Page 271 - a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-young-man

Lure of the fallen seraphim?
Tell no more of enchanted days.

The verses passed from his mind to his lips and, murmur-
ing them over, he felt the rhythmic movement of a villanelle
pass through them. The rose-like glow sent forth its rays of
rhyme; ways, days, blaze, praise, raise. Its rays burned up
the world, consumed the hearts of men and angels: the rays
from the rose that was her wilful heart.

Your eyes have set man’s heart ablaze
And you have had your will of him.
Are you not weary of ardent ways?

And then? The rhythm died away, ceased, began again to
move and beat. And then? Smoke, incense ascending from
the altar of the world.

Above the flame the smoke of praise
Goes up from ocean rim to rim
Tell no more of enchanted days.

Smoke went up from the whole earth, from the vapoury
oceans, smoke of her praise. The earth was like a swing-
ing swaying censer, a ball of incense, an ellipsoidal fall. The
rhythm died out at once; the cry of his heart was broken.
His lips began to murmur the first verses over and over;
then went on stumbling through half verses, stammering
and baffled; then stopped. The heart’s cry was broken.

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