Читать книгу The Complete Works - William Butler Yeats - Страница 145

Table of Contents

 FORGAEL

 AIBRIC

 SAILORS

 DECTORA

The scene is the same as in the text except that the sail is dull copper colour. The poop rises several feet above the stage, and from the overhanging stern hangs a lanthorn with a greenish light. The sea or sky is represented by a semi-circular cloth of which nothing can be seen except a dark abyss, for the stage is lighted by arc-lights so placed upon a bridge over the proscenium as to throw a perpendicular light upon the stage. The light is dim, and there are deep shadows which waver as if with the passage of clouds over the moon. The persons are dressed in blue and green, and move but little. Some sailors are discovered crouching by the sail. Forgael is asleep and Aibric standing by the tiller on the raised poop.

First Sailor. It is long enough, and too long, Forgael has been bringing us through the waste places of the great sea.

Second Sailor. We did not meet with a ship to make a prey of these eight weeks, or any shore or island to plunder or to harry. It is a hard thing, age to be coming on me, and I not to get the chance of doing a robbery that would enable me to live quiet and honest to the end of my lifetime.

First Sailor. We are out since the new moon. What is worse again, it is the way we are in a ship, the barrels empty and my throat shrivelled with drought, and nothing to quench it but water only.

Forgael [in his sleep]. Yes; there, there; that hair that is the colour of burning.

First Sailor. Listen to him now, calling out in his sleep.

Forgael [in his sleep]. That pale forehead, that hair the colour of burning.

First Sailor. Some crazy dream he is in, and believe me it is no crazier than the thought he has waking. He is not the first that has had the wits drawn out from him through shadows and fantasies.

Second Sailor. That is what ails him. I have been thinking it this good while.

First Sailor. Do you remember that galley we sank at the time of the full moon?

Second Sailor. I do. We were becalmed the same night, and he sat up there playing that old harp of his until the moon had set.

First Sailor. I was sleeping up there by the bulwark, and when I woke in the sound of the harp a change came over my eyes, and I could see very strange things. The dead were floating upon the sea yet, and it seemed as if the life that went out of every one of them had turned to the shape of a man-headed bird—grey they were, and they rose up of a sudden and called out with voices like our own, and flew away singing to the west. Words like this they were singing: ‘Happiness beyond measure, happiness where the sun dies.’

Second Sailor. I understand well what they are doing. My mother used to be talking of birds of the sort. They are sent by the lasting watchers to lead men away from this world and its women to some place of shining women that cast no shadow, having lived before the making of the earth. But I have no mind to go following him to that place.

First Sailor. Let us creep up to him and kill him in his sleep.

Second Sailor. I would have made an end of him long ago, but that I was in dread of his harp. It is said that when he plays upon it he has power over all the listeners, with or without the body, seen or unseen, and any man that listens grows to be as mad as himself.

First Sailor. What way can he play it, being in his sleep?

Second Sailor. But who would be our captain then to make out a course from the Bear and the Pole-star, and to bring us back home?

First Sailor. I have that thought out. We must have Aibric with us. He knows the constellations as well as Forgael. He is a good hand with the sword. Join with us; be our captain, Aibric. We are agreed to put an end to Forgael, before he wakes. There is no man but will be glad of it when it is done. Join with us, and you will have the captain’s share and profit.

Aibric. Silence! for you have taken Forgael’s pay.

First Sailor. Little pay we have had this twelvemonth. We would never have turned against him if he had brought us, as he promised, into seas that would be thick with ships. That was the bargain. What is the use of knocking about and fighting as we do unless we get the chance to drink more wine and kiss more women than lasting peaceable men through their long lifetime? You will be as good a leader as ever he was himself, if you will but join us.

Aibric. And do you think that I will join myself To men like you, and murder him who has been My master from my earliest childhood up? No! nor to a world of men like you When Forgael’s in the other scale. Come! come! I’ll answer to more purpose when you have drawn That sword out of its scabbard.

First Sailor. You have awaked him. We had best go, for we have missed this chance.

Forgael. Have the birds passed us? I could hear your voice.

But there were others.

Aibric.I have seen nothing pass.

Forgael. You are certain of it? I never wake from sleep

But that I am afraid they may have passed;

For they’re my only pilots. I have not seen them

For many days, and yet there must be many

Dying at every moment in the world.

Aibric. They have all but driven you crazy, and already

The sailors have been plotting for your death,

And all the birds have cried into your ears

Has lured you on to death.

Forgael.No; but they promised—

Aibric. I know their promises. You have told me all.

They are to bring you to unheard-of passion,

To some strange love the world knows nothing of,

Some ever-living woman as you think,

One that can cast no shadow, being unearthly.

But that’s all folly. Turn the ship about,

Sail home again, be some fair woman’s friend;

Be satisfied to live like other men,

And drive impossible dreams away. The world

Has beautiful women to please every man.

Forgael. But he that gets their love after the fashion

Loves in brief longing and deceiving hope

And bodily tenderness, and finds that even

The bed of love, that in the imagination

Had seemed to be the giver of all peace,

Is no more than a wine cup in the tasting,

And as soon finished.

Aibric. All that ever loved

Have loved that way—there is no other way.

Forgael. Yet never have two lovers kissed but they

Believed there was some other near at hand,

And almost wept because they could not find it.

Aibric. When they have twenty years; in middle life

They take a kiss for what a kiss is worth,

And let the dream go by.

Forgael. It’s not a dream,

But the reality that makes our passion

As a lamp shadow—no—no lamp, the sun.

What the world’s million lips are thirsting for,

Must be substantial somewhere.

Aibric. I have heard the Druids

Mutter such things as they awake from trance.

It may be that the dead have lit upon it,

Or those that never lived; no mortal can.

Forgael. I only of all living men shall find it.

Aibric. Then seek it in the habitable world,

Or leap into that sea and end a journey

That has no other end.

Forgael. I cannot answer.

I can see nothing plain; all’s mystery.

Yet, sometimes there’s a torch inside my head

That makes all clear, but when the light is gone

I have but images, analogies,

The mystic bread, the sacramental wine,

The red rose where the two shafts of the cross,

Body and soul, waking and sleep, death, life,

Whatever meaning ancient allegorists

Have settled on, are mixed into one joy.

For what’s the rose but that? miraculous cries,

Old stories about mystic marriages,

Impossible truths? But when the torch is lit

All that is impossible is certain,

I plunge in the abyss.

[Sailors come in.]

First Sailor. Look there! There in the mist! A ship of spices.

Second Sailor. We would not have noticed her but for the sweet smell through the air. Ambergris and sandalwood, and all the herbs the witches bring from the sunrise.

First Sailor. No; but opoponax and cinnamon.

Forgael [taking the tiller from AIBRIC]. The ever-living have kept my bargain; they have paid you on the nail.

Aibric. Take up that rope to make her fast while we are plundering her.

First Sailor. There is a king on her deck, and a queen. Where there is one woman it is certain there will be others.

Aibric. Speak lower or they’ll hear.

First Sailor. They cannot hear; they are too much taken up with one another. Look! he has stooped down and kissed her on the lips.

Second Sailor. When she finds out we have as good men aboard she may not be too sorry in the end.

First Sailor. She will be as dangerous as a wild cat. These queens think more of the riches and the great name they get by marriage than of a ready hand and a strong body.

Second Sailor. There is nobody is natural but a robber. That is the reason the whole world goes tottering about upon its bandy legs.

Aibric. Run upon them now, and overpower the crew while yet asleep.

[Sailors and AIBRIC go out. The clashing of swords and confused voices are heard from the other ship, which cannot be seen because of the sail.

Forgael [who has remained at the tiller]. There! there! They come! Gull, gannet, or diver,

But with a man’s head, or a fair woman’s.

They hover over the masthead awhile

To wait their friends, but when their friends have come

They’ll fly upon that secret way of theirs,

One—and one—a couple—five together.

And now they all wheel suddenly and fly

To the other side, and higher in the air,

They’ve gone up thither, friend’s run up by friend;

They’ve gone to their beloved ones in the air,

In the waste of the high air, that they may wander

Among the windy meadows of the dawn.

But why are they still waiting? Why are they

Circling and circling over the masthead?

Ah! now they all look down—they’ll speak of me

What the ever-living put into their minds,

And of that shadowless unearthly woman

At the world’s end. I hear the message now.

But it’s all mystery. There’s one that cries,

‘From love and hate.’ Before the sentence ends

Another breaks upon it with a cry,

‘From love and death and out of sleep and waking.’

And with the cry another cry is mixed,

‘What can we do, being shadows?’ All mystery,

And I am drunken with a dizzy light.

But why do they still hover overhead?

Why are you circling there? Why do you linger?

Why do you not run to your desire?

Now that you have happy winged bodies.

Being too busy in the air, and the high air,

They cannot hear my voice. But why that circling?

[The Sailors have returned, DECTORA is with them. She is dressed in pale green, with copper ornaments on her dress, and has a copper crown upon her head. Her hair is dull red.

Forgael [turning and seeing her]. Why are you standing with your eyes upon me?

You are not the world’s core. O no, no, no!

That cannot be the meaning of the birds.

You are not its core. My teeth are in the world,

But have not bitten yet.

Dectora. I am a queen,

And ask for satisfaction upon these

Who have slain my husband and laid hands upon me.

Forgael. I’d set my hopes on one that had no shadow—

Where do you come from? who brought you to this place?

Why do you cast a shadow? Answer me that.

Dectora. Would that the storm that overthrew my ships,

And drowned the treasures of nine conquered nations,

And blew me hither to my lasting sorrow,

Had drowned me also. But, being yet alive,

I ask a fitting punishment for all

That raised their hands against him.

Forgael. There are some

That weigh and measure all in these waste seas—

They that have all the wisdom that’s in life,

And all that prophesying images

Made of dim gold rave out in secret tombs;

They have it that the plans of kings and queens

Are dust on the moth’s wing; that nothing matters

But laughter and tears—laughter, laughter, and tears—

That every man should carry his own soul

Upon his shoulders.

Dectora. You’ve nothing but wild words,

And I would know if you would give me vengeance.

Forgael. When she finds out that I’ll not let her go—

When she knows that.

Dectora. What is it that you are muttering—

That you’ll not let me go? I am a queen.

Forgael. Although you are more beautiful than any,

I almost long that it were possible;

But if I were to put you on that ship,

With sailors that were sworn to do your will,

And you had spread a sail for home, a wind

Would rise of a sudden, or a wave so huge,

It had washed among the stars and put them out,

And beat the bulwark of your ship on mine,

Until you stood before me on the deck—

As now.

Dectora. Does wandering in these desolate seas

And listening to the cry of wind and wave

Bring madness?

Forgael.Queen, I am not mad.

Dectora. And yet you say the water and the wind

Would rise against me.

Forgael.No, I am not mad—

If it be not that hearing messages

From lasting watchers that outlive the moon

At the most quiet midnight is to be stricken.

Dectora. And did those watchers bid you take me captive?

Forgael. Both you and I are taken in the net.

It was their hands that plucked the winds awake

And blew you hither; and their mouths have promised

I shall have love in their immortal fashion.

They gave me that old harp of the nine spells

That is more mighty than the sun and moon,

Or than the shivering casting-net of the stars,

That none might take you from me.

Dectora [first trembling back from the mast where the harp is, and then laughing]. For a moment

Your raving of a message and a harp

More mighty than the stars half troubled me.

But all that’s raving. Who is there can compel

The daughter and grand-daughter of a king

To be his bedfellow?

Forgael.Until your lips

Have called me their beloved, I’ll not kiss them.

Dectora. My husband and my king died at my feet,

And yet you talk of love.

Forgael.The movement of time

Is shaken in these seas, and what one does

One moment has no might upon the moment

That follows after.

Dectora.I understand you now.

You have a Druid craft of wicked sound.

Wrung from the cold women of the sea—

A magic that can call a demon up,

Until my body give you kiss for kiss.

Forgael. Your soul shall give the kiss.

Dectora.I am not afraid,

While there’s a rope to run into a noose

Or wave to drown. But I have done with words,

And I would have you look into my face

And know that it is fearless.

Forgael. Do what you will,

For neither I nor you can break a mesh

Of the great golden net that is about us.

Dectora. There’s nothing in the world that’s worth a fear.

[She passes FORGAEL and stands for a moment looking into his face.]

I have good reason for that thought.

[She runs suddenly on to the raised part of the poop.]

And now

I can put fear away as a queen should.

[She mounts on the bulwark and turns towards FORGAEL.]

Fool, fool! Although you have looked into my face

You did not see my purpose. I shall have gone

Before a hand can touch me.

Forgael [folding his arms]. My hands are still;

The ever-living hold us. Do what you will,

You cannot leap out of the golden net.

First Sailor. There is no need for you to drown. Give us our pardon and we will bring you home on your own ship, and make an end of this man that is leading us to death.

Dectora. I promise it.

Aibric. I am on his side.

I’d strike a blow for him to give him time

To cast his dreams away.

First Sailor. He has put a sudden darkness over the moon.

Dectora. Nine swords with handles of rhinoceros horn

To him that strikes him first.

First Sailor. I will strike him first. No! for that music of his might put a beast’s head upon my shoulders, or it may be two heads and they devouring one another.

Dectora. I’ll give a golden galley full of fruit

That has the heady flavour of new wine

To him that wounds him to the death.

First Sailor. I’ll strike at him. His spells, when he dies, will die with him and vanish away.

Second Sailor. I’ll strike at him.

The Others. And I! And I! And I!

[FORGAEL plays upon the harp.]

First Sailor [falling into a dream]. It is what they are saying, there is some person dead in the other ship; we have to go and wake him. They did not say what way he came to his end, but it was sudden.

Second Sailor. You are right, you are right. We have to go to that wake.

Dectora. He has flung a Druid spell upon the air,

And set you dreaming.

Second Sailor. What way can we raise a keen, not knowing what name to call him by?

First Sailor. Come on to his ship. His name will come to mind in a moment. All I know is he died a thousand years ago, and was never yet waked.

Second Sailor. How can we wake him having no ale?

First Sailor. I saw a skin of ale aboard her—a pigskin of brown ale.

Third Sailor. Come to the ale, a pigskin of brown ale, a goatskin of yellow.

First Sailor [singing]. Brown ale and yellow; yellow and brown ale; a goatskin of yellow.

All [singing]. Brown ale and yellow; yellow and brown ale!

[Sailors go out.

Dectora. Protect me now, gods, that my people swear by!

[AIBRIC has risen from the ground where he had fallen. He has begun looking for his sword as if in a dream.

Aibric. Where is my sword that fell out of my hand

When I first heard the news? Ah, there it is!

[He goes dreamily towards the sword, but DECTORA runs at it and takes it up before he can reach it.

Aibric [sleepily]. Queen, give it me.

Dectora. No, I have need of it.

Aibric. Why do you need a sword? But you may keep it,

Now that he’s dead I have no need of it,

For everything is gone.

A Sailor [calling from the other ship]. Come hither, Aibric,

And tell me who it is that we are waking.

Aibric [half to DECTORA, half to himself]. What name had that dead king? Arthur of Britain?

No, no—not Arthur. I remember now.

It was golden-armed Iollan, and he died

Brokenhearted, having lost his queen

Through wicked spells. That is not all the tale,

For he was killed. O! O! O! O! O! O!

For golden-armed Iollan has been killed.

[He goes out. While he has been speaking, and through part of what follows, one hears the singing of the SAILORS from the other ship. DECTORA stands with the sword lifted in front of FORGAEL. He changes the tune.

Dectora. I will end all your magic on the instant.

[Her voice becomes dreamy, and she lowers the sword slowly, and finally lets it fall. She spreads out her hair. She takes off her crown and lays it upon the deck.

The sword is to lie beside him in the grave.

It was in all his battles. I will spread my hair,

And wring my hands, and wail him bitterly,

For I have heard that he was proud and laughing,

Blue-eyed, and a quick runner on bare feet,

And that he died a thousand years ago.

O! O! O!

[FORGAEL changes the tune.]

But no, that is not it.

I knew him well, and while I heard him laughing

They killed him at my feet. O! O! O! O!

For golden-armed Iollan that I loved.

But what is it that made me say I loved him?

It was that harper put it in my thoughts,

But it is true. Why did they run upon him,

And beat the golden helmet with their swords?

Forgael. Do you not know me, lady? I am he

That you are weeping for.

Dectora. No, for he is dead.

O! O! O! for golden-armed Iollan.

Forgael. It was so given out, but I will prove

That the grave-diggers in a dreamy frenzy

Have buried nothing but my golden arms.

Listen to that low-laughing string of the moon

And you will recollect my face and voice,

For you have listened to me playing it

These thousand years.

[He starts up, listening to the birds. The harp slips from his hands, and remains leaning against the bulwarks behind him.

What are the birds at there?

Why are they all a-flutter of a sudden?

What are you calling out above the mast?

If railing and reproach and mockery

Because I have awakened her to love

By magic strings, I’ll make this answer to it:

Being driven on by voices and by dreams

That were clear messages from the ever-living,

I have done right. What could I but obey?

And yet you make a clamour of reproach.

Dectora [laughing]. Why, it’s a wonder out of reckoning

That I should keen him from the full of the moon

To the horn, and he be hale and hearty.

Forgael. How have I wronged her now that she is merry?

But no, no, no! your cry is not against me.

You know the councils of the ever-living,

And all the tossing of your wings is joy,

And all that murmuring’s but a marriage song;

But if it be reproach, I answer this:

There is not one among you that made love

By any other means. You call it passion,

Consideration, generosity;

But it was all deceit, and flattery

To win a woman in her own despite,

For love is war, and there is hatred in it;

And if you say that she came willingly—

Dectora. Why do you turn away and hide your face,

That I would look upon for ever?

Forgael.My grief.

Dectora. Have I not loved you for a thousand years?

Forgael. I never have been golden-armed Iollan.

Dectora. I do not understand. I know your face

Better than my own hands.

Forgael.I have deceived you

Out of all reckoning.

Dectora.Is it not true

That you were born a thousand years ago,

In islands where the children of Aengus wind

In happy dances under a windy moon,

And that you’ll bring me there?

Forgael.I have deceived you;

I have deceived you utterly.

Dectora.How can that be?

Is it that though your eyes are full of love

Some other woman has a claim on you,

And I’ve but half?

Forgael. Oh, no!

Dectora. And if there is,

If there be half a hundred more, what matter?

I’ll never give another thought to it;

No, no, nor half a thought; but do not speak.

Women are hard and proud and stubborn-hearted,

Their heads being turned with praise and flattery;

And that is why their lovers are afraid

To tell them a plain story.

Forgael. That’s not the story;

But I have done so great a wrong against you,

There is no measure that it would not burst.

I will confess it all.

Dectora.What do I care,

Now that my body has begun to dream,

And you have grown to be a burning coal

In the imagination and intellect?

If something that’s most fabulous were true—

If you had taken me by magic spells,

And killed a lover or husband at my feet—

I would not let you speak, for I would know

That it was yesterday and not to-day

I loved him; I would cover up my ears,

As I am doing now. [A pause.] Why do you weep?

Forgael. I weep because I’ve nothing for your eyes

But desolate waters and a battered ship.

Dectora. O, why do you not lift your eyes to mine?

Forgael. I weep—I weep because bare night’s above,

And not a roof of ivory and gold.

Dectora. I would grow jealous of the ivory roof,

And strike the golden pillars with my hands.