Selected Poems (118 page)

Francesca of Rimini

From the
Inferno
of Dante, Canto the Fifth

‘The land where I was born sits by the seas,
¹

Upon that shore to which the Po descends,

With all his followers, in search of peace.

Love, which the gentle heart soon apprehends,

5

Seized him for the fair person which was ta’en

From me, and me even yet the mode offends.

Love, who to none beloved to love again

Remits, seized me with wish to please, so strong,

That, as thou seest, yet, yet it doth remain.

10

Love to one death conducted us along,

But Cainá waits for him our life who ended: ’

These were the accents utter’d by her tongue. –

Since I first listen’d to these souls offended,

I bow’d my visage, and so kept it till –

15

‘What think’st thou?’ said the bard; when I unbended,

And recommenced: ‘Alas! unto such ill

How many sweet thoughts, what strong ecstasies

Led these their evil fortune to fulfil!’

And then I turn’d unto their side my eyes,

Have made me sorrow till the tears arise.

20

And said, ‘Francesca, thy sad destinies

But tell me, in the season of sweet sighs,

By what and how thy love to passion rose,

So as his dim desires to recognise?’

25

Then she to me: ‘The greatest of all woes

Is to remind us of our happy days

In misery, and that thy teacher knows.

But if to learn our passion’s first root preys

Upon thy spirit with such sympathy,

30

I will do even as he who weeps and says.

We read one day for pastime, seated nigh,

Of Lancilot, how love enchain’d him too.

We were alone, quite unsuspiciously.

But oft our eyes met, and our cheeks in hue

35

All o’er discoloured by that reading were;

But one point only wholly us o’erthrew;

When we read the long-sigh’d-for smile of her,

To be thus kiss’d by such devoted lover,

He who from me can be divided ne’er

40

Kiss’d my mouth, trembling in the act all over.

Accursed was the book and he who wrote!

That day no further leaf we did uncover. —

While thus one spirit told us of their lot,

The other wept, so that with pity’s thralls

45

I swoon’d as if by death I had been smote,

And fell down even as a dead body falls.’

Stanzas (‘When a man hath no freedom’)

When a man hath no freedom to fight for at home,

Let him combat for that of his neighbours;

Let him think of the glories of Greece and of Rome,

And get knock’d on the head for his labours.

5

To do good to mankind is the chivalrous plan,

And is always as nobly requited;

Then battle for freedom wherever you can,

And, if not shot or hang’d, you’ll get knighted.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

Men

SARDANAPALUS
,
King of Nineveh and Assyria, &c.

ARBACES
,
the Mede who aspired to the Throne

BELESES
,
a Chaldean and Soothsayer

SALEMENES
,
the King’s Brother-in-law

ALTADA
,
an Assyrian Officer of the Palace

PANIA

ZAMES

SFERO

BALEA

Women

ZARINA,
the Queen

MYRRHA
,
an Ionian female Slave, and the Favourite of
SARDANAPALUS

Women composing the Harem of
SARDANAPALUS
,
Guards,

Attendants, Chaldean Priests, Medes,
&c. &c.

Scene – a Hall in the Royal Palace of Nineveh.

In this tragedy it has been my intention to follow the account of Diodorus Siculus; reducing it, however, to such dramatic regularity as I best could, and trying to approach the unities. I therefore suppose the rebellion to explode and succeed in one day by a sudden conspiracy, instead of the long war of the history.

Act I

SCENE I

A Hall in the Palace.

SALEMENES
[
solus
]: He hath wrong’d his queen, but still he is her lord;

He hath wrong’d my sister, still he is my brother;

He hath wrong’d his people, still he is their sovereign,

And I must be his friend as well as subject:

5

He must not perish thus. I will not see

The blood of Nimrod and Semiramis

Sink in the earth, and thirteen hundred years

Of empire ending like a shepherd’s tale;

He must be roused. In his effeminate heart

10

There is a careless courage which corruption

Has not all quench’d, and latent energies,

Repress’d by circumstance, but not destroy’d –

Steep’d, but not drown’d, in deep voluptuousness.

If born a peasant, he had been a man

15

To have reach’d an empire: to an empire born,

He will bequeath none; nothing but a name,

Which his sons will not prize in heritage: —

Yet, not all lost, even yet he may redeem

His sloth and shame, by only being that

20

Which he should be, as easily as the thing

He should not be and is. Were it less toil

To sway his nations than consume his life?

To head an army than to rule a harem?

He sweats in palling pleasures, dulls his soul,

25

And saps his goodly strength, in toils which yield not

Health like the chase, nor glory like the war –

He must be roused. Alas! there is no sound

[
Sound of soft music heard from within.
]

To rouse him short of thunder. Hark! the lute,

The lyre, the timbrel; the lascivious tinklings

30

Of lulling instruments, the softening voices

Of women, and of beings less than women,

Must chime in to the echo of his revel,

While the great king of all we know of earth

Lolls crown’d with roses, and his diadem

35

Lies negligently by to be caught up

By the first manly hand which dares to snatch it.

Lo, where they come! already I perceive

The reeking odours of the perfumed trains,

And see the bright gems of the glittering girls,

40

At once his chorus and his council, flash

Along the gallery, and amidst the damsels,

As femininely garb’d, and scarce less female,

The grandson of Semiramis, the man-queen. –

He comes! Shall I await him? yes, and front him,

45

And tell him what all good men tell each other,

Speaking of him and his. They come, the slaves.

Led by the monarch subject to his slaves.

SCENE II

[
Enter
SARDANAPALUS
effeminately dressed, his Head crowned with Flowers, and his Robe negligently flowing, attended by a Train of Women and young Slaves.
]

SARDANAPALUS
[
speaking to some of his attendants
]: Let the

pavilion over the Euphrates

Be garlanded, and lit, and furnish’d forth

For an especial banquet; at the hour

Of midnight we will sup there: see nought wanting,

5

And bid the galley be prepared. There is

A cooling breeze which crisps the broad clear river:

We will embark anon. Fair nymphs, who deign

To share the soft hours of Sardanapalus,

We’ll meet again in that the sweetest hour,

10

When we shall gather like the stars above us,

And you will form a heaven as bright as theirs;

Till then, let each be mistress of her time,

And thou, my own Ionian Myrrha, choose,

Wilt thou along with them or me?

MYRRHA
:My lord —

15

SARDANAPALUS
: My lord, my life! why answerest, thou so coldly?

It is the curse of kings to be so answer’d.

Rule thy own hours, thou rulest mine – say, wouldst thou

Accompany our guests, or charm away

The moments from me?

MYRRHA
:The king’s choice is mine.

20

SARDANAPALUS
: I pray thee say not so: my chiefest joy

Is to contribute to thine every wish.

I do not dare to breathe my own desire,

Lest it should clash with thine; for thou art still

Too prompt to sacrifice thy thoughts for others.

25

MYRRHA
: I would remain: I have no happiness

Save in beholding thine; yet —

SARDANAPALUS
:Yet! what YET?

Thy own sweet will shall be the only barrier

Which ever rises betwixt thee and me.

MYRRHA
: I think the present is the wonted hour

30

Of council; it were better I retire.

SALEMENES
[
comes forward and says
]: The Ionian slave says

well: let her retire.

SARDANAPALUS
: Who answers? How now, brother?

SALEMENES
:The
queen
’s brother,

And your most faithful vassal, royal lord.

SARDANAPALUS
[
addressing his train
]: As I have said, let all dispose their hours

35

Till midnight, when again we pray your presence.

[
The court retiring.
]

[
To
MYRRHA
,
who is going:
]

Myrrha! I thought
thou
wouldst remain.

MYRRHA
:Great king,

Thou didst not say so.

SARDANAPALUS
:But
thou
lookedst it:

I know each glance of those Ionic eyes,

Which said thou wouldst not leave me.

MYRRHA
:Sire! your brother —

40

SALEMENES
: His
consort’s
brother, minion of Ionia!

How darest
thou
name
me
and not blush?

SARDANAPALUS
:Not blush!

Thou hast no more eyes than heart to make her crimson

Like to the dying day on Caucasus,

Where sunset tints the snow with rosy shadows,

45

And then reproach her with thine own cold blindness,

Which will not see it. What, in tears, my Myrrha?

SALEMENES:
Let them flow on; she weeps for more than one, And is herself the cause of bitterer tears.

SARDANAPALUS
: Cursed be he who caused those tears to flow!

50

SALEMENES
: Curse not thyself – millions do that already.

SARDANAPALUS
: Thou dost forget thee: make me not remember

I am a monarch.

SALEMENES
:Would thou couldst!

MYRRHA
:My sovereign,

I pray, and thou, too, prince, permit my absence.

SARDANAPALUS
: Since it must be so, and this churl has check’d

55

Thy gentle spirit, go; but recollect

That we must forthwith meet: I had rather lose

An empire than thy presence.

[
Exit
MYRRHA
.]

SALEMENES
:It may be,

Thou wilt lose both, and both for ever!

SARDANAPALUS
:Brother,

I can at least command mself who listen

60

To language such as this: yet urge me not

Beyond my easy nature.