#THEY CUT OFF THE SPRING AND BED SCENE AND THAT IS BLASPHEMOUS BUT STILL I LIVE FOR THE PRESENT

[queentoreador]

You knew this was coming. The Garden of Proserpine.

[I'm posting the whole poem: it's so beautiful and perfect in its completeness it feels blasphemous to cut it.]Here, where the world is quiet; Here, where all trouble seems Dead winds' and spent waves' riot In doubtful dreams of dreams; I watch the green field growing For reaping folk and sowing, For harvest-time and mowing, A sleepy world of streams. [The poem starts off with lines that I honestly think should be more recognised. It took me so long to discover Swinburne and once I had, I couldn't help but feel that he deserves more recognition than he gets. At least outside of academic study. (For example "the world is quiet here" is a code in ASOUE and I never knew it was a reference.) The poem begins like a lullaby, it's somehow soothing, definitely soporific. The repetition of "Here, where" has a whispering quality and again feels like a lullaby. The alliteration of the 'w' again adds to a breathy, whispered tone. Swinburne's death is a peaceful ceasing of violence and noise: the poem feels hushed throughout, bordering on silent.]I am tired of tears and laughter, And men that laugh and weep; Of what may come hereafter For men that sow to reap: I am weary of days and hours, Blown buds of barren flowers, Desires and dreams and powers And everything but sleep. [The speaker rejects the world of the living but especially it's excess. Excess of noise, colour and emotion. The futility of life is presented as something exhausting and even the things that individuals classically strive for (desires, dreams, powers) are rejected as ultimately fruitless.]Here life has death for neighbour, And far from eye or ear Wan waves and wet winds labour, Weak ships and spirits steer; They drive adrift, and whither They wot not who make thither; But no such winds blow hither, And no such things grow here. [The idea of life and death being adjacent but separate, the idea of "the veil" etc. is presented. Instead of stagnation, he again choses to present to the end of life as calm, quiet and still.]No growth of moor or coppice, No heather-flower or vine, But bloomless buds of poppies, Green grapes of Proserpine, Pale beds of blowing rushes Where no leaf blooms or blushes Save this whereout she crushes For dead men deadly wine. [Poppies of course being connected literally with the production of opiates and symbolically with sleep (see the field in The Wizard of Oz). Green grapes perhaps implying sourness, bitterness - none of the sweetness or richness of the world of the living. Rushes, again with the whispering sound. You can practically hear the wind "blowing" through the line. "For dead men, deadly wine" ah. I just love that line... This whole stanza is just so beautifully crafted, I can see the scene so clearly in my mind's eye.]Pale, without name or number, In fruitless fields of corn, They bow themselves and slumber All night till light is born; And like a soul belated, In hell and heaven unmated, By cloud and mist abated Comes out of darkness morn. [The juxtaposition of fruitless fields of corn feels again cold. The symbol of the harvest failing to fulfill its basic function. And also the rejection of Demeter and the Spring, the souls wait for her arrival to bring the light which for them will never come.]Though one were strong as seven, He too with death shall dwell, Nor wake with wings in heaven, Nor weep for pains in hell; Though one were fair as roses, His beauty clouds and closes; And well though love reposes, In the end it is not well. [Swinburne is not a fan of Christian dogma, heaven and hell are both rejected in favour of his version of the afterlife. Which while he implies is preferable to the exhaustion of life, does not pretend that it will be beautiful. No one escapes the cold reality of death.]Pale, beyond porch and portal, Crowned with calm leaves, she stands Who gathers all things mortal With cold immortal hands; Her languid lips are sweeter Than love's who fears to greet her To men that mix and meet her From many times and lands. [Prosperpine/Persephone is presented as a matriarchal figure here which is slightly unusual as that role usually falls to her mother Demeter. She is cold, and unfailing in her duties yet still gentle. Death being sweeter than love, a balm for the pains of life. A universal kiss.]She waits for each and other, She waits for all men born; Forgets the earth her mother, The life of fruits and corn; And spring and seed and swallow Take wing for her and follow Where summer song rings hollow And flowers are put to scorn. [She has not only rejected the world of the living, but forgotten it entirely - so detached is she in her own domain from the spirits of life. Spring and seed and swallow, symbols of fertility and birth - even her antithesis is drawn to her realm eventually.]There go the loves that wither, The old loves with wearier wings; And all dead years draw thither, And all disastrous things; Dead dreams of days forsaken, Blind buds that snows have shaken, Wild leaves that winds have taken, Red strays of ruined springs. [Love is presented as fleeting even in age, weary wings implying a laying to rest. An acceptance of falling. Here the tone briefly becomes more clamourous: the world of the living intrudes his thoughts of peace. But these intrusions are assimilated back into the silence and peace of death.]We are not sure of sorrow, And joy was never sure; To-day will die to-morrow; Time stoops to no man's lure; And love, grown faint and fretful, With lips but half regretful Sighs, and with eyes forgetful Weeps that no loves endure. [The fickleness and frailty of human subjectivity is presented here as a justification for his views. Human life, human experience is fallible - death is not. Even love dies. Love itself is brought to tears at its own demise. Though weeps again is a quiet verb, less melodramatic than "sobs" for example, it's far more restrained.]From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be That no life lives for ever; That dead men rise up never; That even the weariest river Winds somewhere safe to sea. [He creates a collective voice here, invoking humanity as "we". Death here is freedom and peace and not something to be feared but embraced. Like rivers to the sea: each individual life joins together and is lost in a collective death.]Then star nor sun shall waken, Nor any change of light: Nor sound of waters shaken, Nor any sound or sight: Nor wintry leaves nor vernal, Nor days nor things diurnal; Only the sleep eternal In an eternal night. [Only here does the poem really feel dark (as in the literal quality, not metaphorically) as the lights are shut off, the candles are snuffed, and the poem comes to rest. All the senses are abandoned, all the seasons fade away into the blackness of oblivion and the poem itself dies in a peaceful, perfect phrase.]