---

Kenneth Slessor - Music
Work rating: Low

I
 MUSIC, on the air`s edge, rides alone, 
 Plumed like empastured Caesars of the sky 
 With a god`s helmet; now, in the gold dye 
 Of sunlight, the iron cloak, the Tuscan stone, 
 Melt to enchanted flesh—a voice is blown 
 Down from the windy pit, like a star falling. 
 Men think it is a lost eagle calling, 
 But the fool and the lover know it for Music`s cry. 
 He is running with the Valkyrs on a road of manes, 
 Darkness draws back its fur, the stars course by, 
 Fighting the windy beaks of hurricanes 
 To keep their stations in the sky— 
 Away, away! The little earth-light wanes, 
 The moon has drowned herself, cold music rings, 
 The battering of a thousand Vulcanals 
 Hammers the blood; a thousand horsemen fly 
 Belly to air, away! Now Music sings 
 Harshly, like horns of Tartars blown on high. 
II
 A SHIP in hell marooned; 
 He lies under the mast, 
 Caked with the sticky unguents of the sun. 
 Sluggishly at his wound, 
 The rat Pain, biting with bloody teeth 
 And broken nails, is fed at last, 
 The tale is done. 
 Let the shell of bleeding flesh remain, 
 This crusted finery is nothing worth. 
 He flings his body carelessly to Pain, 
 Meat for the earth. 
 Trumpets of godhood! The voice of Music sings, 
 Lost in the dark forest, riding out, 
 Louder and nearer, with triumphant wings, 
 Music and his eternal cavaliers— 
 Now Tristan rises with a mighty shout. 
 Nobody hears. 
III
 O, SILENT night, dark beach, 
 Drowning like lovers, each in each, 
 Uncharge thy musky boughs, unbend 
 Thy mouths of air, and give them speech— 
 Then, like a nest of thieves, 
 The golden, tattling leaves 
 Will sell their mask for bravoes` love, 
 Or cry their fruit to stranger Eves, 
 And voices ride 
 By foam and field 
 Of drowsy lovers, lips unsealed, 
 Blown to the lazy tide— 
 "With love we put the planets out, 
 With kissing drowned the bells, 
 And struck the clambering moon to ice; 
 Now we shall sleep and hide . . . " 
 I sang with Nonie, side by side, 
 Sunk in a drift of tumbled laces, 
 Till Music breathed his enormous flute 
 Over our small, upturned faces. 
IV
 IN the pans of straw-coned country 
 This river is the solitary traveller; 
 Nothing else moves, the sky lies empty, 
 Birds there are none, and cattle not many. 
 Now it is sunlight, what is the difference? 
 Nothing. The sun is as white as moonlight. 
 Wind has buffeted flat the grasses, 
 Long, long ago; but now there is nothing, 
 Wind gone and men gone, only the water 
 Stumbling over the stones in silence— 
 Nothing but fields with roots gone rotten, 
 Paddocks unploughed and clotted marshes. 
 Even the wind that stirred them has vanished, 
 Only the river remains with its water, 
 Shambling over the straw-coned country. 
 Nothing else moves, the sky lies empty, 
 Only the river remains with its water, 
 And droughts will come . . . . 
V
 IN and out the countryfolk, the carriages and carnival, 
 Pastry-cooks in all directions push to barter their confections, 
 Trays of little gilded cakes, caramels in painted flakes, 
 Marzipan of various makes and macaroons of all complexions, 
 Riding on a tide of country faces. 
 Up and down the smoke and crying, 
 Girls with apple-eyes are flying, 
 Country boys in costly braces 
 Run with red, pneumatic faces; 
 Trumpets gleam, whistles scream, 
 Organs cough their coloured steam out, 
 Dogs are worming, sniffing, squirming; 
 Air-balloons and paper moons, 
 Roundabouts with curdled tunes, 
 Drowned bassoons and waggon-jacks; 
 Tents like flowers of candle-wax; 
 "Buy, buy, buy, buy! 
 Cotton ties, cakes and pies, what a size, test your eyes, hairdyes, 
 candy-shies, all a prize, penny tries, no lies, watch it rise, 
 buy, buy, buy, buy!" 
 So everybody buys. 
 Gently the doctor of magic mutters, 
 Opens his puppet-stall, 
 Pulls back the painted shutters, 
 Ruffles the golden lace. 
 Ha! The crowd flutters . . . 
 Reddened and sharp and small, 
 O, Petroushka`s face! 
VI
 TORCHES and running fire; the flagstones drip 
 Like a black mirror, wet from killing. Smoke goes up, 
 Clouding the gilded rafter-birds, and the flying cup 
 That floats with magic wine to Konchak`s lip. 
 Then the Khan claps his beard, and harps are brushed 
 Clear in the darkness; dancers` bells far off 
 Blab at their ankles. Now, from the gold trough, 
 We have dipped bowls of mare`s milk; all is hushed. 
 Suddenly, dull bubbling drums uprise, grow thicker, 
 Split with a scream of metal—glazed in the flare, 
 Tartar girls rapidly whirl in storms of animal hair, 
 Spinning in islands of movement, quicker and quicker. 
 In the middle of the dance, smiling at his whim, 
 Khan Konchak rose, and left the golden hall. 
 Soon there was silent darkness over all. 
 One of the dancers was sent after him. 
VII
 IN the apple-country, in the apple-trees, 
 The boughs are bubbling with pink snow 
 To frost the fields. A thousand birds fall crying, 
 Sharp and sweet, like morning-stars, in seas 
 Deeper than air. A thousand blossoms blow, 
 Drops of gold blood, like flowers gone flying, 
 Drowning with foam the drowsy girls below. 
 These country-girls, in hats of straw, 
 Take kissing as a natural law, 
 Put up their cheeks, like rosy saucers, 
 Gravely on tiptoe waiting. 
 They plainly do not know the dangers 
 This practice breeds from courteous strangers, 
 Who find, on airing their politeness, 
 Such local customs captivating. 
 As for my part, under the trees, 
 I found a girl with tawny knees, 
 Pretty enough, at a hurried view. 
 We lay on blossoms, glassed with dew. 
 I didn`t notice her till we kissed. 
 How pleasant, a sentimentalist! 
VIII
 OPEN! It is the moon knocking with fists of air 
 To break thy doors down, it is the lusty moon 
 More clamorous than hunting-cries, come tramping 
 With lanterns to uprouse thee, drown the fields  
 In drifts of crystal, waken the farms with light, 
 And lovers call to buffet the rough smoke 
 From valleys rising up—then, like the juice 
 Of Juno`s apples, the rich, Indian glow 
 Shall cast them out of Time, and all be running, 
 Dancing and kissing, in this headlong, breathless moon, 
 This moon pulling at old hinges, bawling through keyholes, 
 Crying out "Siegmund! Siegmund! Siegmund!" 
 The door flies open. 
 In this house, there is anger, in the forest, night, 
 But love is under my laughter, and under my cloak, flight. 
 O, hast thou not yet woken? 
 In night, there is bitterness, in sorrow, tears to weep, 
 But love is under my music, and under my cloak, sleep. 
 O, Lady, hast thou spoken? 
 In tears, there is remembering, in memory, no release, 
 But love is under my kissing, and under my cloak, peace. 
 O, hide beneath my cloak! 
 So shall we steal into the deeps of Spring, 
 Clasped each to each, and swim the merry tide, 
 Rounding the world, on the green floods astride, 
 Till, drowned in a bubble of flowers, too dazed to cling, 
 We`re thrown up, pink and naked castaways, 
 On some old beach, where Time is put to rout, 
 And the world a buried star, not talked about— 
 So shall we daunt the gods, conceal their gaze. 
IX
 ONCE, at your words, I would have struck to flame 
 The ground I strode on, all the hives of blood 
 Gone bursting mad—but now, congealed and thick, 
 Anger, the wine, chokes me, hoods me with stone, 
 Clogs and corrodes me with its marish flood. 
 Suddenly, as though to metal grown, 
 I stand immovable, feel strangely sick, 
 And hear your voice far off, crying my name. 
 The clouds dissolve. Now I can see your face, 
 Immense and sweating; the room has fallen in, 
 Tiny beside it—your face, immense and sweating, 
 Blurred into mockery at the words that fill you. 
 Come, then. You wish to crush me. Let us begin; 
 Since it is obvious I shall have to kill you, 
 Have done with useless voices and regretting. 
 I want to get it over, and leave this place. 
 Then, like some god on a stone pedestal 
 Who stirs by night with unfamiliar limbs, 
 I turn to an automation, upraise 
 Half-wondering an arm I find in the air, 
 Clammy with grappled iron. Everything swims, 
 Fogged in the coughing gas-light. Blindly I stare, 
 And stab once or twice . . . stabbing in a daze . . . . 
 No need for more. He is dead, this animal. 
 Dead, dead. There was no need to strike 
 So many times, there is no need to hide— 
 It`s nothing to be ashamed of nowadays. 
 He was my enemy. Now he has perished, 
 Charred in the smoking ovens of my pride. 
 Why should the splendid fury that I cherished 
 Seem now to be a cold and fruitless blaze? 
 Good God! Can`t I kill my enemy if I like! 
X
 NOTHING grows on the stone trees 
 But lanterns, frosty gourds of colour, 
 Melting their bloody drops in water 
 Over the dark seas. 
 These peaks of stucco, smoking light, 
 These Venice-roads, the pools and channels, 
 Tunnel the night with a thousand planets, 
 Daubing their glaze of white, 
 Where belfries glitter, spire on spire, 
 Shining on men with paper faces, 
 And boats, in the glass billow fading, 
 Beetles of cloudy fire. 
 Faintly the dripping, crystal strings 
 Unlock their Spanish airs, their festival 
 Which, far away, resolves to emptiness, 
 Echoes of bitter things, 
 Far away music, cold and small, 
 Which, like a child`s delight remembered, 
 Falls to mocked effigy for ever, 
 Melancholy to recall. 
XI
 COME in your painted coaches, friends of mine, 
 We`ll keep the stars night-company with wine, 
 Morning shall find us bending to the flute, 
 And daybreak mock us at our candleshine. 
 Pile all thy jewelled berries in a heap, 
 Almonds and musk and sweetmeats, all for thee— 
 We`ll rest on silk a thousand cushions deep, 
 Wake up and shake the cassia-tree, 
 And eat a sticky cake, and sleep, 
 And slee—.. 
XII
 Look up! Thou hast a shining Guest 
 Whose body in the dews hath lain, 
 His face like a strange wafer pressed 
 Secret and starry, at thy pane; 
 And he shall sing with human tongue 
 Old music men have never sung 
 Since Orpheus on earth was young, 
 And shall not sing again. 
 But life and all its lies of stone 
 Shall crack to fumes and disappear, 
 Thy little golden shells be blown 
 Like stars in water, far and near, 
 And thou shalt wake behind the Glass, 
 In stone dissolved, and phantom brass— 
 O, deaf! The bells of Music pass, 
 Not can, but darest, thou hear!
Source
The script ran 0.003 seconds.