning, advanced, said thickly: "I am Sark, If it is he you want." It was so dark I all but missed the hand whose firm, strong grip Denied the fumes whose presence proved him weak. I hedged. No use. "Decent of you to seek Me out like this. Come, try this Berbice chair! The skipper sent you? Good! The skipper's friend Would be @3amicus certus in@1 -- the end!" This with a mirthless laugh. "A smoke? a drink?" My cool refusal made him laugh again, This time like sunlight when it braves March rain. The woman did not linger. I was glad; I would have never stuck it if she had, And suddenly I felt his need cry to me And knew that I must listen, though I fear Mixed with the wish to help was that to hear. His eyes -- the skipper was correct -- they blazed; And I, I listened, startled, shaken, dazed By all the splendors -- more than speech was his -- By all the rocking splendors which rolled out Funneled with flame, a gold-spun water-spout. Such was his force, his swinging speed, his height, Reaching from silt to star -- until he broke And sucked me down to share a stifling smoke Through which dragged heavily his final words, Pitiless, shameless, hopeless, first and last, As if a god had turned iconoclast: "She? It's the old, old story. Man's conceit Hankers for what it fails to understand, -- The fascination of Fate's ampersand. But, Fate, remember, is the weaker self Made master of the will. So what I got Is what I destined; what I am, a sot, Only my own velleity in terms Of liquor. For the choice was mine, and then Again the choice was mine, all mine! Amen." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...HINC LACHRIMAE; OR THE AUTHOR TO AURORA: 1 by WILLIAM BOSWORTH |