The Sovran Rhythm

Yet, after years and years, to Eve there came
Impatience in her soul, and as a blight
Of being the sapless, loveless flower of white
And torrid happiness that cleaved the same;
And once, when in the skies the tempest moved
Fain had she risen and its lightning proved.
Then did a sweet, broad shudder glide on her;
And, in her deepest flesh to feel it, Eve
Pressed her frail hands against her bosom's heave.
The angel, when he felt the sleeper stir
With violent abrupt awakening,
And scattered air and arms, and body rocked,
Questioned the night, but Eve remained unlocked,
And silent. He in vain bespoke each thing
That lived beside her by the naked sources,
Birds, flowers, and mirrors of cold water-courses
With which, perchance, her unknown thought arose
Up from the ground; and one night when he bowed,
And with his reverent fingers sought to close
Her eyes, she leapt out of his great wing's shroud.
O fertile folly in its sudden flare
Beyond the too pure angel's baffled care!
For while he stretched his arms out she was drifting
Already far, and passionately lifting
To braziers of the stars her body bare.

And all the heart of Adam, seeing her so,
Trembled.
She willed to love, he willed to know.

Awkward and shy he neared her, daring not
To startle eyes that lost in reveries swam;
From terebinths were fluttered scents, and from
The soil's fermenting mounted odours hot.

He tarried, as if waiting for her hests;
But she snatched up his hands, and o'er them hung,
And kissed them slowly, long, with kiss that clung,
And guided them to cool erected breasts.

But through her flesh they burned and burned. His mouth
Had found the fires to set on flame his drouth,
And his lithe fingers spread her streaming tresses
O'er the long ardour of their first caresses.

Stretched by the cool of fountains both were lying,
Seen of their passion-gleaming eyes alone.
And Adam felt a sudden thought unknown
Well in his heart to her fast heart replying.

Eve's body hid profound retreats as sweet
As moss that by the noon's cool breeze is brushed;
Gladly came sheaves undone to be their seat,
Gladly the grass was by their loving crushed.

And when the spasm leapt from them at last,
And held them bruised in arms strained stiff and tight,
All the great amorous and feline night
Tempered its breeze as over them it passed.

But on their vision burst
A cloud far off at first,
And whirling its dizziness with such a blast
That it was all a miracle and a fright,
Leapt from the dim horizon through the night.
Adam raised Eve, and pressed unto him fast
Her shivering body exquisitely wan.
Livid and sulphurous the cloud came on,
With thundering threats o'erflowing, and red lit.
Suddenly on the spot
Where the wild grass was hot
With their two bodies that had loved on it,
All the loud
Rage of the dark, tremendous cloud
Bit.

And the voice of the Lord God in its shadow sounded,
Fires from the flowers and nightly bushes bounded;
And where the dark the turning paths submerged,
With sword in hand flamboyant angels surged;
Lions were roaring at the fateful skies,
Eagles hailed death with hoarsely boding cries;
And by the waters all the palm-trees bent
Under the same hard wind of discontent
That beat on Eve and Adam on that sward,
And in the vasty darkness drove them toward
New human worlds more fervent than the old.

* * * * *

Now felt the man a magnet manifold
Draw out his strength and mingle it with all;
Ends he divined, and knew what gave them birth;
His lover's lips with words grew magical;
And his unwritten simple heart loved earth,
And serviceable water, trees that hold
Authority, and stones that broken shine.
Fruits tempted him to take their placid gold,
And the bruised grapes of the translucent vine
Kindled his thirst which they were ripe to still.
The howling beasts he chased awoke the skill
That in his hands had slept; and pride dowered him
With vehement strengths that foam and over-brim,
That he himself his destiny might build.

And the woman, still more fair since by the man
The marvellous shiver through her body ran,
Lived in the woods of gold by perfumes filled
And dawn, with all the future in her tears.
In her awoke the first soul, made of pride
And sweet strength blended with an unknown shame,
At the hour when all her heart was shed in flame
On the child sheltered in her naked side.
And when the day burns glorious and is done,
And feet of tall trees in the forests gleam,
She laid her body full of her young dream
On sloping rocks gilt by the setting sun;
Her lifted breasts two rounded shadows showed
Upon her skin as rosy as a shell,
And the sun that on her pregnant body glowed
Seemed to be ripening all the world as well.
Valiant and grave she pondered, burning, slow,

How by her love the lot of men should grow,
And of the beautiful and violent will
Fated to tame the earth. Ye sacred cares
And griefs, she saw you, you she saw, despairs!
And all the darkest deeps of human ill.
And with transfigured face and statelier bearing
She took your hands in hers and kissed your brow;
But you as well, men's grandeur madly daring,
You lifted up her soul, and she saw how
The limitless sands of time should by your tide
Be buried under billows singing pride;
In you she hoped, ideas keen in quest,
Fervour to love and to desire the best
In valiant pain and anguished joy; and so,
One evening roving in the after-glow,
When she beheld, come to a mossy plot,
The gates of Paradise thrown open wide,
And the angel beckoning, she turned aside
Without desire of it, and entered not.