Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verses

Name: Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verses
Author: Edith Wharton

by Edith Wharton

Pages: about 42
Category: Literature & Fiction
Language: English
Reading time: 46 min at 250 wpm

Start readingThe whole book, as cards or one word at a time. 26 min at 450 wpm in Read mode.

From the opening

THE MORTAL LEASE EXPERIENCE GRIEF CHARTRES TWO BACKGROUNDS THE TOMB OF ILARIA GIUNIGI THE ONE GRIEF THE EUMENIDES
ORPHEUS AN AUTUMN SUNSET MOONRISE OVER TYRINGHAM ALL SOULS ALL SAINTS THE OLD POLE STAR A GRAVE NON DOLET! A HUNTING-SONG SURVIVAL USES A MEETING
THOU couldst not look on me and live: so runs The mortal legend--thou that couldst not live Nor look on me (so the divine decree)! That saw'st me in the cloud, the wave, the bough, The clod commoved with April, and the shapes Lurking 'twixt lid and eye-ball in the dark. Mocked I thee not in every guise of life, Hid in girls' eyes, a naiad in her well, Wooed through their laughter, and like echo fled, Luring thee down the primal silences Where the heart hushes and the flesh is dumb? Nay, was not I the tide that drew thee out Relentlessly from the detaining shore, Forth from the home-lights and the hailing voices, Forth from the last faint headland's failing line, Till I enveloped thee from verge to verge And hid thee in the hollow of my being? And still, because between us hung the veil, The myriad-tinted veil of sense, thy feet Refused their rest, thy hands the gifts of life, Thy heart its losses, lest some lesser face Should blur mine image in thine upturned soul Ere death had stamped it there. This was thy thought. And mine?
The gods, they say, have all: not so! This have they--flocks on every hill, the blue Spirals of incense and the amber drip Of lucid honey-comb on sylvan shrines, First-chosen weanlings, doves immaculate, Twin-cooing in the osier-plaited cage, And ivy-garlands glaucous with the dew: Man's wealth, man's servitude, but not himself! And so they pale, for lack of warmth they wane, Freeze to the marble of their images, And, pinnacled on man's subserviency, Through the thick sacrificial haze discern Unheeding lives and loves, as some cold peak Through icy mists may enviously descry Warm vales unzoned to the all-fruitful sun.

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Artemis to Actaeon, and Other Verses

From the opening

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