August, 2000 Monthly Feature : Each month I have been putting together some of my favourites to share with you. Archives
Nightsong
[ "The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience."
The twilight is falling and the sun has gone, leaving only strip upon strip of rose, jasmine and violet clouds to show in the west. The soft summer breeze caresses me as gently as a lover's hand, and the scents of sun-warmed earth and evening-blooming wildflowers intoxicate me. Listening to the sound of crickets and peepers, the insistent hum of cicadas, and the dark rustlings in the trees I fall into a half-trance. I walk like a ghost and the air does not stir at my passing. Half in a dream and half out of it, the falling night lays me gently on the grass while I watch the rising moon.
Suddenly bright and shiny as it moves slowly toward the west, the moon pours a dazzling white over the dark landscape. This night the sky is ablaze with stars. As I gaze up at them, they too seem unnaturally bright, as though they somehow came closer to the earth. I pick out the constellations I recognize, the Big and Little Dippers, and the North Star, and, low over the fields, Mars glowing red and warlike. I wonder where Orion might be, with Betelgeuese and Rigel.
The night seems to expand around me, to encompass and envelop me. The deep colors of the the grass, the leaves and the flowers grow richer, more vibrant in the moonlight, like the colors in old tapestries. The coppery sheen of the beech leaves became brighter, hammered from precious metals. The sky pulses and throbs, evoking a low, touchable canopy. Bejeweled, is seems to be lit by a globe I could reach up and extinguish at will. I feel a rush of intensity I do not understand, but do not care to; to have it is enough. I am aware! I am at one with my surroundings, with sky and earth and light and sound, with trees, with flower, wind, with all of nature.
In my mind I hear the sound of music. It rises on the breeze above the sounds of the night creatures, a light roulade of notes, silvery and melodious; faint at first, then taking on a definite form and melody. There is magic in the sound, a kind of mysterious, siren strain gratifying to the ear, alluring and enticing with the plaintive quality of a shepherd's pipes once heard in the hills of Greece. There is something absolutely and completely pagan about the proliferation of notes, not wild, but primitive. It is sinous and serpentine, winding itself through the air and breeze, seductively mixing with the sough of the leaves and the grass. It is strange and magical, as unknowable as the Elysian mysteries.
Then, as mysteriously, as magically as it had begun, it ends. The tremolo of the flutes intones a last strain, then dies and all becomes still again. In a daze, I do not think, do not want to think. I breath deeply, and very softly, not to upset the delicate equilibrium within me. All is still again, and I am left with a profound and deep-seated longing I cannot name.
Slowly I rise to my feet and return home.
K.M.G.
|
August MoonriseThe sun was gone, and the moon was coming Over the blue Connecticut hills; The west was rosy, the east was flushed, And over my head the swallows rushed This way and that, with changeful wills. I heard them twitter and watched them dart Now together and now apart Like dark petals blown from a tree; The maples stamped against the west Were black and stately and full of rest, And the hazy orange moon grew up And slowly changed to yellow gold While the hills were darkened, fold on fold To a deeper blue than a flower could hold. Down the hill I went, and then I forgot the ways of men, For night-scents, heady, and damp and cool Wakened ecstasy in me On the brink of a shining pool. O Beauty, out of many a cup You have made me drunk and wild Ever since I was a child, But when have I been sure as now That no bitterness can bend And no sorrow wholly bow One who loves you to the end? And though I must give my breath And my laughter all to death, And my eyes through which joy came, And my heart, a wavering flame; If all must leave me and go back Along a blind and fearful track So that you can make anew, Fusing with intenser fire, Something nearer your desire; If my soul must go alone Through a cold infinity, Or even if it vanish, too, Beauty, I have worshipped you. Let this single hour atone For the theft of all of me. Sara Teasdale |
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