poet, writing merely to be read, finds open to him many new fields. Being no longer limited to the song and the ballad, he is free to cultivate the longer narrative, dramatic, and reflective forms. He gives a stronger emphasis to both form and content. After all, however, other forms of poetry are, when compared with the song, essentially less poetic and nearer the level of prose, for the singing quality is of the very essence of poetry. Poetry, when divorced from music, develops a kind of music of its own. Human speech as well as music has its own peculiar melody and rhythm. "Speech-tunes," as Sidney Lanier called them, are almost impossible to write down in any musical scale because of the minute differences in pitch and time; but they are of the greatest importance for the poet. Lord Houghton tells us that "one of Keats's favorite topics of conversation was the principle of melody in verse, which he believed to consist in the adroit management of open and close vowels. He had a theory that vowels could be as skilfully combined and interchanged as differing notes of music and that all sense of monotony was to be avoided except when expressive of a special purpose." A stanza from Keats's "Ode to a Nightingale" furnishes an almost perfect illustration of his theory. Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, She stood in tears amid the alien corn: The same that oft-times hath Charmed magic casements, opening on the foam With this superb example of word melody, compare some intentionally unmusical lines written by Lanier to show the effect of monotony in vowel sounds, 'Tis May-day gay: wide-smiling skies shine bright A study of the most musical English and American poets-Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats, Tennyson, Swinburne, Yeats, Poe, and Lanierwill teach one much about this word music in poetry. The skilful poet uses all the resources at his command, rime, alliteration, assonance, onomatopoeia; and he varies his stresses, his pauses, and the length and the rhythm of his lines. How this word melody of the poet differs from that of the song will be evident from the following quotation from an English critic, John Addington Symonds: "I once asked an eminent musician, the late Madame Goldschmidt, why Shelley's lyrics were ill-adapted to music. She made me read aloud to her the Song of Pan and those lovely lines To the [sic] Night, 'Swiftly walk over the western wave, Spirit of Night! Then she pointed out how the verbal melody was intended to be self-sufficing in these lyrics, how full of complicated thoughts and changeful images the verse is, how packed with consonants the words are, how the tone of the emotion alters, and how no one melodic phrase could be found to fit the dædal woof of the poetic emotion." TO NIGHT Swiftly walk o'er the western wave, Out of thy misty eastern cave, Wrap thy form in a mantle gray, Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day; When I arose and saw the dawn, I sighed for thee; When light rode high, and the dew was gone, And the weary Day turned to his rest, Thy brother Death came, and cried, Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, Death will come when thou art dead Sleep will come when thou art fled; Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1828) Although Tennyson's subject matter is often commonplace, no later poet has surpassed him in poetic music. His "Crossing the Bar" has tempted many a composer; and yet it hardly seems to require a musical setting, so perfect is the verbal melody which Tennyson gave it. The poem was written in the poet's eighty-first year, and by his direction it is placed last in every edition of his poems. The "Pilot" Tennyson explained as "That Divine and Unseen Who is always guiding us." CROSSING THE BAR Sunset and evening star, And one clear call for me! And may there be no moaning of the bar, When I put out to sea, But such a tide as moving seems asleep, Too full for sound and foam, When that which drew from out the boundless deep Twilight and evening bell, And after that the dark! And may there be no sadness of farewell, When I embark; For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place The flood may bear me far, I hope to see my Pilot face to face When I have crost the bar. Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) Tennyson's "Sweet and Low," one of the lyrics in The Princess, is as musical as "Crossing the Bar," but it has been wedded by Barnby to an air which fits it admirably. The song is one of the most beautiful lullabies in the language. SWEET AND LOW Sweet and low, sweet and low, Wind of the western sea! Over the rolling waters go, Come from the dying moon, and blow, Blow him again to me: While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps. Sleep and rest, sleep and rest, Father will come to thee soon; Rest, rest, on mother's breast, Father will come to thee soon; Father will come to his babe in the nest, Silver sails all out of the west Under the silver moon; Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep. No living poet has written more melodious verse than William Butler Yeats. The following song from his poetic drama, The Land of Heart's Desire, is as musical as the best of Elizabethan songs. |