The Torch

Through skies blown clear by storm, o'er storm-spent seas,

Day kindled pale with promise of full noon

Of blue unclouded; no night-weary wind

Ruffled the slumberous, heaving deeps to white,

Though round the Farne Isles the waves never sink

In foamless sleep — about the pillared crags

For ever circling with unresting spray.

At dawn's first glimmer, from his island-cell —

Rock-hewn, secure from tempest — Oswald came

With slow and weary step, white-faced and worn

With night-long vigil for storm-perilled souls.

His anxious eye with sharp foreboding bright —

He scanned the treacherous flood; the long froth-trail

That marks the lurking reefs; the jag-toothed chasms

Which, foaming, gape at night beneath the keel —

The mouth of hell to storm-bewildered ships:

But no scar-stranded vessel met his glance.

Relieved, he drank the glistering calm of morn,

With nostril keen and warm lips parted wide;

While, gradually, the sun-enkindled air

Quickened his pallid cheek with youthful flame,

Though lonely years had silvered his dark head,

And round his eyes had woven shadow-meshes.

Clearly he caught the ever-clamorous cries

Of guillemot and puffin from afar,

Where, canopied by hovering, white wings,

They crowded naked pinnacles of rock.

He watched, with eyes of glistening tenderness,

The brooding eider — Cuthbert's sacred bird,

That bears among the isles his saintly name —

Breast the calm waves; a black, wet-gleaming fin

Cleft the blue waters with a foaming jag,

Where, close behind the restless herring-herd,

With ravening maw of death, the porpoise sped.

Oswald, light-tranced, dreamed in the sun awhile;

Till, suddenly, as some old sorrow starts,

Though years have glided by with soothing lull,

The gust of ancient longing rent his bliss:

His narrow isle, as by some darkling spell,

More narrow shrank; the gulls’ unceasing cries

Grew still more fretful; and his hermit-life

A sea-scourged desolation to him seemed.

The holy tree of peace — which he had dreamt

Would flourish in the wilderness afresh,

Upspringing ever in new ecstasy

Of branching beauty and white blooms of truth,

Till its star-tangling crest should cleave the sky,

And angels rustle through its topmost boughs —

Seemed sapless, rootless. Through his quivering limbs

His famine-wasted youth to life upleapt

With passionate yearning for humanity:

The stir of towns; the jostling of glad throngs;

Welcoming faces and warm-clasping hands;

Yea, even for the lips and eyes of Love

He hungered with keen pangs of old desire:

And, if for him these might not be, he craved

At least the exultation of swift peril —

The red-foamed riot of delirious strife

That rears a bloody crest o'er peaceful shires,

And, slaying, in a swirl of slaughter dies.

With brow uplifted and strained, pulsing throat,

And salt-parched lips out-thrust, unto the sun

He stretched beseeching hands, as though he sought

To snatch some glittering disaster thence.

One moment radiant thus; and then once more

His arms dropped listless, and he slowly shrank

Within his sea-stained habit, cowering dark

Amid the azure blaze of sea and sky.

Then, stirring, with impatient step he moved

Across the isle to where the rocky shore,

Forming a little, crag-encircled bay,

Sloped steeply to the level of the sea;

But, as he neared the edges of the tide,

Startled, he paused, as, marvelling, he saw

A woman on the shelving, wet, black rock,

Lying, forlorn, among the storm-wrack, white

And motionless; still wet, her raiment clung

About her limbs, and with her wet, gold hair

Green sea-weed tangled. Oswald on her looked

Amazed, as one who, in a sea-born trance,

Discovers the lone spirit of the storm,

Self-spent at last, and sunk in dreamless slumber

Within some caverned gloom. Coldly he watched

The little waves creep up the glistening rock,

And, faltering, slide once more into the deep,

As though they feared to waken her: at length,

When one, more venturous, about her stole,

And moved her heavy hair as if with life,

He shuddered; and a lightning-knowledge struck

His heart with fear; and in a flash he knew

That no sea-phantom couched before him lay,

But some frail fellow-creature, tempest-tost,

Hung yet in peril on the edge of death,

Her weak life slipping from the saving grasp

While he delayed. He sprang through plashy weed,

O'er slippery ridges, to the rock whereon

She lay with upturned face and close-shut eyes —

One hand across her breast, the other dipped

Within a shallow pool of emerald water,

With blue-veined fingers clutching the red fronds

Of frail sea-weed. Then Oswald, bending, felt

Upon his cheek the feeble breath that still

Fluttered between the pallid, parted lips.

In trembling haste, he loosed the sodden cords

That bound her to a spar; and with hot hands

He chafed her icy limbs, until the glow

Of life returned. With fitful quivering

The white lids opened; and she looked on him

With dull, unwondering eyes whose deep-sea blue

The gloom of death's late passing shadowed yet;

When suddenly light thrilled them, and bright fear

Flashed from their depths, and, with a little gasp,

She strove to rise; but Oswald with quick words

Calmed her weak terror, and she sank once more,

Closing her eyes; and, gently lifting her

Within his arms — her gold hair hanging straight

And heavy with sea-water, as he plunged

Knee-deep through pools of crackling bladder-weed —

He bore her, unresisting, o'er the isle

Unto the rock-built shelter he had reared,

Some little way apart from his own cell,

For storm-stayed fishers or wrecked mariners.

He laid her on a bed of withered bents,

And ministered to her with gentle hands

And ceaseless care; till, wrapped in warm, deep sleep,

She sank oblivious. Silently he placed

His island-fare beside her on the board,

Lest she should wake in need; then, with hushed step,

He turned to go; but, ere he reached the door,

He paused, and looked again towards the bed,

As though he feared his strange sea-guest might flee

Like some wild spirit, born of wondering foam,

That wins from man the shelter of his breast,

Then, on a night of moon-enchanted tides,

Leaps with shrill laughter to its native seas,

Bearing his soul within its glistening arms,

To drown his peace on earth and hope of heaven

In cold eternities of lightless deeps.

But still in dreamless sleep the stranger lay,

With parted lips and breathing soft and calm;

About her head unloosed, her hair outshone,

Among the grey-green bents, like fine, red gold.

So beautiful she was that Oswald, pierced

With quivering rapture, dared no longer bide,

But, with quick fingers, softly raised the latch,

And stumbled o'er the threshold. As he went,

A flock of sea-gulls from the bent-thatched roof

Rose, querulous, and round him, wheeling, swept,

With creaking wings and cold, black eyes agleam;

Yet Oswald saw them not, nor heard their cries;

Nor saw he, as he paced the eastern crags,

How, round the Farnes, the dreaming ocean lay

In broad, unshadowed, sapphire ecstasy,

That glowed to noon through slow, uncounted hours.

His early gloom had vanished; time and space

And earth and sea no longer compassed him;

One thought alone consumed him — beauty slept

Within the shelter of his hermitage,

Upon grey, rustling bents, with golden hair.

He roamed, unresting, till the copper sun

Sank in a steel-grey sea, and earth and sky

Were strewn with shadows — wavering and dim —

To weave a pathway for the dawning moon,

That she, from night's oblivion, might create

With the cold spell of her enchantments old

A phantom earth with magical, bright seas,

A vaster heaven of unrevealed stars.

Unmoving, on a headland of swart crag

That jutted gaunt and sharp against the night,

Stood Oswald, cowled and silent. Hour by hour

He gazed across the sea, which nothing shadowed,

Save where — now dim, now white — a lonely sail

Hung, restless, o'er a fisher's barren toil.

Yet Oswald saw nor sail nor moon nor sea:

His heart kept vigil by the little house

Wherein the stranger slumbered; and it seemed

His life, by some strange power within him stayed,

Awaited the unlatching of the door.

But now, within the hut, the sleeper dreamt

Of foaming caverns and o'erwhelming waters;

Then, shuddering awake, awhile she lay,

And watched the moonlight, cold and white, which poured

Through the warm dusk, from the high window-slit;

When, all at once, the strangeness of the room

Closed in upon her with bewildering dread.

She stirred; the bents, beneath her, rustled strange;

She started in affright, and, swaying, stood

Within the streaming moonlight, till, at last,

In memory, once more disaster swept

Over her life, and left her, desolate,

Upon bleak crags of alien seas unknown.

Yet, through the tumult of tempestuous dark,

Above the echo of despairing cries,

A calm voice sounded; and beyond the whirl

Of foaming death, wherein she caught the gleam

Of well-loved faces drowning in cold seas,

A living face shone out — a beacon clear:

Then numbing fear fell from her, and she moved,

Unlatched the door, and stole into the night.

One moment, dazzled by the full-moon glare,

She paused, a shivering form within the wide

And glittering desolation — lone and frail.

But Oswald, watchful on the eastern scars,

Seeing her, forward came with eager pace

To meet her; and, as he drew swiftly near,

His cowl fell backward; and she knew again

The face that calmed the terrors of her dreams.

Yet, with the knowledge, through her being stole,

Vague fear more strange, more impotent than the blind

Unquestioning dread when death had round her stormed;

No peril of the body could arouse

Such ecstasy of terror in her soul,

Which seemed upborne upon the shivering crest

Of some great wave, just curving, ere it crash

Upon the crags of time. Yet, though she feared

When Oswald paused, uncertain, quick she spake,

As though she sought to parry doom with words.

She questioned him — scarce heeding his replies —

How she had hither come; when, suddenly,

Sped by her fluttering words, the last, dim cloud

Rolled from her memory, and she saw revealed

Within a pitiless glare of naked light

The utmost horror of her desolation.

Mute with despair, she stood with parted lips,

And then cried fiercely: “Hath the sea upcast

None other on this shore? Am I, alone,

Of all my kin who sailed in that doomed ship,

Flung back to life?” And as, with piteous glance,

He answered her: “Ah God, that I, with them,

Had died! O traitor cords that held too sure

My body to the broken spar of life!

O feeble seas, that fumed in such wild wrath,

Yet could not quench so frail a thing as I!”

With passionate step, across the isle she ran,

And leapt from crag to crag, until she stood

Upon a dizzy scar that jutted sheer

Above low-lapping waves. Then once again

Her moaning cry was heard among the Isles:

“O bitter waters, give them back to me!

You shall not keep them; all your waves of woe

Cannot withhold from me those dauntless lives

That were my life. Surely they cannot rest

Without me; even from your unfathomed graves

Surely my love will draw them to my arms!”

As though in tremulous expectation tranced,

She yearned, with arms outstretched; as dawn arose

Exultant from the sea, and with clear rays

Kindled her wind-tost hair to streaming flame.

Awhile she stood, then, moaning, slowly sank

Upon the crag; and Oswald came to her

With words of comfort which unloosed her pent

And aching woe in swift, tumultuous tears.

Oswald, in silent anguish, drew apart,

Gazing, unseeing, o'er the dawning waves;

Until at last the tempest of her grief,

In low and fitful sobbing, spent itself;

When, turning to him, once again she spake,

And, shuddering, with faltering voice, outpoured

The tale of her despair: and Oswald heard

How she, who sat thus strangely by his side,

Marna, a sea-earl's daughter, had besought

Her father, when the old sea-hunger lit

His eyes — as waves shot through with stormy fight —

For leave to bear him company but once,

When, with his sons, he rode the adventurous seas;

How he had yielded with reluctant love;

And how, from out the firth of some far strand,

Their galley rode, beneath a flaming dawn;

How her young heart had leapt to see the sails

Unfurled to take the wind, as, one by one,

Toil-glistening rowers shipped the dripping oars,

And loosened every sheet before the breeze;

How, as the ship with timbers all astrain,

Leapt to mid-sea, through Marna's body thrilled

A kindred rapture, and there came to her

The sheer, delirious joy of them true-born

To wander with the foam — each creaking cord

That tugged the quivering mast unto her singing

Of unknown shores and far, enchanted lands,

Beyond the blue horizon; how, all day,

They rode, undaunted, through the spinning surf;

But, as the sun dipped, in the cold, grey tide,

The wind, that since the dawn with steady speed

Had filled the sails, now came in fitful gusts,

Fierce and yet fiercer, till the sullen waves

Were lashed to anger, and the waters leapt

To tussle with the furies of the air;

And how the ship, in the encounter caught,

Was tossed on crests of swirling dark, or dropped

Between o'er-toppling walls of whelming night;

How in those hours — too dread for thought or speech —

Her father's hand had bound her to a spar;

And, even as — the cord between his teeth —

He tugged the last knot sure, the vessel crashed

Upon a cleaving scar; and she but saw

The strong, pale faces looking upon death,

Before the fierce, exultant waters closed

With cold oblivion o'er them; and no more

She knew, until she waked within the hut,

To find her world, in one disastrous night,

In one swift surge of roaring darkness, swept

From her young feet; her kindred, home and friends,

And all familiar hopes and joys and fears

Dropt like a garment from her life, which now

Stood naked on the edge of some new world

Of unknown terrors.

Oswald heard her tale

With pitying glance; yet in his eyes arose

A strange, new light, which as each gust of grief

Shook out the fluttering words, more brightly burned;

So that, when Marna ceased, it seemed to her

That he, in holy contemplation rapt,

Had heeded not her woe; and from her heart

Burst out a cry: “Ah God, I am alone!”

But, stung by her shrill anguish, Oswald waked

From his bright reverie, and his shining eyes

Darkened with swift compassion, as he turned

And, trembling, spake: “Nay, not alone...”

Then mute

He stood — his pale lips clenched — as though within

There surged a torrent which he dared not loose.

Marna looked wondering up; but, when her eyes

Saw the white passion of his face, her soul

Was tossed once more on crests of unknown fears;

Yet rapture warred with terror in her heart;

She trembled, and her breath came short and quick.

She dared not raise her eyes again to his,

Till, on her straining ears, his words, once more,

Fell, slow and cold and clear as water dripping

Between locked sluice-gates: “Nothing need you fear.

Beyond the sea of unknown terrors lie

White havens of an undiscovered peace.

For even this bleak, scar-embattled coast

May yield safe harbour to the storm-spent soul.

Your world has fallen from you that you may

Enter another world, more beautiful,

Built‘ neath the shadow of the throne of God.

There shall you find new friends, who yet will seem

Familiar to your eyes, because their souls

Have passed through kindred perils and despairs.”

He ceased; and silence, trembling,‘ twixt them hung;

Till Marna, gazing yet across the sea,

Rent it with words: “Where may I find this peace?”

And Oswald answered: “In an inland dale

The Sisters of the Cross await your coming,

With ever-open gate. Within seven days,

My brethren from the mainland will put out,

Bringing me food; on their return with them

You may embark. Till then, this barren rock

Must be your home.” Exultant light once more

Leapt, flashing, in the depths of his dark eyes.

Yet Marna looked not up, but, slowly, spake:

“Yea, I must go.... But you....”

Then in dismay

She stopped, as though the thought had slipped unknown

From her full heart; but Oswald caught the words,

And spake with hard, quick speech, as if to baffle

Some doubt that strove within him: “On this Isle

I bide, till God shall kindle my weak soul

To burn, a beacon o'er His lonely seas.”

Once more he paused; and perilous silence swayed

Between them, until Oswald, quaking, rose,

As one who dared no longer rest beneath

O'er-toppling doom. Yet, with calm voice, he spake:

“Even within this wilderness abides

Such beauty that, in your brief sojourn here,

Your soul shall starve not; all about you sweeps

The ever-changing wonder of the sea;

But if, too full of bitter memories,

The bright waves darken, you may lift your eyes

To watch the swooping gull; the flashing tern;

The stately cormorant and the kittiwake —

Most beautiful of all the island-birds;

Or, if your woman's heart should crave some grace

More exquisite, see, frail bell-campions blow,

As foam-flowers on the shallow, sandy turf.”

As thus he spake, a light in Marna's eyes

Arose, and sorrow left her for awhile:

And she with bright glance questioned him, and watched

The hovering gulls, and plucked the snowy blooms,

With little cries at each discovered beauty.

Yet Oswald by her side walked silently,

And watched, as one struck mute with anguished fear,

Her eager eyes, and heard her chattering words.

Then, suddenly, he left her, but returned

Within the hour, with faltering step, and spake

With tremulous voice: “We two must part awhile;

For I must keep lone vigil in my cell

Six days and nights, with fasting and with prayer;

Meanwhile, within the little hut for you

Are food and shelter till the brethren come.

When I must give you over to their care.”

Marna, with wondering heart, looked up at him;

But such a wild light flickered in his eyes

She dared not speak; and, shuddering, he turned,

And strode back swiftly to the hermitage.

Marna looked after him with yearning gaze,

As though her heart would have her call him back,

Yet her lips moved not; motionless, she watched

Until he passed from sight; then, sinking low

Among the flowers, she wept, she knew not why.

And, as the door closed on him, Oswald fell

Prone on the cold, black, vigil-furrowed rock

That paved his narrow cell; and long he lay

As in the clutch of some dread waking-trance,

Nor stirred until the shadows into night

Were woven. Then unto his feet he leapt

With this wild cry: “O God, why hast Thou sent

This scourge most bitter for my naked soul?

I feared not storm nor solitude, O God;

I shrank not from the tempest of Thy wrath;

Though oft my weak soul wavered, trampled o'er

By deedless hours, and yearned unto the world,

Ever afresh Thy love hath bound me fast

Unto this island of Thy lonely seas;

And I, who deemed that I at last might reach —

I who had come through all — Thy golden haven,

Knew not Thy hand withheld this last despair,

This scourge most bitter, being most beautiful.”

Then on his knees he sank, and tried to pray

Before the Virgin's shrine, where ever burned

His votive taper with unfailing light.

But when his lips would breathe the holy name,

His heart cried: “Marna! Marna!” Every pulse

Throbbed “Marna!” And his body shook and swayed,

As though it strove to utter that one word,

And cry it once unto eternal stars,

Though it should perish crying. Through the cell

The silence murmured: “Marna!” And without

A lone gull wailed it to the windy night.

He lifted his wild eyes, and in the shrine

He saw the face of Marna, which outburned

The flickering taper; on the gloom up-surged,

Foam-white, the face of Marna; till the dark

Flowed pitiful o'er him, and on the stone

He sank unconscious. Night went slowly by,

And pale dawn stole in silence through his cell;

And, in the light of morn, the taper died,

With feeble guttering; yet he never stirred,

Though noonday waxed and waned.

But Marna roamed

All night beneath the stars. To her it seemed

That not until the closing of the door

Had all hope perished: now death tore, afresh,

Her father and her brothers from her arms.

By day and night and under sun and moon

She roamed unresting — seeing, heeding naught —

Till weariness o'ercame her, and she slept;

And, as she slumbered, snowy-plumed peace

Nestled within her heart; and, when she waked,

She only yearned for that dim, cloistral calm,

Embosomed deep in some bough-sheltered vale,

Whither the boat must bear her.

In his cell,

As night paled slowly to the seventh morn,

Oswald arose — the fire within his eyes

Yet more intense, more fierce. With eager hand

He clutched the latch, and, flinging wide the door,

He strode into the dawn. One moment, dazed,

As though bewildered by the light, he paused;

But, when his glance in restless roving fell

On Marna, standing on the western crag

Against the setting moon, beneath the dawn,

His passion surged upon him, and he shook;

Then, springing madly forth, he, stumbling, ran,

And, falling at her feet upon the rock,

His voice rang out in fearful exultation:

“You shall not go! I cannot let you go!

Has not the tumult tossed you to my breast?

Yea, and not all the storms of all the seas

Shall drag you from me! Nay, you shall not go!

For we will live together on this isle

Which time has builded in the deeps for us —

We two together, one in ecstasy,

Throughout eternity; for time shall fall

From off us; and the world shall be no more:

And God, if God should stand between us now...”

Faltering, he paused; and Marna stood, afraid,

Quaking before him; but she spake no word.

Across the waters came the plash of oars;

But Oswald heard them not, and once more cried:

“You will not go — thrusting me back to death?

For now I know the strange, new thing you brought

For me from out the storm was life — yea, life;

And I am one arisen from the grave.

You will not thrust me back and take again

That which you came through storm to bring to me?

You will not go? I cannot let you go!”

He ceased; and now the even plash of oars

Came clearer. One dread moment Marna stood

Swaying; then, stretching forth her arms, she cried:

“Ah God! Ah God! Why hath Thy cold hand set

This doom upon me? Must I ever bear

Death and disaster unto whom I love?

Oh, is it not enough that,‘ neath the wave,

Because I sought to bear them company,

My father and my brothers lie in death?

But this — ah God — that it should come to this!

Must I bear ever death within my hands?”

She paused one moment, with wild-heaving breast;

Then, turning unto Oswald, spake again,

With softer voice: “But you — have you no pity?

You who are but God's servant — surely you

Have pity on my weakness. From this doom

Which overhangs me you must set me free.

You say I brought you life; but in me lies

For you — the priest of God — a death more deep

Than all the drowning fathoms of the sea.

I go, that you may live. If life indeed

I brought you, I was but the torch of God

To kindle the clear flame of your strong soul

To burn, a beacon o'er His lonely seas.”

She ceased, with arms outstretched and lighted eyes.

As on some holy vision Oswald gazed

In rapt, adoring fear; nor spake, nor stirred.

Near, and yet nearer, drew the plash of oars;

And, turning in the boat, the brethren looked

With wondering eyes upon them, whispering: “Lo,

Some seraph-messenger of God most high

Tarries with Oswald. See the strange new peace

That burns his face like a white altar-flame.

Not yet must we draw near, lest our weak sight

Be blinded by that glory of gold hair

That gleams so strangely in the light of dawn.”