Chapters 30
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1 01 - O, the Splendour of this Joy of Ours 1:08
O the splendor of this joy of ours. O the splendor of this joy of ours, Woven of gold of the sunlit hours. Here stands the house in soft repose, The garden and the orchard close. Here is the bench beneath the apple-trees, Where lazily the blanched spring its petals now doth fling, and here the luminous birds one sees, soaring like presages of light in the clear heaven of their flight. And here, as of caresses reigned in showers, from the lips of the higher blue, two lovely tarns of softest hue, bordered naively with involuntary flowers. O the splendor of our joy, for we live doubly, in ourselves, and Day's High Ecstasy.
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2 02 - What Tho' We See It Break Before Us Into Flowers 1:16
What though we see it break before us into flowers? This garden where we pass the clear and silent hours, in our two hearts are spirit-flowers unfurled, where blooms the fairest garden in the world. For as flowers we live and breathe, When in laughter love breaks forth, and our sorrows sigh like trees in the dark winds from the north. For we live as limpid lakes at calm, that mirror roses heavy with their balm, and rich vermilion lilies of the south, each like a warm red mouth. For we utter all delight that leaps in feasts and in the spring, when in vows our words take flight, sore exultant on the wing. O, what flowers are in our hearts unfurled within the fairest garden in the world.
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3 03 - This Carven Column Whereon Monsters Cling 1:33
This carven column whereon monsters cling, by Emil Verhaaren, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org, by Sonia. This carven column whereon monsters cling, and twist among themselves with ravening jaws. They seem to pant, and grip with mighty claws, and from each other anguished cries to ring. This was my soul before it knew thyself. O thou the ever new, the ever old, who earnest forth to me from deeps of self ardor between thy hands and joy untold. I breathe a scent of faint familiar flowers within thy heart that sleep, and thirsty memory drinks deep of kindred echoes from past years of ours, at the same instance in our childhood Tears unknowing we have wept. We must have known like gladness and like fears, like trysts with grief have kept.
Long since was I bound to thee as thine own, by one who came inscrutable, unknown, upon my life's adventurous battlefield. Oh, had I searched his face, forgetting fear, I should have known thine eyes this many a year, that there between his eyelids were revealed.
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4 04 - The Night, Unfolding, Banishes the Day 1:12
The Night Unfolding Banishes the Day, by Emil Verharan, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Four. The night unfolding banishes the day. The moon seems in its long survey to brood upon the sleeping silences. All the air is pure and clear, pure and pale, afar and near. And clear the waters in the friendly mead. What agony is in the slow and steady drip of water from a reed that sounds and then is hushed below? But in my hands thy hands I hold. Thy steadfast eyes enfold mine eyes. I see thy peace like purest water undefiled by cloudy fear, undimmed by hovering wraith of doubt. And oh, I see the perfect faith that rests within us like a sleeping child.
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5 05 - Remembering Thy Gracious Gift to Me 1:12
Remembering Thy Gracious Gift to Me by Emil Verharan, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Five. Remembering Thy Gracious Gift to Me, so simple, so profound, my wondering heart is lost in prayer to Thee. How long it seemed before I, groping, found, and knocked at Thy heart's door. And from how far I came at last to thee, whose hands were stretched in silent search for me. My heart was eaten by corroding rust that preyed upon my strength, defiled my trust. I was weary. I was old with long mistrust. I sickened of the roadway's empty length. When Thy feet wandered into my life's way, they brought a joy so exquisite to me that, trembling and in tears, I can but stay to worship silently.
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6 06 - At Times Thou Art the Spacious Light and Air 1:26
At times thou art the spacious light and air. At times thou art the spacious light and air of all this tranquil morning garden, where sinuous paths wind in the blue haze, like swans upon the deep blue waterways. At other times, Thou art the shivering wind, exultant, cool, who passes running fingers light and kind along the clear brow of the pool. When with thy two hands thou touchest me, I feel the brushing of cool leaves against my cheek. When midday cleaves the dimness, all the shadows secretly meditate the words that thou didst speak. So all the hours pass by some sweet grace of thine into my heart. And when at last one night comes apace, And wrapped in sleep and still apart thy spirit lies, Feel through thy closed eyelids how mine eyes dwell on thee With a love beyond compare, More humble and more clinging than a prayer.
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7 07 - Oh, Let It Knock Upon Our Door 1:19
O, let it knock upon our door. O, let it knock upon our door, that hand that taps with futile touch. We have our joy, the rest, what can it offer more, the rest with futile listless touch? Let them pass our door, the wearied, mirthless joys, with their tinsel and their toys. Let laughter rise and sound, and disappear, the crowd move on with million voices clear. The moment is so fair with light in this garden all about. The moment is so rare with new-born light, deep within us and without. Ah, tis the part of wisdom, dear. No longer seek we those who go by the long highway drear, with heavy feet and singing low. But stay we here. Contented as of old, though night itself strike out the sky above, Loving within us the idea we hold Of this most wondrous steadfast thing, our love.
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8 08 - I Have Given All My Heart to Thee 1:28
I have given all my heart to thee.
I have given all my heart to thee. I have given all my heart to thee, as simply as a child, giving a dewy flower, fresh and wild. I pressed it to my lips and gave it thee. I broke the flower's stem with burning hand. Speak not. For words may hurt, but with thine eyes speak to my soul, that it may understand. The flower that is my heart, my sacrifice, tells thee quite simply that one must confide in virgin love, as children trust in God, who is so good and great and wise. Let the bold spirit revel in the hills, in willful dalliance and vanity, but let us worship in simplicity. The very truth that holds our hearts and wills. Nor can love be more fully said than when soul speaks to soul at night, and overhead the innumerable silent stars, like eyes, burn each on each, a speaking that surpasses speech amid the barkening silence of the skies.
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9 09 - The Youthful Spring with Wondrous Might 1:23
The youthful spring with wondrous might, by Emil Viharwen, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org, by Ian King.
The youthful spring with wondrous might, bursts out in all its clarity upon our wistful words and sight, and bathes them deep in purity, the wind and the slender lips of the flowers. Trembling, scatter abroad in showers their syllables of light. But the soul of us will not be caught within the chains that language wrought. One simple flight of spirit doth enshrine, better than word or fitful thought, our joy in its abiding place divine. That heaven of thine Wherein thy soul kneels gently down to mine, and that where wistfully my soul kneels humbly there to thine.
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10 10 - Come Out Into the Garden Fair 1:48
Come out into the garden fair, where now the brooding eve has closed the flowers with its tranquil light, and in thy soul let sink the peaceful night. For no longer may its gloom Achieve to trouble our deep prayer. Above, the crystal stars are shining forth, with light translucent, and more pure than ever came from out the frozen north. Beyond them all, the peaceful skies endure. The million voices of this mystery murmur around thee. The million laws of nature's realm Are stirring about Thee. The silver tides from all the universe o'erwhelm Thy heart. But Thou hast naught of fear or strife, for Thy soul knows it is that love may be the love that is the work of life and its mystery in Thee.
Take then this peace the skies have sent and lay it to Thy soul. Since fear has gone, this peace that floats like some strange dawn across the midnight of the firmament.
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11 11 - How Swiftly is She Caught in Ecstasy 1:12
How swiftly is she caught in ecstasy? How swiftly is she caught in ecstasy? With her clear eyes of leaping flame, She, so sweet with clarity, Meek before life's sternest claim. This eve, how sudden fervor rayed her eyes, A simple word did entrance yield, To the garden, where she stood revealed, Both queen and serving-maid. So meek herself, but for us two on fire, To her must kneel, whoever doth desire, The harvest of that joy that rolls From out our two surcharged souls. We heard exulting love within us seek The quiet refuge of our hearts once more, and the living silence speak words we dreamed not of before.
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12 12 - At That Time When in Loneliness I stood 1:31
At the time when in loneliness I stood, by Emil Verharan, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. Twelve. At that time when in loneliness I stood, and desolation deep within me froze my life, you shone from out the multitude. A glowing window on a winter eve across the windy surface of the snows. Your piteous heart brought sweet reprieve caressingly to me in need, like breath of spring from off some warm mead, and faith did then command that frankness, tenderness, and troth should dwell with friendly hand in hand within the wind-hushed stillness of us both. Since then, though summer melts the winter cold within, and under skies whose leaping fire designs with gold all the winding pathways of our thought, though flaming love itself is bought to far-flung blossoms of desire, that endlessly to gain in might seek endless birth anew, always I look to that dear light whose sweetness first I knew.
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13 13 - Of What Avail the Hectic Reasoning 1:11
Of what avail the hectic reasoning?
Of what avail the hectic reasoning? Of what avail the hectic reasoning? Of what we were and what we may attain? All doubt is dead within this close, Where spring unfolds within us far from life and pain. I reason not, nor do I seek to know, For naught can trouble that within whose scope Are all of sweet impulse and sudden fervors glow, And tranquil flight to sanctuared hope. Before I knew, I felt thy clarity, And this my joy above all else to fill my heart with love, Nor question why thy voice so calls to me. Come, let our hearts be true, That they ensure to us the tenderness without the strife, And let them say that life, Was never made to reach a love so pure.
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14 14 - Quietly, Like Stately Queens of Old 1:31
Quietly like stately queens of old, who step by languid step descend the stairs of gold in fairy tales, and thou movest in my dream. Names I give thee, such as must beseem all beauty and all radiance, names that soothe, resounding silken smooth, sounds that wind and waver, glide and glance, weaving my poems as in subtle dance. Ah, but how soon I leave this play, when I behold thy wistful way, thine unadorned profoundly wistful way. Thy forehead unafraid and calmer than the day thy peaceful childlike hands laid upon thy knees, thy breathing bosom and the dreamful ease that on thy deep and limpid spirit lies. How useless, and how little in the sight of this are all things! All things save the naked light that wells up from thy heart and gathers in thine eyes.
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15 15 - To All Thy Smiles and Tears 1:21
To All Thy Smiles and Tears, by Emil Verharin, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox. Org by Larry Wilson. Fifteen.
To all thy smiles and tears my sweetest thoughts I give, those from a brimming heart and those that live too deep for language to impart. To all thy smiles and tears, and to thy soul, my soul with all its smiles and tears and its caress. See thou how dawn has blanched all the earth. The shades of gloom seem put to flight to vanish comfortless. The lonely lakes have caught the morning's light. The wet flowers glisten and are filled with mirth, and the golden woods have swept away the night. O that I might at last enter upon the joyous way. O that I might at last with a victor's joy and a victor's pride, and thou by my side. O that I might at last enter with thee into love's full day.
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16 16 - I Bathe in Thy Two Eyes My Soul Entire 1:26
I bathe in thy two eyes, my soul entire, by Emil Verhaaren, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org, by Sonia. I bathe in thy two eyes, my soul entire. I bathe in thy two eyes, my soul entire, as though in purest water it were laid, and in their sanctities I quench its fire, that tempered and more keen it may be made. O, to join in utter purity, as two stained windows, smitten by the sun, mingle their lights in separate clarity, and melt to one. I am sometimes impatient of my lot, as being one who has not and cannot attain the perfectness he would espouse. My heart beats on the bars that are its vows, my heart whose evil blossoms push their way between the rocks of blind brutality, And flaunt shamefacedly their swarthy flowers in sinister array.
My heart so false, so true, as changed the years. My heart of very contradiction made, exaggerating heart, where merge in shade, immensities of joy and startled fears.
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17 17 - That Love Within Our Eyes May Be 1:06
That love within our eyes may be.
That love within our eyes may be uttered with all clarity. Oh, let us cleanse our looks from those that chose the way of life's brutality. The dawn has flowered in red and gold, strange softened light and mist. It seems as though some tender down of gold and silver through the twilight kissed with dim caresses all our garden ways. Our mysterious lake displays its trembling sheen of golden light. Beneath the trees swoon birds in emerald flight, and dawn, from off the gloomy plain, the hillside steep, doth sweep the last gray ashes of unwilling night.
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18 18 - Mid-Summer Blooms Within Our Quiet Garden-Ways 1:35
Midsummer blooms within our quiet garden ways by Emil Verhaaren, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Sonia. Midsummer blooms within our quiet garden ways. Midsummer blooms within our quiet garden ways. A golden peacock down the dusky alley strays. Gay flower petals strew, pearl, emerald, and blue, the curving slopes of fragrant summer grass. The pools are clear as glass between the white cups of the lily-flowers. The currents are like jewelled fairy bowers. A dazzling insect worries the heart of a rose, where a delicate fern a filmy shadow throws, and airy as bubbles the thousands of bees over the young grape-clusters swarm as they please. The air is pearly, iridescent, pure.
These profound and radiant noons mature, unfolding even as odorous roses of clear light. Familiar roads to distances invite, like slow and graceful gestures, one by one, bound for the pearly-hued horizon and the sun. Surely the summer closed with all her arts, no other garden with such grace and power.
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19 19 - May Thy Dear Eyes, Thy Clear Eyes, Be 0:53
May thy dear eyes, thy clear eyes be, by Emil Vahelren, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Sarah Partain. May thy dear eyes, thy clear eyes, be to me on earth the pledges of felicity, and may our kindled souls in showers clothe with gold each flaming thought of ours, that my two hands against thy heart never cease to be to thee on earth the emblem. of all peace. And may we live as two lost prayers implore, one to the other yearning evermore. May our kisses be on lips in strife to us on earth, the symbols of our life.
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20 20 - Tell Me, Oh My Tranquil Friend 1:02
Tell me, O my tranquil friend, how absence of a day untuned, and brought our song of love to end, and wakened every sleeping wound. I go to meet all those that come from out that land of mystery, where thou didst go toward the red sunrise. Beneath a tree I sit, cold and dumb. Down the long road, spy eagerly. And long I look with fervor on the eyes, still lustrous with the sight of thee. I'd kiss those fingers for thy touch less wearisome. I'd utter words whose meaning none perceive. But, dumb, I listen. Hear their footfalls reach, the shadows where the aged eve holds the black night in leash.
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21 21 - In Those Hours When We Seem Shut Out 1:05
In those hours when we seem shut out from all that is not part of us, what cleansing flood is it, so nebulous, that bathes in circles our two hearts about? Joining our hands without a prayer, arm to arm without a cry, seeking we know not what nor where, something far off, more pure than thou or I. Thou fervent soul, O say, how does one live in this yearn for day? In those high hours how deep doth grow our will, in front of life's supremacies! What need of other heavens still, wherein with newer gods to cope? What anguish, and what ecstasies, and what unflinching hope! To be, one day, through death itself, the prey of these far silent agonies.
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22 22 - Oh, This Happiness 0:57
O, this is happiness, sometimes so rare, so frail, it brings us near distress. In vain we strive, as our hearts fail, to make for us a screening tent, with all thy wondrous hair, to shelter us from care, yet deep within does anguish still ferment. But love, A kneeling angel prays, asking alone for this, that fate may give to others equal days of tenderness and bliss. And on those stormy days, when evenings share, with highest heaven all their cruel despair, we seek forgiveness as the night unrolls, forgiveness for the sweetness in our souls.
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23 23 - Oh, Let Us Live Out Love with All Our Powers 1:11
O, let us live out love with all our powers. By Emil Valhagen. Translated by Charles R. Murphy. Read for LibriVox.org by Amy Deutschler. Twenty-three. O, let us live out love with all our powers, aspire audaciously in thoughts most high, that they may interweave in harmony in the supremest ecstasy of ours. Because within our twined souls something more pure than ought in us, more sacred, mightier unrolls, join we our hands, and let us seek it thus. What matters it that not but tears our halting speech avail for that whose puescent beauty, as it nears, doth make our two hearts quail? O, may we thus for ever meet love's stern and sweetened pains. Kneeling by fervor overcome before the sudden God within that reigns, so violent and so burning sweet, our very souls succumb.
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24 24 - No Sooner Lip to Lip, Than We Are Fraught 1:30
No sooner lip to lip than we are fraught by Emil Verhagen. Translated by Charles R. Murphy. Read for LibriVox.org by Amy Deutschler. XXIV. No sooner lip to lip than we are fraught with sunlit fervor that o'erpowers, as though two gods within us sought a godlike union in these souls of ours. Ah, how we feel divinity is near, our hearts so freshened by their primal might of light, that in their clarity the universe shines clear. Ah, joy alone the ferment of the earth doth bring to life and stir to far illimitable birth, as there above, across the bars of heaven, where voyage veils of gossamer are born the myriad flowering stars. How for us is design of life profound! All seems as pure as leaping fire, our words so filled with fair desire, we say them o'er to hear them ceaseless sound.
We are the ones victorious and sublime who seek eternity with humble pride. Our love shall ever be free from the bonds of time.
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25 25 - That Nothing May Elude Our Close Embrace 1:12
XXV. That nothing may elude our close embrace, this depth of holy love, that through the body love be clear with grace, I seek with thee the garden of our love. Thy breast is there, an offering. Thy hands reach out to me, naive and tender, whispering, is breathed and heard by thee. The shadows from the branches now, o'er thy throat and visage pass. Thy hair has spread its blossoms low, in garlands on the grass. All blue and silver broods the night, a silent sleeping bed this hour. Sweet night, whose breezes one by one deflower the lilies trembling in the low moon's light.
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26 26 - Although, the Autumn Eves 1:40
Although the Autumn Eves by Emil Verharan Translated by Charles R. Murphy Read for LibriVox.org by Amy Deutschler 26. Although these autumn eves so wistfully between the trees all down the paths fall the listless yellow leaves between the trees and down the paths. Although while autumn grieves, the night wind reaps a harvest pale so wistfully, where the late-blown roses fail, losing petals wan in showers. Ah, let no petal from our love fall and wither with the flowers, but let us both lean close above the smoldering hearth of memory. But let us tend and feed the glowing coals, and reach our hands and warm our souls against the winter cold and misery. Against the hour that tolls the death of all desire, against our very selves our stricken passion, O, lean with me above the blessed fire that memory's hands have kindled in compassion.
And if the skies be drowned while passionate autumn roams the world and rakes the woods and the wild lakes. No echo of the madness shall be found in that safe garden, inmost and supreme, here in the breathing stillness sound, the quiet footfalls of our dream.
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27 27 - The Gift of Body, When the Soul is Given 1:10
27. The gift of body when the soul is given is naught but harmony of two tendernesses driven one to the other fervidly. Glory in thyself thou findest sweet. So fair in thy fresh purity, only to offer me the wondrous gift complete. I come to thee, and know exultation in this gift of thine. Always the truer, the more pure I grow, since thy dear body gave itself to mine. Love, oh, may it overflow our hearts and be the reason in our lives. Whose maddest happiness is one that strives toward the madness of a trust divine.
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28 28 - Was There Ever in Us One Caress 1:23
Was there ever in us one caress? Was there ever in us one caress, one joyous laugh, or tenderness we dared not strew before us on our way? Or ever prayer in silence heard, whose dim, unuttered word we sought to stay? A single yearning of compassion, a quiet vow, or one of passion we sought to slay? So, loving thus, our hearts, like two apostles, went seeking the lowly ones with timid brow, who, feeling so then bound to us, proclaimed on high love's ravishment, as a flowery people loves the bough that holds them bathed in the sun's warm ray. Our souls groan greater still by this rebirth. Began to glory those who feel love sway, Increasing love by love's own might, To cherish thus divinely the whole earth That seemed reflected in our own soul's light.
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29 29 - This Fair Garden Flowering to Flame 1:42
This Fair Garden Flowering to Flame by Emil Verharan, translated by Charles R. Murphy, read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. 29. This fair garden flowering to flame, that seems the wondrous beauty to proclaim of that clear garden whereunto we cleave, is crystallized in frosted gold this eve. A great white silence drops athwart the sky. Out there, where gleams a marble hue, whither one by one the tall trees stride, each with its shadow long and blue and lonely by its side. No stir of wind, but soundlessly the blanched veils of cold alone unfold themselves mysteriously on the marsh's silver. O'er the road's white stone? The stars are lustrous with desire, like furbished steel, the rhyme within the cold, translucent air.
From some infinity sublime across the paleness of a waning moon falls shower on shower of fire, stardust that there sinks in a scintillating swoon. It is the hour divine when wistfully a million eyes look down upon the earth, upon the hazards of our human birth, from out immutable eternity.
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30 30 - If It Ever Be 1:18
If it ever be that thou and I should bring one to the other's suffering of loss and sorrow, or if fate decree that weariness of banal joys unstring the golden bow within us of desire. If thoughts' clear crystal vase entire must in our spirits fall and break below. If, spite of all, I lie at last supine, vanquish for not having been enough the prey of great divine utter nobility. Oh, let us be like maddened fools that climb the height beneath the ruined sky, and let us closer, closer cling, and in one monstrous flight with sun-drenched souls cleave the onrushing night.
End of Poem. This recording is in the public domain. End of the Sunlit Hours by Emil Verharan, translated by Charles R. Murphy.