Читать книгу Nirvana Days - Rice Cale Young - Страница 11

O-Shichi, all my heart today

Is dreaming of your fate;

And of your little house that stood

Beside the temple gate;

Of its plum-garden hid away

Behind white paper doors;

And of the young boy-priest who read too late with you love-lores.

O-Shichi dwelt in Yedo – where

A thousand wonders dwell.

Gods, golden palaces and shrines

That like a charm enspell.

O-Shichi dwelt among them there,

More wondrous, she, than all —

A flower some forgetful god had from his hand let fall.

And all her days were as the dream

On flowers in the sun.

And all her ways were as the waves

That by Shin-bashi run.

And in her gaze there was the gleam

Of stars that cannot wait

Too long for love and so fare forth from heaven to find a mate.

O-Shichi dwelt so, till one night

When all the city slept,

When not a paper lantern swung,

When only fire-flies swept

Soft cipherings of spirit-light

Across the temple's gloom —

Sudden a cry was heard – the cry that should O-Shichi doom.

For following the cry came flame,

A Chaya's roof a-blaze.

And quickly was the street a stream

Of stricken folk, whose gaze

Knew well that when the morning came

Their homes would be but smoke

Vanished upon the winds: now had O-Shichi's fate awoke.

And waited. For at morning priests

In pity of her years

And desolation led her back

Behind the great god's spheres;

The great god Buddha, who of beasts

And men all mindful was.

O Buddha, in thy very courts O-Shichi learned love's laws!

Love of the body and the soul,

Not of Nirvana's state!

Love that beyond itself can see

No beauty wise or great.

O-Shichi for a moon – a whole

Moon happy there beheld

The young boy-priest whose yearning e'er into his eyes upwelled.

So all too soon for her was found

Elsewhere a kindly thatch.

And all too soon O-Shichi heard

Behind her close love's latch.

They led her from the temple's ground

Into untrysting days.

And all too soon that happy moon was hid in sorrow's haze.

For now at dawn she rose to dress

With blooms some honored vase,

Or to embroider or brew tea's

Sweet ceremonial grace.

Or she at dusk, in sick distress,

Before the butsudan,

Must to ancestral tablets pray – not to her Moto-San!

Not unto him, her love, who sways

Her breast, as moon the tide,

Whose breath is incense – Ah, again

To see him softly glide

Before the grave god-idol's gaze

Of inward ecstasy,

To watch the great bell boom for him its mystic sutra-plea.

But weeks grew into weariness,

And weariness to pain,

And pain to lonely wildness, which

Set fire unto her brain.

And, "I will see my love!" distress

Made fair O-Shichi cry,

"Tho for ten lives away from him I then must live and die."

Yet – no! She dared not go to him,

To her he could not come.

Then, sudden a thought her being swept

And struck her loud heart dumb.

Till in her rose confusion dim,

Fear fighting with Desire —

Which to O-Shichi took the shape of Fudo, god of fire.

And Fudo won her: for that night

Did fond O-Shichi dare

To set aflame her father's house,

Hoping again to share

The temple with her acolyte,

Her lover-priest, who, spent

With speechless passion for her face, in vain strove to repent.

But ah! what destiny can do

Is not for folly's hand.

The flames O-Shichi kindled were

From sea to Shiba fanned.

And it was learned a love-sick girl

Had charred a thousand homes.

Then were the fury-smitten folk like to a sea that foams.

And so they seized her: but not in

The temple – O not there

Had she been led again by priests

In pity – led to share

Her lover's eyes; no, but her sin

Brought not one dear delight

To poor O-Shichi – who was now to look on her last rite.

For to the stake they bound her – fire

They lit – to be her fate…

O-Shichi, have I dreamt it all?

Your face, the temple gate,

The fair boy-priest shut from desire

In Buddhahood to-be?

Then let me dream and ever dream, O flower by Yedo's sea.