Kathleen Raine: The Marriage of Psyche

Syysmyrskyn piiskaama aamuyö on mitä otollisinta aikaa hurmioituneelle luonnonlyriikalle. Kathleen Raine kuvaa Runossaan The Marriage of Psyche rakkauden mysteeriä minua suuresti liikuttavalla tavalla.

Runon toinen säkeistö on antanut nimen Rainen saavuttamattoman rakkauden, Gavin Maxwellin teokselle The Bright Ring of Water.

1. THE HOUSE

In my love's house

There are hills and pastures carpeted with flowers,

His roof is the blue sky, his lamp the evening star,

The doors of his house are the winds, and the rain his curtain.

In his house are many mountains, each alone,

And islands where the sea-birds home.

In my love's house

There is a waterfall that flows all night

Down from the mountain summit where the snow lies

White in the shimmering blue of everlasting summer,

Down from the high crag where the eagle flies.

At his threshold the tides of ocean rise,

And the porpoise follows the shoals into still bays

Where starfish gleam on brown weed under still water.

In sleep I was born here

And waking found rivers and waves my servants,

Sun and cloud and winds, bird-messengers,

And all the flocks of his hills and shoals of his seas.

I rest, in the heat of the day, in the light shadow of leaves

And voices of air and water speak to me.

All this he has given me, whose face I have never seen,

But into whose all-enfolding arms I sink in sleep.

2. THE RING

He has married me with a ring, a ring of bright water

Whose ripples travel from the heart of the sea,

He has married me with a ring of light, the glitter

Broadcast on the swift river,

He has married me with the sun's circle

Too dazzling to see, traces in summer sky.

He has crowned me with the wreath of white cloud

That gathers on the snowy summit of the mountain,

Ringed me round with the world-circling wind,

Bound me to the whirlwind's centre.

He has married me with the orbit of the moon

And with the boundless circle of the stars,

With the orbits that measure years, months, days and nights,

Set the tides flowing, Command the winds to travel or be at rest.

At the ring's centre,

Spirit or angel troubling the still pool,

Causality not in nature,

Finger's touch that summons at a point, a moment

Stars and planets, life and light

Or gathers cloud about an apex of cold,

Transcendent touch of love summons world to being.