Page:Aurora Leigh a Poem.djvu/194

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AURORA LEIGH.
185
A mere dumb corpse, till Christ the Lord came down,Unlocked the doors, forced opened the blank eyes,And used his kingly chrisms to straighten outThe leathery tongue turned back into the throat:Since when, she lives, remembers, palpitatesIn every lip, aspires in every breath,Embraces infinite relations. Now,We want no half-gods, Panomphæan Joves,Fauns, Naiads, Tritons, Oreads, and the rest,To take possession of a senseless worldTo unnatural vampire-uses. See the earth,The body of our body, the green earth,Indubitably human, like this fleshAnd these articulated veins through whichOur heart drives blood! There's not a flower of spring,That dies ere June, but vaunts itself alliedBy issue and symbol, by significanceAnd correspondence, to that spirit-worldOutside the limits of our space and time,Whereto we are bound. Let poets give it voiceWith human meanings; else they miss the thought,And henceforth step down lower, stand confessedInstructed poorly for interpreters,—Thrown out by an easy cowslip in the text.
Even so my pastoral failed: it was a bookOf surface-pictures—pretty, cold, and falseWith literal transcript,—the worse done, I think,For being not ill-done. Let me set my markAgainst such doings, and do otherwise.
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