The Slender Poe Anthology Page 6

  OINOS. And why, Agathos, should they have proceeded?

  AGATHOS. Because there were some considerations of deep interest beyond. It was deducible from what they knew, that to a being of infinite understanding—one to whom the perfection of the algebraic analysis lay unfolded—there could be no difficulty in tracing every impulse given the air—and the ether through the air—to the remotest consequences at any even infinitely remote epoch of time. It is indeed demonstrable that every such impulse given the air, must, in the end, impress every individual thing that exists within the universe;—and the being of infinite understanding—the being whom we have imagined—might trace the remote undulations of the impulse—trace them upward and onward in their influences upon all particles of an matter—upward and onward for ever in their modifications of old forms—or, in other words, in their creation of new—until he found them reflected—unimpressive at last—back from the throne of the Godhead. And not only could such a thing do this, but at any epoch, should a given result be afforded him—should one of these numberless comets, for example, be presented to his inspection—he could have no difficulty in determining, by the analytic retrogradation, to what original impulse it was due. This power of retrogradation in its absolute fulness and perfection—this faculty of referring at all epochs, all effects to all causes—is of course the prerogative of the Deity alone—but in every variety of degree, short of the absolute perfection, is the power itself exercised by the whole host of the Angelic Intelligences.

  OINOS. But you speak merely of impulses upon the air.

  AGATHOS. In speaking of the air, I referred only to the earth; but the general proposition has reference to impulses upon the ether—which, since it pervades, and alone pervades all space, is thus the great medium of creation.

  OINOS. Then all motion, of whatever nature, creates?

  AGATHOS. It must: but a true philosophy has long taught that the source of all motion is thought—and the source of all thought is—

  OINOS. God.

  AGATHOS. I have spoken to you, Oinos, as to a child of the fair Earth which lately perished—of impulses upon the atmosphere of the Earth.

  OINOS. You did.

  AGATHOS. And while I thus spoke, did there not cross your mind some thought of the physical power of words? Is not every word an impulse on the air?

  OINOS. But why, Agathos, do you weep—and why, oh why do your wings droop as we hover above this fair star—which is the greenest and yet most terrible of all we have encountered in our flight? Its brilliant flowers look like a fairy dream—but its fierce volcanoes like the passions of a turbulent heart.

  AGATHOS. They are!—they are! This wild star—it is now three centuries since, with clasped hands, and with streaming eyes, at the feet of my beloved—I spoke it—with a few passionate sentences—into birth. Its brilliant flowers are the dearest of all unfulfilled dreams, and its raging volcanoes are the passions of the most turbulent and unhallowed of hearts.

  Another of his poems in prose. Here a demon pictures the actions of man set against a strange landscape where rain turns to blood once it hits the ground. The man suggests Poe himself: “…his brow was lofty with thought, and his eye wild with care.”

  It may be important for readers to have their own image of what a demon is. In ancient Greece, a daimon was a tutelary spirit guiding one to self-actualization. Through the centuries a reversal took place. The demon who tells this fable admits to using the force of a curse to effect change. How often do we say things that cause the world to darken?

  In one of his richest concluding paragraphs, Poe evokes the ‘glorious histories’ and holy lore he surely would like his own fabulations to be included among. The lynx, sacred to Apollo, may symbolize a matchless vision.

  SILENCE — A FABLE

  “The mountain pinnacles slumber; valleys,

  crags and caves are silent.” —Alcman

  “Listen to me,” said the Demon as he placed his hand upon my head. “The region of which I speak is a dreary region in Libya, by the borders of the river Zaire. And there is no quiet there, nor silence.

  “The waters of the river have a saffron and sickly hue; and they flow not onwards to the sea, but palpitate forever and forever beneath the red eye of the sun with a tumultuous and convulsive motion. For many miles on either side of the river’s oozy bed is a pale desert of gigantic water-lilies. They sigh one unto the other in that solitude, and stretch towards the heaven their long and ghastly necks, and nod to and fro their everlasting heads. And there is an indistinct murmur which cometh out from among them like the rushing of subterrene water. And they sigh one unto the other.

  “But there is a boundary to their realm—the boundary of the dark, horrible, lofty forest. There, like the waves about the Hebrides, the low underwood is agitated continually. But there is no wind throughout the heaven. And the tall primeval trees rock eternally hither and thither with a crashing and mighty sound. And from their high summits, one by one, drop everlasting dews. And at the roots strange poisonous flowers lie writhing in perturbed slumber. And overhead, with a rustling and loud noise, the gray clouds rush westwardly forever, until they roll, a cataract, over the fiery wall of the horizon. But there is no wind throughout the heaven. And by the shores of the river Zaire there is neither quiet nor silence.

  “It was night, and the rain fell; and falling, it was rain, but, having fallen, it was blood. And I stood in the morass among the tall and the rain fell upon my head—and the lilies sighed one unto the other in the solemnity of their desolation.

  “And, all at once, the moon arose through the thin ghastly mist, and was crimson in color. And mine eyes fell upon a huge gray rock which stood by the shore of the river, and was lighted by the light of the moon. And the rock was gray, and ghastly, and tall,—and the rock was gray. Upon its front were characters engraven in the stone; and I walked through the morass of water-lilies, until I came close unto the shore, that I might read the characters upon the stone. But I could not decypher them. And I was going back into the morass, when the moon shone with a fuller red, and I turned and looked again upon the rock, and upon the characters;—and the characters were DESOLATION.

  “And I looked upwards, and there stood a man upon the summit of the rock; and I hid myself among the water-lilies that I might discover the actions of the man. And the man was tall and stately in form, and was wrapped up from his shoulders to his feet in the toga of old Rome. And the outlines of his figure were indistinct—but his features were the features of a deity; for the mantle of the night, and of the mist, and of the moon, and of the dew, had left uncovered the features of his face. And his brow was lofty with thought, and his eye wild with care; and, in the few furrows upon his cheek I read the fables of sorrow, and weariness, and disgust with mankind, and a longing after solitude.

  “And the man sat upon the rock, and leaned his head upon his hand, and looked out upon the desolation. He looked down into the low unquiet shrubbery, and up into the tall primeval trees, and up higher at the rustling heaven, and into the crimson moon. And I lay close within shelter of the lilies, and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude;—but the night waned, and he sat upon the rock.

  “And the man turned his attention from the heaven, and looked out upon the dreary river Zaire, and upon the yellow ghastly waters, and upon the pale legions of the water-lilies. And the man listened to the sighs of the water-lilies, and to the murmur that came up from among them. And I lay close within my covert and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude;—but the night waned and he sat upon the rock.

  “Then I went down into the recesses of the morass, and waded afar in among the wilderness of the lilies, and called unto the hippopotami which dwelt among the fens in the recesses of the morass. And the hippopotami heard my call, and came, with the behemoth, unto the foot of the rock, and roared loudly and fearfully beneath t
he moon. And I lay close within my covert and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude;—but the night waned and he sat upon the rock.

  “Then I cursed the elements with the curse of tumult; and a frightful tempest gathered in the heaven where, before, there had been no wind. And the heaven became livid with the violence of the tempest—and the rain beat upon the head of the man—and the floods of the river came down—and the river was tormented into foam—and the water-lilies shrieked within their beds—and the forest crumbled before the wind—and the thunder rolled—and the lightning fell—and the rock rocked to its foundation. And I lay close within my covert and observed the actions of the man. And the man trembled in the solitude;—but the night waned and he sat upon the rock.

  “Then I grew angry and cursed, with the curse of silence, the river, and the lilies, and the wind, and the forest, and the heaven, and the thunder, and the sighs of the water-lilies. And they became accursed, and were still. And the moon ceased to totter up its pathway to heaven—and the thunder died away—and the lightning did not flash—and the clouds hung motionless—and the waters sunk to their level and remained—and the trees ceased to rock—and the water-lilies sighed no more—and the murmur was heard no longer from among them, nor any shadow of sound throughout the vast illimitable desert. And I looked upon the characters of the rock, and they were changed;—and the characters were SILENCE.

  “And mine eyes fell upon the countenance of the man, and his countenance was wan with terror. And, hurriedly, he raised his head from his hand, and stood forth upon the rock and listened. But there was no voice throughout the vast illimitable desert, and the characters upon the rock were SILENCE. And the man shuddered, and turned his face away, and fled afar off, in haste, so that I beheld him no more.”

  * * *

  Now there are fine tales in the volumes of the Magi—in the iron-bound, melancholy volumes of the Magi. Therein, I say, are glorious histories of the Heaven, and of the Earth, and of the mighty sea—and of the Genii that over-ruled the sea, and the earth, and the lofty heaven. There was much lore too in the sayings which were said by the Sybils; and holy, holy things were heard of old by the dim leaves that trembled around Dodona—but, as Allah liveth, that fable which the Demon told me as he sat by my side in the shadow of the tomb, I hold to be the most wonderful of all! And as the Demon made an end of his story, he fell back within the cavity of the tomb and laughed. And I could not laugh with the Demon, and he cursed me because I could not laugh. And the lynx which dwelleth forever in the tomb, came out therefrom, and lay down at the feet of the Demon, and looked at him steadily in the face.

  This poem was never printed during Poe’s lifetime.Entered into a young lady’s album possibly in 1829, it was later discovered and published in 1875 with initial controversy concerning its authenticity, now a matter put to rest.

  It’s quintessential Poe; in a voice both defiant and vulnerable, he speaks of his early exile from others and their common sorrows and pleasures. The recognition initiates him into the daunting vocation of poet, bound by a mystery “drawn from every depth.”

  Charles Wright, like Poe, is a Southerner possessed of wizardry both musical and imagistic, which serves a spiritual quest not unfamiliar with doubt. “Poetry is an exile’s art,” he writes in Halflife: A Commonplace Journal, “Anyone who writes it seriously writes from an exile’s point of view.”

  ALONE

  From childhood’s hour I have not been

  As others were—I have not seen

  As others saw—I could not bring

  My passions from a common spring—

  From the same source I have not taken

  My sorrow—I could not awaken

  My heart to joy at the same tone—

  And all I lov’d—I lov’d alone—

  Then—in my childhood—in the dawn

  Of a most stormy life—was drawn

  From ev’ry depth of good and ill

  The mystery which binds me still—

  From the torrent, or the fountain—

  From the red cliff of the mountain—

  From the sun that ’round me roll’d

  In its autumn tint of gold—

  From the lightning in the sky

  As it pass’d me flying by—

  From the thunder, and the storm—

  And the cloud that took the form

  (When the rest of Heaven was blue)

  Of a demon in my view—

  These two brief passages come from the preface to Poe’s volume, Poems of 1831. In the second passage, the 22-year-old introduces the crucial importance of music in the poet’s art, as well as distinguishing poetry’s objective—pleasure—from the “truth” of science. As William Carlos Williams would later confirm, “If it ain’t a pleasure, it ain’t a poem.”

  Poe, already aware of the inhibiting provincialism of the American letters of his time, is prescient in the other passage, supposing that some books improve with travel, for two decades later, Charles Baudelaire, his Parisian twin, would begin to translate Poe in earnest—ultimately playing a key role in establishing the name of Poe in world literature.

  LETTER TO MR. B————— 1831

  You are aware of the great barrier in the path of an American writer. He is read, if at all, in preference to the combined and established wit of the world. I say established; for it is with literature as with law or empire—an established name is an estate in tenure, or a throne in possession. Besides, one might suppose that books, like their authors, improve by travel-their having crossed the sea is, with us, so great a distinction. Our antiquaries abandon time for distance; our very fops glance from the binding to the bottom of the title-page, where the mystic characters which spell London, Paris, or Genoa, are precisely so many letters of recommendation.

  * * *

  A poem, in my opinion, is opposed to a work of science by having for its immediate object, pleasure, not truth; to romance, by having for its object an indefinite instead of a definite pleasure, being a poem only so far as this object is attained: romance presenting perceptible images with definite, poetry indefinite sensations, to which end music is an essential, since the comprehension of sweet sound is our most indefinite conception. Music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry; music without the idea is simply music; the idea without the music is prose from its very definitiveness.

  What was meant by the invective against him who had no music in his soul?

  This solid, unusually straightforward poem first appeared in Poe’s second volume, Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and Minor Poems, published in Baltimore, December 1829. At the time, Charles Darwin, born less than a month after Poe, was at Christ’s College in Cambridge, indifferently studying toward possibly becoming a parson. A decade after Poe’s death, Darwin would publish his theory of natural selection in On The Origin of Species, a book by which much of America is still troubled.

  The pure objectivity to which science often aspires is qualified nicely by Poe’s direct address: “Science! ...Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes!”

  Myths nourish the imagination as well as being timeless. Richard Wilbur says of Poe’s sonnet, “…the poem may seem a hyperbolic warning that if the age does not grant poetry its own kind of truth, it will deprive itself of the highest and fullest means of ordering and enhancing human experience.”

  SONNET — TO SCIENCE

  Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!

  Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.

  Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart,

  Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?

  How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,

  Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering

  To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,

  Albeit he soared with an undaunted wi
ng?

  Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car,

  And driven the Hamadryad from the wood

  To seek a shelter in some happier star?

  Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,

  The Elfin from the green grass, and from me

  The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

  Always short of cash, Poe gave a number of his fictional characters great wealth, and none more than Ellison, the hero of this visionary tale, first published in the March 1847 issue of Columbian Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine.

  Ellison is one of the most intriguing of all Poe characters; “In the widest and noblest sense he was a poet.” I was first introduced to Ellison’s four elementary conditions for bliss— free exercise in the open air, love of woman, detachment from ambition, and creation of novel beauty—in an old paperback of Baudelaire’s poetry and criticism translated by Wallace Fowlie; it was from a passage in Edgar Poe, His Life and Works, with the French en face. I was in my 20s; I never forgot them, though I hadn’t read this tale until beginning to work on the book now in your hands. I’m glad I got around to it.

  There is a trip downriver that has a psychedelic feel to it, and when you get to where it’s going, a palace hovers, made possible by the magic of elemental agencies.