C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Invocation to Poetry
By Zygmunt Krasiński (1812–1859)
S
Surges the sea, upon whose hurrying waves
A rainbow glides before thee, cleaving the clouds!
Whate’er thou look’st upon is thine! Coasts, ships,
Men, mountains, cities, all belong to thee!
Master of Heaven as earth, it seems as naught
Could equal thee in glory!
Raptures ineffable! Thou weavest hearts
Together, then untwin’st them like a wreath,
As wild caprice may guide thy flame-lit fingers!
Thou forcest tears, then driest them with a smile;
Thou scar’st away the smile from paling lips,
Perhaps but for a moment, a few hours,
Perhaps for evermore!
But thou!—What dost thou feel, and what create?
A living stream of beauty flows through thee,
But Beauty thou art not! woe, woe, to thee!
The weeping child upon its mother’s breast,
The field-flower knowing not its perfumed gift,
More merit have before the Lord than thou!
Whence com’st thou, fleeting shadow? to the Light
Still bearing witness, though thou know’st it not,
Hast never seen it, nor wilt ever see!
In anger or in mockery wert thou made?
So full of self-deceit that thou canst play
The angel to the moment when thou fall’st.
And crawlest like a reptile upon earth,
Stifled in mud, or feeding upon dust!
Thou and the woman have like origin!
Bring naught to birth, nothing create, nor serve!
The groans of the unfortunate are weighed;
The lowest beggar’s sighs counted in heaven,
Gathered and sung upon celestial harps:
But thy despair and sighs fall to the earth,
Where Satan gathers them; adds them with joy
To his own lies, illusions, mockeries!
The Lord will yet disown them, as they have
Ever disowned the Lord!
Not that I rise against thee, Poetry,—
Mother of Beauty, of ideal Life!
But I must pity him condemned to dwell
Within the limits of these whirling worlds,
In dying agonies, or yet to be
Doomed to sad memories, or prophecies,
Perchance remorse, or vague presentiments,—
Who gives himself to thee! for everywhere
Thou ruinest wholly those who consecrate
Themselves, with all they are, to thee alone,
Who solely live the voices of thy glory!
As God dwelt in the world, concealed, unknown,
But grand and mighty in each separate part:
The unseen God, before whom creatures bow,
And kneeling cry, “Behold Him! He is here!”
A guiding star, he bears thee on his brow,
And no unfaithful word will sever him
From thy true love! He will love men, and be
A man himself, encircled by his brothers!
Betrays thee to the hour, or his own needs,
Devotes thee to man’s perishable joys,
Painting the sensual with thy hues divine,—
Thou turn’st away thy face, while scattering
Perchance upon his brow some fading flowers,
Of which he strives to twine a funeral crown,
Spending his life to weave a wreath of death!
He and the woman have one origin!