—March 15, 1894
The Secret
One thing in all things have I seen:One thought has haunted earth and air;Clangour and silence both have beenIts palace chambers. Everywhere
I saw the mystic vision flow,And live in men, and woods, and streams,Until I could no longer knowThe dream of life from my own dreams.
Sometimes it rose like fire in me,Within the depths of my own mind,And spreading to infinity,It took the voices of the wind.
It scrawled the human mystery,Dim heraldry—on light and air;Wavering along the starry sea,I saw the flying vision there.
Each fire that in God's temple litBurns fierce before the inner shrine,Dimmed as my fire grew near to it,And darkened at the light of mine.
At last, at last, the meaning caught:When spirit wears its diadem,It shakes its wondrous plumes of thought,And trails the stars along with them.
—April 15, 1894
Dust
I heard them in their sadness say,"The earth rebukes the thought of God:We are but embers wrapt in clayA little nobler than the sod."
But I have touched the lips of clay—Mother, thy rudest sod to meIs thrilled with fire of hidden day,And haunted by all mystery.
—May 15, 1894
Magic—After reading the Upanishads
Out of the dusky chamber of the brainFlows the imperial will through dream on dream;The fires of life around it tempt and gleam;The lights of earth behind it fade and wane.
Passed beyond beauty tempting dream on dream,The pure will seeks the hearthold of the light;Sounds the deep "OM," the mystic word of might;Forth from the hearthold breaks the living stream.
Passed out beyond the deep heart music-filled,The kingly Will sits on the ancient throne,Wielding the sceptre, fearless, free, alone,Knowing in Brahma all it dared and willed.
—June 15, 1894
Immortality
We must pass like smoke, or live within the spirits' fire;For we can no more than smoke unto the flame return.If our thought has changed to dream, or will into desire,As smoke we vanish o'er the fires that burn.
Lights of infinite pity star the grey dusk of our days;Surely here is soul; with it we have eternal breath;In the fire of love we live or pass by many ways,By unnumbered ways of dream to death.
—July 15, 1894
The Man to the Angel
I have wept a million tears;Pure and proud one, where are thine?What the gain of all your yearsThat undimmed in beauty shine?
All your beauty cannot winTruth we learn in pain and sighs;You can never enter inTo the Circle of the Wise.
They are but the slaves of lightWho have never known the gloom,And between the dark and brightWilled in freedom their own doom.
Think not in your pureness thereThat our pain but follows sin;There are fires for those who dareSeek the Throne of Might to win.
Pure one, from your pride refrain;Dark and lost amid the strife,I am myriad years of painNearer to the fount of life.
When defiance fierce is thrownAt the God to whom you bow,Rest the lips of the UnknownTenderest upon the brow.
—September 15, 1894
Songs of Olden Magic—II.
The Robing of the King —"His candle shined upon my head, and by his light I walked through darkness."—Job, xxix. 3
On the bird of air blue-breastedglint the rays of gold,And a shadowy fleece above uswaves the forest old,Far through rumorous leagues of midnightstirred by breezes warm.See the old ascetic yonder,Ah, poor withered form!Where he crouches wrinkled overby unnumbered yearsThrough the leaves the flakes of moonfirefall like phantom tears.At the dawn a kingly hunterpassed proud disdain,Like a rainbow-torrent scatteredflashed his royal train.Now the lonely one unheededseeks earth's caverns dim,Never king or princes will robe themradiantly as him.Mid the deep enfolding darkness,follow him, oh seer,While the arrow will is piercingfiery sphere on sphere.Through the blackness leaps and sparklesgold and amethyst,Curling, jetting and dissolvingin a rainbow mist.In the jewel glow and lunarradiance rise thereOne, a morning star in beauty,young, immortal, fair.Sealed in heavy sleep, the spiritleaves its faded dress,Unto fiery youth returningout of weariness.Music as for one departing,joy as for a king,Sound and swell, and hark! above himcymbals triumphing.Fire an aureole encirclingsuns his brow with goldLike to one who hails the morningon the mountains old.Open mightier vistas changinghuman loves to scorns,And the spears of glory pierce himlike a Crown of Thorns.As the sparry rays dilatingo'er his forehead climbOnce again he knows the DragonWisdom of the prime.High and yet more high to freedomas a bird he springs,And the aureole outbreathing,gold and silver wingsPlume the brow and crown the seraph.Soon his journey doneHe will pass our eyes that follow,sped beyond the sun.None may know the darker radiance,King, will there be thine.Rapt above the Light and hiddenin the Dark Divine.
—September 15, 1895
Brotherhood
Twilight a blossom grey in shadowy valleys dwells:Under the radiant dark the deep blue-tinted bellsIn quietness reimage heaven within their blooms,Sapphire and gold and mystery. What strange perfumes,Out of what deeps arising, all the flower-bells fling,Unknowing the enchanted odorous song they sing!Oh, never was an eve so living yet: the woodStirs not but breathes enraptured quietude.Here in these shades the Ancient knows itself, the Soul,And out of slumber waking starts unto the goal.What bright companions nod and go along with it!Out of the teeming dark what dusky creatures flit,That through the long leagues of the island night aboveCome wandering by me, whispering and beseeching love,—As in the twilight children gather close and pressNigh and more nigh with shadowy tenderness,Feeling they know not what, with noiseless footsteps glideSeeking familiar lips or hearts to dream beside.Oh, voices, I would go with you, with you, away,Facing once more the radiant gateways of the day;With you, with you, what memories arise, and nighTrampling the crowded figures of the dawn go by;Dread deities, the giant powers that warred on menGrow tender brothers and gay children once again;Fades every hate away before the Mother's breastWhere all the exiles of the heart return to rest.
—July 15, 1895
In the Womb
Still rests the heavy share on the dark soil:Upon the dull black mould the dew-damp lies:The horse waits patient: from his lonely toilThe ploughboy to the morning lifts his eyes.
The unbudding hedgerows, dark against day's fires,Glitter with gold-lit crystals: on the rimOver the unregarding city's spiresThe lonely beauty shines alone for him.
And day by day the dawn or dark enfolds,And feeds with beauty eyes that cannot seeHow in her womb the Mighty Mother mouldsThe infant spirit for Eternity.
—January 15, 1895
In the Garden of God
Within the iron citiesOne walked unknown for years,In his heart the pity of pitiesThat grew for human tears
When love and grief were endedThe flower of pity grew;By unseen hands 'twas tendedAnd fed with holy dew.
Though in his heart were barred inThe blooms of beauty blown;Yet he who grew the gardenCould call no flower his own.
For by the hands that watered,The blooms that opened fairThrough frost and pain were scatteredTo sweeten the dull air.
—February 15, 1895
The Breath of Light
From the cool and dark-lipped furrowsbreathes a dim delightAureoles of joy encircleevery blade of grassWhere the dew-fed creatures silentand enraptured pass:And the restless ploughman pauses,turns, and wonderingDeep beneath his rustic habitfinds himself a king;For a fiery moment lookingwith the eyes of GodOver fields a slave at morningbowed him to the sod.Blind and dense with revelationevery moment flies,And unto the Mighty Mothergay, eternal, riseAll the hopes we hold, the gladness,dreams of things to be.One of all they generations,Mother, hails to thee!Hail! and hail! and hail for ever:though I turn againFor they joy unto the humanvestures of pain.I, thy child, who went forth radiantin the golden primeFind thee still the mother-heartedthrough my night in time;Find in thee the old enchantment,there behind the veilWhere the Gods my brothers linger,Hail! for ever, Hail!
—May 15, 1895
The Free
They bathed in the fire-flooded fountains;Life girdled them round and about;They slept in the clefts of the mountains:The stars called them forth with a shout.
They prayed, but their worship was onlyThe wonder at nights and at days,As still as the lips of the lonelyThough burning with dumbness of praise.
No sadness of earth ever capturedTheir spirits who bowed at the shrine;They fled to the Lonely enrapturedAnd hid in the Darkness Divine.
At twilight as children may gatherThey met at the doorway of death,The smile of the dark hidden FatherThe Mother with magical breath.
Untold of in song or in story,In days long forgotten of men,Their eyes were yet blind with a gloryTime will not remember again.
—November 15, 1895
Songs of Olden Magic—IV
The Magi
"The mountain was filled with the hosts of the Tuatha de Dannan."—Old Celtic Poem
See where the auras from the olden fountainStarward aspire;The sacred sign upon the holy mountainShines in white fire:Waving and flaming yonder o'er the snowsThe diamond lightMelts into silver or to sapphire glowsNight beyond night;And from the heaven of heavens descends on earthA dew divine.Come, let us mingle in the starry mirthAround the shrine!Enchantress, mighty mother, to our homeIn thee we press,Thrilled by the fiery breath and wrapt in someVast tendernessThe homeward birds uncertain o'er their nestWheel in the dome,Fraught with dim dreams of more enraptured rest,Wheel in the dome,But gather ye to whose undarkened eyesThe night is day:Leap forth, Immortals, Birds of Paradise,In bright arrayRobed like the shining tresses of the sun;And by his nameCall from his haunt divine the ancient oneOur Father Flame.Aye, from the wonder-light that wraps the star,Come now, come now;Sun-breathing Dragon, ray thy lights afar,Thy children bow;Hush with more awe the breath; the bright-browed racesAre nothing worthBy those dread gods from out whose awful facesThe earth looks forthInfinite pity, set in calm; their vision castAdown the yearsBeholds how beauty burns away at lastTheir children's tears.Now while our hearts the ancient quietnessFloods with its tide,The things of air and fire and height no lessIn it abide;And from their wanderings over sea and shoreThey rise as oneUnto the vastness and with us adoreThe midnight sun;And enter the innumerable All,And shine like gold,And starlike gleam in the immortals' hall,The heavenly fold,And drink the sun-breaths from the mother's lipsAwhile—and thenFail from the light and drop in dark eclipseTo earth again,Roaming along by heaven-hid promontoryAnd valley dim.Weaving a phantom image of the gloryThey knew in Him.Out of the fulness flow the winds, their sonIs heard no more,Or hardly breathes a mystic sound alongThe dreamy shore:Blindly they move unknowing as in trance,Their wanderingIs half with us, and half an inner danceLed by the King.
—January 15, 1896
O hero of the iron age,Upon thy grave we will not weep,Nor yet consume away in rageFor thee and thy untimely sleep.Our hearts a burning silence keep.
O martyr, in these iron daysOne fate was sure for soul like thine:Well you foreknew but went your ways.The crucifixion is the sign,The meed of all the kingly line.
We may not mourn—though such a nightHas fallen on our earthly spheresBereft of love and truth and lightAs never since the dawn of years;—For tears give birth alone to tears.
One wreath upon they grave we lay(The silence of our bitter thought,Words that would scorch their hearts of clay),And turn to learn what thou has taught,To shape our lives as thine was wrought.
—April 15, 1896
[* This is unsigned but is very possibly G.W. Russell's. It was a memoriam to William Quan Judge (W.Q.J), the leader of the American and European Theosophical Societies at the time, one of the original founders of the Theosophical Society, and close co-worker with H.P. Blavatsky.]
Fron the Book of the Eagle—[St. John, i. 1-33]
In the mighty Mother's bosom was the WiseWith the mystic Father in aeonian night;Aye, for ever one with them though it ariseGoing forth to sound its hymn of light.
At its incantation rose the starry fane;At its magic thronged the myriad race of men;Life awoke that in the womb so long had lainTo its cyclic labours once again.
'Tis the soul of fire within the heart of life;From its fiery fountain spring the will and thought;All the strength of man for deeds of love or strife,Though the darkness comprehend it not.
In the mystery written hereJohn is but the life, the seer;Outcast from the life of light,Inly with reverted sightStill he scans with eager eyesThe celestial mysteries.Poet of all far-seen thingsAt his word the soul has wings,Revelations, symbols, dreamsOf the inmost light which gleams.
The winds, the stars, and the skies though wroughtBy the one Fire-Self still know it not;And man who moves in the twilight dimFeels not the love that encircles him,Though in heart, on bosom, and eyelids pressLips of an infinite tenderness,He turns away through the dark to roamNor heeds the fire in his hearth and home.
They whose wisdom everywhereSees as through a crystal airThe lamp by which the world is lit,And themselves as one with it;In whom the eye of vision swells,Who have in entranced hoursCaught the word whose might compelsAll the elemental powers;They arise as Gods from menLike the morning stars again.They who seek the place of restQuench the blood-heat of the breast,Grow ascetic, inward turningTrample down the lust from burning,Silence in the self the willFor a power diviner still;To the fire-born Self aloneThe ancestral spheres are known.
Unto the poor dead shadows cameWisdom mantled about with flame;We had eyes that could see the lightBorn of the mystic Father's might.Glory radiant with powers untoldAnd the breath of God around it rolled.
Life that moved in the deeps belowFelt the fire in its bosom glow;Life awoke with the Light allied,Grew divinely stirred, and cried:"This is the Ancient of Days within,Light that is ere our days begin.
"Every power in the spirit's kenSprings anew in our lives again.We had but dreams of the heart's desireBeauty thrilled with the mystic fire.The white-fire breath whence springs the powerFlows alone in the spirit's hour."
Man arose the earth he trod,Grew divine as he gazed on God:Light in a fiery whirlwind brokeOut of the dark divine and spoke:Man went forth through the vast to treadBy the spirit of wisdom charioted.
There came the learned of the schoolsWho measure heavenly things by rules,The sceptic, doubter, the logician,Who in all sacred things precision,Would mark the limit, fix the scope,"Art thou the Christ for whom we hope?Art thou a magian, or in theeHas the divine eye power to see?"He answered low to those who came,"Not this, nor this, nor this I claim.More than the yearning of the heartI have no wisdom to impart.I am the voice that cries in himWhose heart is dead, whose eyes are dim,'Make pure the paths where through may runThe light-streams from that golden one,The Self who lives within the sun.'As spake the seer of ancient days."The voices from the earthly waysQuestioned him still: "What dost thou here,If neither prophet, king nor seer?What power is kindled by they might?""I flow before the feet of Light:I am the purifying stream.But One of whom ye have no dream,Whose footsteps move among you still,Though dark, divine, invisible.Impelled by Him, before His waysI journey, though I dare not raiseEven from the ground these eyes so dimOr look upon the feet of Him."
When the dead or dreamy hoursLike a mantle fall away,Wakes the eye of gnostic powersTo the light of hidden day,
And the yearning heart withinSeeks the true, the only friend,He who burdened with our sinLoves and loves unto the end.
Ah, the martyr of the world,With a face of steadfast peaceRound whose brow the light is curled:'Tis the Lamb with golden fleece.
So they called of old the shining,Such a face the sons of menSee, and all its life diviningWake primeval fires again.
Such a face and such a gloryPassed before the eyes of John,With a breath of olden storyBlown from ages long agone
Who would know the God in man.Deeper still must be his glance.Veil on veil his eye must scanFor the mystic signs which tellIf the fire electric fellOn the seer in his trance:As his way he upward wingsFrom all time-encircled things,Flames the glory round his headLike a bird with wings outspread.Gold and silver plumes at rest:Such a shadowy shining crestRound the hero's head reveals himTo the soul that would adore,As the master-power that heals himAnd the fount of secret lore.Nature such a diademPlaces on her royal line,Every eye that looks on themKnows the Sons of the Divine.
—April 15, 1896
The Protest of Love"Those who there take refuge nevermore return."—Bhagavad Gita
Ere I lose myself in the vastness and drowse myself with the peace,While I gaze on the light and beauty afar from the dim homes of men,May I still feel the heart-pang and pity, love-ties that I wouldnot release,May the voices of sorrow appealing call me back to their succour again.
Ere I storm with the tempest of power the thrones and dominionsof old,Ere the ancient enchantment allures me to roam through the star-misty skies,I would go forth as one who has reaped well what harvest the earthmay unfold:May my heart be o'erbrimmed with compassion, on my brow be thecrown of the wise.
I would go as the dove from the ark sent forth with wishes and prayersTo return with the paradise-blossoms that bloom in the eden of light:When the deep star-chant of the seraphs I hear in the mystical airsMay I capture one tone of their joy for the sad ones discrownedin the night.
Not alone, not alone would I go to my rest in the Heart of the Love:Were I tranced in the innermost beauty, the flame of its tenderest breath,I would still hear the plaint of the fallen recalling me back from aboveTo go down to the side of the mourners who weep in the shadow of death.
—May 15, 1896
The King Initiate"They took Iesous and scourged him."—St. John
Age after age the world has weptA joy supreme—I saw the handsWhose fiery radiations sweptAnd burned away his earthly bands:And where they smote the living dyesFlashed like the plumes of paradise.
Their joys the heavy nations hush—A form of purple glory roseCrowned with such rays of light as flushThe white peaks on their towering snows:It held the magic wand that gaveRule over earth, air, fire and wave.
What sorrow makes the white cheeks wet:The mystic cross looms shadowy dim—There where the fourfold powers have metAnd poured their living tides through him,The Son who hides his radiant crestTo the dark Father's bosom pressed.
—June 15, 1896
The Dream of the Children
The children awoke in their dreamingWhile earth lay dewy and still:They followed the rill in its gleamingTo the heart-light of the hill.
Its sounds and sights were forsakingThe world as they faded in sleep,When they heard a music breakingOut from the heart-light deep.
It ran where the rill in its flowingUnder the star-light gayWith wonderful colour was glowingLike the bubbles they blew in their play.
From the misty mountain underShot gleams of an opal star:Its pathways of rainbow wonderRayed to their feet from afar.
From their feet as they strayed in the meadowIt led through caverned aisles,Filled with purple and green light and shadowFor mystic miles on miles.
The children were glad; it was lonelyTo play on the hill-side by day."But now," they said, "we have onlyTo go where the good people stray."
For all the hill-side was hauntedBy the faery folk come again;And down in the heart-light enchantedWere opal-coloured men.
They moved like kings unattendedWithout a squire or dame,But they wore tiaras splendidWith feathers of starlight flame.
They laughed at the children overAnd called them into the heart:"Come down here, each sleepless rover:We will show you some of our art."
And down through the cool of the mountainThe children sank at the call,And stood in a blazing fountainAnd never a mountain at all.
The lights were coming and goingIn many a shining strand,For the opal fire-kings were blowingThe darkness out of the land.
This golden breath was a madnessTo set a poet on fire,And this was a cure for sadness,And that the ease of desire.
And all night long over EriThey fought with the wand of lightAnd love that never grew wearyThe evil things of night.
They said, as dawn glimmered hoary,"We will show yourselves for an hour;"And the children were changed to a gloryBy the beautiful magic of power.
The fire-kings smiled on their facesAnd called them by olden names,Till they towered like the starry racesAll plumed with the twilight flames.
They talked for a while together,How the toil of ages oppressed;And of how they best could weatherThe ship of the world to its rest.
The dawn in the room was straying:The children began to blink,When they heard a far voice saying,"You can grow like that if you think!"
The sun came in yellow and gay light:They tumbled out of the cot,And half of the dream went with daylightAnd half was never forgot.
—July 15, 1896
The Chiefs of the Air
Their wise little heads with scorningThey laid the covers between:"Do they think we stay here till morning?"Said Rory and Aileen.
When out their bright eyes came peepingThe room was no longer there,And they fled from the dark world creepingUp a twilight cave of air.
They wore each one a gay dress,In sleep, if you understand,When earth puts off its grey dressTo robe it in faeryland.
Then loud o'erhead was a hummingAs clear as the wood wind rings;And here were the air-boats comingAnd here the airy kings.
The magic barks were gleamingAnd swift as the feathered throng:With wonder-lights out-streamingThey blew themselves along.
And up on the night-wind swimming,With pose and dart and rise,Away went the air fleet skimmingThrough a haze of jewel skies.
One boat above them driftedApart from the flying bands,And an air-chief bent and liftedThe children with mighty hands.
The children wondered greatly,Three air-chiefs met them there,They were tall and grave and statelyWith bodies of purple air.
A pearl light with misty shimmerWent dancing about them all,As the dyes of the moonbow glimmerOn a trembling waterfall.
The trail of the fleet to the far landsWas wavy along the night,And on through the sapphire starlandsThey followed the wake of light.
"Look down, Aileen," said Rory,"The earth's as thin as a dream."It was lit by a sun-fire gloryOutraying gleam on gleam.
They saw through the dream-world underIts heart of rainbow flameWhere the starry people wander;Like gods they went and came.
The children looked without talkingTill Roray spoke again,"Are those our folk who are walkingLike little shadow men?
"They don't see what is about them,They look like pigmies small,The world would be full without themAnd they think themselves so tall!"
The magic bark went fleetingLike an eagle on and on;Till over its prow came beatingThe foam-light of the dawn.
The children's dream grew fainter,Three air-chiefs still were there,But the sun the shadow painterDrew five on the misty air.
The dream-light whirled bewild'ring,An air-chief said, "You know.You are living now, my children,Ten thousand years ago."
They looked at themselves in the old light,And mourned the days of the newWhere naught is but darkness or cold light,Till a bell came striking through.
"We must go," said the wise young sages:It was five at dawn by the chimes,And they ran through a thousand agesFrom the old De Danaan Times.
—August 15, 1896
The Palaces of the Sidhe
Two small sweet lives togetherFrom dawn till the dew falls down,They danced over rock and heatherAway from the dusty town.
Dark eyes like stars set in pansies,Blue eyes like a hero's bold—Their thoughts were all pearl-light fancies,Their hearts in the age of gold.
They crooned o'er many a fableAnd longed for the bright-capped elves,The faery folk who are ableTo make us faery ourselves.
A hush on the children stealingThey stood there hand in hand,For the elfin chimes were pealingAloud in the underland.
And over the grey rock sliding,A fiery colour ran,And out of its thickness glidingThe twinkling mist of a man—
To-day for the children had fled toAn ancient yesterday,And the rill from its tunnelled bed tooHad turned another way.
Then down through an open hollowThe old man led with a smile:"Come, star-hearts, my children, followTo the elfin land awhile."
The bells above them were hanging,Whenever the earth-breath blewIt made them go clanging, clanging,The vasty mountain through.
But louder yet than the ringingCame the chant of the elfin choir,Till the mountain was mad with singingAnd dense with the forms of fire.
The kings of the faery racesSat high on the thrones of might,And infinite years from their facesLooked out through eyes of light.
And one in a diamond splendourShone brightest of all that hour,More lofty and pure and tender,They called him the Flower of Power.
The palace walls were glowingLike stars together drawn,And a fountain of air was flowingThe primrose colour of dawn.
"Ah, see!" said Aileen sighing,With a bend of her saddened headWhere a mighty hero was lying,He looked like one who was dead.
"He will wake," said their guide, "'tis but seeming,And, oh, what his eyes shall seeI will know of only in dreamingTill I lie there still as he."
They chanted the song of waking,They breathed on him with fire,Till the hero-spirit outbreaking,Shot radiant above the choir.
Like a pillar of opal gloryLit through with many a gem—"Why, look at him now," said Rory,"He has turned to a faery like them!"
The elfin kings ascendingLeaped up from the thrones of might,And one with another blendingThey vanished in air and light.
The rill to its bed came splashingWith rocks on the top of that:The children awoke with a flashingOf wonder, "What were we at?"
They groped through the reeds and clover—"What funny old markings: look here,They have scrawled the rocks all over:It's just where the door was: how queer!"
—September 15, 1896
The Voice of the Wise
They sat with hearts untroubled,The clear sky sparkled above,And an ancient wisdom bubbledFrom the lips of a youthful love.
They read in a coloured historyOf Egypt and of the Nile,And half it seemed a mystery,Familiar, half, the while.
Till living out of the storyGrew old Egyptian men,And a shadow looked forth RoryAnd said, "We meet again!"
And over Aileen a maidenLooked back through the ages dim:She laughed, and her eyes were ladenWith an old-time love for him.
In a mist came temples throngingWith sphinxes seen in a row,And the rest of the day was a longingFor their homes of long ago.
"We'd go there if they'd let us,"They said with wounded pride:"They never think when they pet usWe are old like that inside."
There was some one round them strayingThe whole of the long day through,Who seemed to say, "I am playingAt hide-and-seek with you."
And one thing after anotherWas whispered out of the air,How God was a big kind brotherWhose home was in everywhere.
His light like a smile come glancingFrom the cool, cool winds as they pass;From the flowers in heaven dancingAnd the stars that shine in the grass,
And the clouds in deep blue wreathing,And most from the mountains tall,But God like a wind goes breathingA heart-light of gold in all.
It grows like a tree and pushesIts way through the inner gloom,And flowers in quick little rushesOf love to a magic bloom.
And no one need sigh now or sorrowWhenever the heart-light flies,For it comes again on some morrowAnd nobody ever dies.
The heart of the Wise was beatingIn the children's heart that day,And many a thought came fleeting,And fancies solemn and gay.
They were grave in a way diviningHow childhood was taking wings,And the wonder world was shiningWith vast eternal things.
The solemn twilight flutteredLike the plumes of seraphim,And they felt what things were utteredIn the sunset voice of Him.
They lingered long, for dearerThan home were the mountain placesWhere God from the stars dropt nearerTheir pale, dreamy faces.
Their very hearts from beatingThey stilled in awed delight.For Spirit and children were meetingIn the purple, ample night.
Dusk its ash-grey blossoms sheds on violet skiesOver twilight mountains where the heart-songs rise,Rise and fall and fade again from earth to air:Earth renews the music sweeter. Oh, come there.Come, ma cushla, come, as in ancient timesRings aloud and the underland with faery chimes.Down the unseen ways as strays each tinkling fleeceWinding ever onward to a fold of peace,So my dreams go straying in a land more fair;Half I tread the dew-wet grasses, half wander there.Fade your glimmering eyes in a world grown cold:Come, ma cushla, with me to the mountain's fold,Where the bright ones call us waving to and fro:Come, my children, with me to the Ancient go.
—October 15, 1896
A Dawn Song
While the earth is dark and greyHow I laugh within: I knowIn my breast what ardours gayFrom the morning overflow.
Though the cheek be white and wetIn my heart no fear may fall:There my chieftain leads, and yetAncient battle-trumpets call.
Bend on me no hasty frownIf my spirit slight your cares:Sunlike still my joy looks downChanging tears to beamy airs.
Think me not of fickle heartIf with joy my bosom swellsThough your ways from mine depart:In the true are no farewells.
What I love in you I findEverywhere. A friend I greetIn each flower and tree and wind—Oh, but life is sweet, is sweet.
What to you are bolts and barsAre to me the hands that guideTo the freedom of the starsWhere my golden kinsmen bide.
From my mountain top I view:Twilight's purple flower is gone,And I send my song to youOn the level light of dawn.
—November 15, 1896
—An Ancient Eden
Our legends tell of aery fountains upspringing in Eri, and how the people of long ago saw them not but only the Tuatha de Danaan. Some deem it was the natural outflow of water at these places which was held to be sacred; but above fountain, rill and river rose up the enchanted froth and foam of invisible rills and rivers breaking forth from Tir-na-noge, the soul of the island, and glittering in the sunlight of its mystic day. What we see here is imaged forth from that invisible soul and is a path thereto. In the heroic Epic of Cuculain Standish O'Grady writes of such a fountain, and prefixes his chapter with the verse from Genesis, "And four rivers went forth from Eden to water the garden," and what follows in reference thereto.
The Fountain of Shadowy Beauty—A Dream
I would I could weave inThe colour, the wonder,The song I conceive inMy heart while I ponder,
And show how it came likeThe magi of oldWhose chant was a flame likeThe dawn's voice of gold;
Who dreams followed near themA murmur of birds,And ear still could hear themUnchanted in words.
In words I can onlyReveal thee my heart,Oh, Light of the Lonely,The shining impart.
Between the twilight and the darkThe lights danced up before my eyes:I found no sleep or peace or rest,But dreams of stars and burning skies.
I knew the faces of the day—Dream faces, pale, with cloudy hair,I know you not nor yet your home,The Fount of Shadowy Beauty, where?
I passed a dream of gloomy waysWhere ne'er did human feet intrude:It was the border of a wood,A dreadful forest solitude.
With wondrous red and fairy goldThe clouds were woven o'er the ocean;The stars in fiery aether swungAnd danced with gay and glittering motion.
A fire leaped up within my heartWhen first I saw the old sea shine;As if a god were there revealedI bowed my head in awe divine;
And long beside the dim sea margeI mused until the gathering hazeVeiled from me where the silver tideRan in its thousand shadowy ways.
The black night dropped upon the sea:The silent awe came down with it:I saw fantastic vapours flitAs o'er the darkness of the pit.
When, lo! from out the furthest nightA speck of rose and silver lightAbove a boat shaped wondrouslyCame floating swiftly o'er the sea.
It was no human will that boreThe boat so fleetly to the shoreWithout a sail spread or an oar.
The Pilot stood erect thereonAnd lifted up his ancient face,(Ancient with glad eternal youthLike one who was of starry race.)
His face was rich with dusky bloom;His eyes a bronze and golden fire;His hair in streams of silver lightHung flamelike on his strange attire
Which starred with many a mystic sign,Fell as o'er sunlit ruby glowing:His light flew o'er the waves afarIn ruddy ripples on each barAlong the spiral pathways flowing.
It was a crystal boat that chasedThe light along the watery waste,Till caught amid the surges hoaryThe Pilot stayed its jewelled glory.
Oh, never such a glory was:The pale moon shot it through and throughWith light of lilac, white and blue:And there mid many a fairy hueOf pearl and pink and amethyst,Like lightning ran the rainbow gleamsAnd wove around a wonder-mist.
The Pilot lifted beckoning hands;Silent I went with deep amazeTo know why came this Beam of LightSo far along the ocean waysOut of the vast and shadowy night.
"Make haste, make haste!" he cried. "Away!A thousand ages now are gone.Yet thou and I ere night be spedWill reck no more of eve or dawn."
Swift as the swallow to its nestI leaped: my body dropt right down:A silver star I rose and flew.A flame burned golden at his breast:I entered at the heart and knewMy Brother-Self who roams the deep,Bird of the wonder-world of sleep.
The ruby body wrapped us roundAs twain in one: we left behindThe league-long murmur of the shoreAnd fleeted swifter than the wind.
The distance rushed upon the bark:We neared unto the mystic isles:The heavenly city we could mark,Its mountain light, its jewel dark,Its pinnacles and starry piles.
The glory brightened: "Do not fear;For we are real, though what seemsSo proudly built above the wavesIs but one mighty spirit's dreams.
"Our Father's house hath many fanes;Yet enter not and worship not,For thought but follows after thoughtTill last consuming self it wanes.
"The Fount of Shadowy Beauty flingsIts glamour o'er the light of day:A music in the sunlight singsTo call the dreamy hearts awayTheir mighty hopes to ease awhile:We will not go the way of them:The chant makes drowsy those who seekThe sceptre and the diadem.
"The Fount of Shadowy Beauty throwsIts magic round us all the night;What things the heart would be, it seesAnd chases them in endless flight.Or coiled in phantom visions thereIt builds within the halls of fire;Its dreams flash like the peacock's wingAnd glow with sun-hues of desire.We will not follow in their waysNor heed the lure of fay or elf,But in the ending of our daysRest in the high Ancestral Self."
The boat of crystal touched the shore,Then melted flamelike from our eyes,As in the twilight drops the sunWithdrawing rays of paradise.
We hurried under arched aislesThat far above in heaven withdrawnWith cloudy pillars stormed the night,Rich as the opal shafts of dawn.
I would have lingered then—but he—"Oh, let us haste: the dream grows dim,Another night, another day,A thousand years will part from him
"Who is that Ancient One divineFrom whom our phantom being bornRolled with the wonder-light aroundHad started in the fairy morn.
"A thousand of our years to himAre but the night, are but the day,Wherein he rests from cyclic toilOr chants the song of starry sway.
"He falls asleep: the Shadowy FountFills all our heart with dreams of light:He wakes to ancient spheres, and weThrough iron ages mourn the night.We will not wander in the nightBut in a darkness more divineShall join the Father Light of LightsAnd rule the long-descended line."
Even then a vasty twilight fell:Wavered in air the shadowy towers:The city like a gleaming shell,Its azures, opals, silvers, blues,Were melting in more dreamy hues.We feared the falling of the nightAnd hurried more our headlong flight.In one long line the towers went by;The trembling radiance dropt behind,As when some swift and radiant oneFlits by and flings upon the windThe rainbow tresses of the sun.
And then they vanished from our gazeFaded the magic lights, and allInto a Starry Radiance fellAs waters in their fountain fall.
We knew our time-long journey o'erAnd knew the end of all desire,And saw within the emerald glowOur Father like the white sun-fire.
We could not say if age or youthWere on his face: we only burnedTo pass the gateways of the Day,The exiles to the heart returned.
He rose to greet us and his breath,The tempest music of the spheres,Dissolved the memory of earth,The cyclic labour and our tears.In him our dream of sorrow passed,The spirit once again was freeAnd heard the song the Morning-StarsChant in eternal revelry.
This was the close of human story;We saw the deep unmeasured shine,And sank within the mystic gloryThey called of old the Dark Divine.
Well it is gone now,The dream that I chanted:On this side the dawn nowI sit fate-implanted.
But though of my dreamingThe dawn has bereft me,It all was not seemingFor something has left me.
I fell in some otherWorld far from this cold lightThe Dream Bird, my brother,Is rayed with the gold light.
I too in the FatherWould hide me, and so,Bright Bird, to foregatherWith thee now I go.
—December 15, 1896
A New Earth
"Then felt I like some watcher of the skiesWhen a new planet swims within his ken."
I who had sought afar from earthThe faery land to greet,Now find content within its girth,And wonder nigh my feet.
To-day a nearer love I chooseAnd seek no distant sphere,For aureoled by faery dewsThe dear brown breasts appear.
With rainbow radiance come and goThe airy breaths of day,And eve is all a pearly glowWith moonlit winds a-play.
The lips of twilight burn my brow,The arms of night caress:Glimmer her white eyes drooping nowWith grave old tenderness.
I close mine eyes from dream to beThe diamond-rayed again,As in the ancient hours ere weForgot ourselves to men.
And all I thought of heaven beforeI find in earth below,A sunlight in the hidden coreTo dim the noon-day glow.
And with the Earth my heart is glad,I move as one of old,With mists of silver I am cladAnd bright with burning gold.
—February 1896
Duality
"From me spring good and evil."Who gave thee such a ruby flaming heart,And such a pure cold spirit? Side by sideI know these must eternally abideIn intimate war, and each to each impartLife from their pain, with every joy a dartTo wound with grief or death the self-allied.Red life within the spirit crucified,The eyes eternal pity thee, thou artFated with deathless powers at war to be,Not less the martyr of the world than heWhose thorn-crowned brow usurps the due of tearsWe would pay to thee, ever ruddy life,Whose passionate peace is still to be at strife,O'erthrown but in the unconflicting spheres.
—March 15, 1896 (This is unsigned, but in AE's "Collected Poems")
The Element Language
In a chapter in the Secret Doctrine dealing with the origin of language, H.P. Blavatsky makes some statements which are quoted here and which should be borne well in mind in considering what follows. "The Second Race had a 'Sound Language,' to wit, chant-like sounds composed of vowels alone." From this developed "monosyllabic speech which was the vowel parent, so to speak, of the monosyllabic languages mixed with hard consonants still in use among the yellow races which are known to the anthropologist. The linguistic characteristics developed into the agglutinative languages…. The inflectional speech, the root of the Sanskrit, was the first language (now the mystery tongue of the Initiates) of the Fifth Race."
The nature of that language has not been disclosed along with other teaching concerning the evolution of the race, but like many other secrets the details of which are still preserved by the Initiates, it is implied in what has already been revealed. The application to speech of the abstract formula of evolution which they have put forward should result in its discovery, for the clue lies in correspondences; know the nature of any one thing perfectly, learn its genesis, development and consummation, and you have the key to all the mysteries of nature. The microcosm mirrors the macrocosm. But, before applying this key, it is well to glean whatever hints have been given, so that there may be less chance of going astray in our application. First, we gather from the Secret Doctrine that the sounds of the human voice are correlated with the forces, colours, numbers and forms. "Every letter has its occult meaning, the vowels especially contain the most occult and formidable potencies." (S.D., I, 94) and again it is said "The magic of the ancient priests consisted in those days in addressing their gods in their own language. The speech of the men of earth cannot reach the Lords, each must be addressed in the language of his respective element"—-is a sentence which will be shown pregnant with meaning. "The book of rules" cited adds as an explanation of the nature of that element- language: "It is composed of Sounds, not words; of sounds, numbers and figures. He who knows how to blend the three, will call forth the response of the superintending Power" (the regent-god of the specific element needed). Thus this "language is that of incantations or of Mantras, as they are called in India, sound being the most potent and effectual magic agent, and the first of the keys which opens the door of communication between mortals and immortals." (S.D. I, 464)
From these quotations it will be seen that the occult teachings as to speech are directly at variance with the theories of many philologists and evolutionists. A first speech which was like song— another and more developed speech which is held sacred—an esoteric side to speech in which the elements of our conventional languages (i.e. the letters) are so arranged that speech becomes potent enough to guide the elements, and human speech becomes the speech of the gods—there is no kinship between this ideal language and the ejaculations and mimicry which so many hold to be the root and beginning of it. Yet those who wish to defend their right to hold the occult teaching have little to fear from the champions of these theories; they need not at all possess any deep scholarship or linguistic attainment; the most cursory view of the roots of primitive speech, so far as they have been collected, will show that they contain few or no sounds of a character which would bear out either the onomatopoetic or interjectional theories. The vast majority of the roots of the Aryan language express abstract ideas, they rarely indicate the particular actions which would be capable of being suggested by any mimicry possible to the human voice. I have selected at random from a list of roots their English equivalents, in order to show the character of the roots and to make clearer the difficulty of holding such views. The abstract nature of the ideas, relating to actions and things which often have no attendant sound in nature, will indicate what I mean. What possible sounds could mimic the sense of "to move, to shine, to gain, to flow, to burn, to blow, to live, to possess, to cover, to fall, to praise, to think"? In fact the most abstract of all seem the most primitive for we find them most fruitful in combination to for other words. I hope to show this clearly later on. It is unnecessary to discuss the claims of the interjectional theory, as it is only a theory, and there are few roots for which we could infer even a remote origin of this nature. The great objection to the theory that speech was originally a matter of convention and mutual agreement, is the scarcity of words among the roots which express the wants of primitive man. As it is, a wisdom within or beyond the Aryan led him to construct in these roots with their abstract significance an ideal foundation from which a great language could be developed. However as the exponents of rival theories have demolished each other's arguments, without anyone having established a clear case for himself, it is not necessary here to do more than indicate these theories and how they may be met.
In putting forward a hypothesis more in accord with the doctrine of the spiritual origin of man, and in harmony with those occult ideas concerning speech already quoted, I stand in a rather unusual position, as I have to confess my ignorance of any of these primitive languages. I am rather inclined however, to regard this on the whole as an advantage for the following reasons. I think primitive man (the early Aryan) chose his words by a certain intuition which recognised an innate correspondence between the thought and the symbol. Para passu with the growing complexity of civilization language lost it spiritual character, "it fell into matter," to use H.P. Blavatsky's expression; as the conventional words necessary to define artificial products grew in number, in the memory of these words the spontaneity of speech was lost, and that faculty became atrophied which enable man to arrange with psychic rapidity ever new combinations of sounds to express emotion and thought. Believing then that speech was originally intuitive, and that it only need introspection and a careful analysis of the sounds of the human voice, to recover the faculty and correspondences between these sounds and forces, colours, forms, etc., it will be seen why I do not regard my ignorance of these languages as altogether a drawback. The correspondences necessarily had to be evolved out of my inner consciousness, and in doing this no aid could be derived from the Aryan roots as they now stand. In the meaning attached to each letter is to be found the key to the meaning and origin of roots; but the value of each sound separately could never be discovered by an examination of them in their combinations, though their value and purpose in combination to form words might be evident enough once the significance of the letters is shewn. Any lack of knowledge then is only a disadvantage in this, that it limits the area from which to choose illustrations. I have felt it necessary to preface what I have to say with this confession, to show exactly the position in which I stand. The correspondences between sounds and forces were first evolved, and an examination of the Aryan roots proved the key capable of application.
———— Note:—In an article which appeared in the Theosophist, Dec. 1887, I had attempted, with the assistance of my friend Mr. Chas. Johnston, to put forward some of the ideas which form the subject matter of this paper. Owing to the numerous misprints which rendered it unintelligible I have felt it necessary to altogether re-write it. —-G.W.R. ————
It is advisable at this point to consider how correspondences arose between things seeming so diverse as sounds, forms, colors and forces. It is evident that they could only come about through the existence of a common and primal cause reflecting itself everywhere in different elements and various forms of life. This primal unity lies at the root of all occult philosophy and science; the One becomes Many; the ideas latent in Universal Mind are thrown outwards into manifestation. In the Bhagavad-Gita (chap. IV) Krishna declares: "even though myself unborn, of changeless essence, and the lord of all existence, yet in presiding over nature—which is mine—I am born but through my own maya, the mystic power of self-ideation, the eternal thought in the eternal mind." "I establish the universe with a single portion of myself and remain separate;" he says later on, and in so presiding he becomes the cause of the appearance of the different qualities. "I am in the taste in water, the light in the sun and moon, the mystic syllable OM in all the Vedas, sound in space, the masculine essence in men, the sweet smell in the earth, the brightness in the fire" etc. Pouring forth then from one fountain we should expect to find correspondences running everywhere throughout nature; we should expect to find all these things capable of correlation. Coexistent with manifestation arise the ideas of time and space, and these qualities, attributes or forces, which are latent and unified in the germinal thought, undergo a dual transformation; they appear successively in time, and what we call evolution progresses through Kalpa after Kalpa and Manvantara after Manvantara: the moods which dominate these periods incarnate in matter, which undergoes endless transformations and takes upon itself all forms in embodying these sates of consciousness.
The order in which these powers manifest is declared in the Puranas, Upanishads and Tantric works. It is that abstract formula of evolution which we can apply alike to the great and little things in nature. This may be stated in many ways, but to put it briefly, there is at first one divine Substance-Principle, Flame, Motion or the Great Breath; from this emanate the elements Akasa, ether, fire, air, water and earth; the spiritual quality becoming gradually lessened in these as they are further removed from their divine source; this is the descent into matter, the lowest rung of manifestation. "Having consolidated itself in its last principle as gross matter, it revolves around itself and informs with the seventh emanation of the last, the first and lowest element." (S.D. I, p. 297) This involution of the higher into the lower urges life upwards through the mineral, vegetable, animal and human kingdoms, until it culminates in spiritually and self consciousness. It is not necessary here to go more into detail, it is enough to say that the elements in nature begin as passive qualities, their ethereal nature becomes gross, then positive and finally spiritual, and this abstract formula holds good for everything in nature. These changes which take place in the universe are repeated in man its microcosm, the cosmic force which acts upon matter and builds up systems of suns and planets, working in him repeats itself and builds up a complex organism which corresponds and is correlated with its cosmic counterpart. The individual spirit Purusha dwells in the heart of every creature, its powers ray forth everywhere; they pervade the different principles or vehicles; they act through the organs of sense; they play upon the different plexuses; every principle and organ being specialised as the vehicle for a particular force or state of consciousness. All the sounds we can utter have their significance; they express moods; they create forms; they arouse to active life within ourselves spiritual and psychic forces which are centered in various parts of the body. Hence the whole organism of man is woven through and through with such correspondences; our thoughts, emotions, sensations, the forces we use, colours and sounds acting on different planes are all correlated among themselves, and are also connected with the forces evolving present about us, in which we live and move. We find such correspondences form the subject matter of many Upanishads and other occult treatises; for example in Yajnavalkyasamhita, a treatise on Yoga philosophy, we find the sound "Ra" associated with the element of fire, Tejas Tatwa, with the God Rudra, with a centre in the body just below the heart. Other books add, as correspondences of Tejas Tatwa, that its colour is red, its taste is hot, its form is a triangle and its force is expansion. The correspondences given in different treatises often vary; but what we can gather with certainty is that there must have existed a complete science of the subject; the correlation of sound with such things, once understood, is the key which explains, not only the magic potency of sound, but also the constuction of those roots which remain as relics of the primitive Aryan speech.
The thinking principle in man, having experiences of nature through its vehicles, the subtle, astral and gross physical bodies, translates these sensations into its own set of correspondences: this principle in man, called the Manas, is associated with the element of akasa, whose property is sound; the Manas moves about in akasa, and so all ideas which enter into the mind awaken their correspondences and are immediately mirrored in sound. Let us take as an instance the perception of the colour red; this communicated to the mind would set up a vibration, causing a sound to be thrown outwards in mental manifestation, and in this way the impulse would arise to utter the letter R, the correspondence of this colour. This Manasic principle in man, the real Ego, is eternal in its nature; it exists before and after the body, something accruing to it from each incarnation; and so, because there is present in the body of man this long-traveled soul, bearing with it traces of its eternal past, these letters which are the elements of its speech have impressed on them a correspondence, not only with the forces natural to its transitory surroundings, but also with that vaster evolution of nature in which it has taken part. These correspondences next claim our attention.