XXV

I9.

The Tree, the Temple and the Upright Man,
the square, the circle and add to the five,
the Oracle, my uncle's Seraphim;

he said the future would encompass us,
separate yet together, with their wings;
I do not need to seek their names,

their letters and their numbers in the book,
for they are ONE, yet doubled, two and two, a host
to sweep us to God's throne - and I am lost -

spare me myself, my small identity, I pray,
who should submit, soar higher, caught away;
spare me my name, Elizabeth, spare me his,

although he never said Lady Elizabeth,
nor I, Sir Walter - dear Lord,
do I remember/that time "before" -

for galleys crash and fire is flung,
and I again am standing on a wharf,
watching a tall mast slowly disappear.

20.

XXVI

The past can neither add nor take away, I said,
but now "before" and "after" challenge each other,
a satrap or a monk with sunken eyes,

a memory of a purple sleeve, a memory of bliss,

a memory of repentance and slow death,

a memory of burning censors and the sulphur fumes

that vainly choke the half-dead; there is hope ;
there is no hope, the cart is at the door,
you can not sort them out; leave them

and nail them in, or take the lot ?
whose is the voice, what executioner
condemns us all together ?

XXVII

21.

I am a ghost tending a little flame,
but one spark may ignite the host
of invisible Seraphim so that they

may visibly manifest on earth to men;
I speak his name, a thousand men appear,
or would if they could hear;

He could have ruled the realm, the world,
only he choose the way of love, Elizabeth (another,
and found himself (and with her) not the Queen)
in the Tower;

that was his earlier plight, the later
was longer- I heard the story of his short release,
of his return, then of his death;

maybe my part was sheer delerium,
as Hugh once said; maybe it was an angel
that paced the corridors about my bed;

maybe it was an angel in my room,
("my Lizeth ✓ - are you mad? ")
or maybe as Hugh said, it was a devil.

XXVIII

22.

It needed fire to generate rememberance,
Love was the primum mobile, the mediator,
Carthage, Rome, Tyre,

and on the Cathedral's apse and nave
and the flesh crucified, until
rememberance brought us to this hour,

in which I strive, with or without
the litany and prayers, to save identity,
the Man - Angel or Devil.

23.

XXIX

do
I / go back and clutch my precious book
and warm it at my breast,
it is the child I lost ;

granted me
O infinite grace - my uncle/ granted
this blessing and this peace,
here is a great sun, set between the trees

of Paradise, those same trees
with names of God, the same God
and yet other, some seventy names or more ;

inscribed in the circumference of this Flower ;
I dare not read them, printed on the page ;
later, I'll light my candle, kneel and seek

the numbers and the names upon the chart,
divided round the circle of the year,
so one can find the special angel

and God's special name
that guides the soul from birth;
I know his birthday and the day he died,

and my name on the chart lies not so far from his ;/
Azriel who saw him die, now let me live
to honour and to serve the names of God.

24.

XXX

He honoured his *parole* and loved,
and that has saved his soul and mine;

better the dim, sweet sanctuary of my room
and Ignorance (mine) of his activity

with crucibles and astrolabes, of which they spoke,
his traffic with daemonic powers and spirits of the dead;

I read of this too, in my uncle's book,
and those two names among rebellious spirits,
the other false, rebellious ones,

Lilith and Lucifer- let them not be lost,
O God of more than seventy names,

and attributes of justice - let us keep these,
as symbols of our meeting, for his death

redeemed us, spared us, made the memory
of a little room, one of the aspects of eternity,

one of the stations, measured in that Sun
by rays from the circumference,

with numbers that again are found
in Paradise, upon the leaves;

we were one number; separate, we are two
upon the Tree of Heaven, Sephirothique.

25.

XXXI

Julius come back, Julius come back,
I flamed too high and now I toss with fever,
there was a purple tent, there was a river,
there was real terror of barbaric hosts,
physical fear, but there was the escape,
the cup within my reach; even as you turned
to speak, before you parted the tent-folds,
you said, "keep the wine till the last", and vale,
and paused with the fold lifted like a banner,
to add ave and dropped the folds and went ;
the names I whispered on my knees,
the prayers I sent to heaven had no place there ;
the world had punished us enough,
peace, peace, there was no Tower, no severed head,
peace, peace, there was no plague, penance, redemption,
but only at the last, you voice that said ave.

XXXII

26.

" You can not beat them back, the garrisons are weak, stay here, let Julia rest here in the garden,

Rome is doomed anyway, enjoy to-day to-day, you are not Caesar, our great ancestor;

they won't get here to-morrow or next year, or the year after, the legions are on guard about the walls,

there is enough to do here in the city, see, Julia begs you stay, " and Hermas put his arm

about my shoulder, "you almost disappear among the lilies, in this white and silver ;"

O Hermas, comforter, you would have kept me there, but I must disappear, though not among your lilies;

"a hunting-trip ? you can't get past the gates -" "Octavius will help, " it was planned long ago -"

"Julia, you're mad - " it, was a simple matter after all, and all discretion for the laticlave.

XXXIII

27.

It was cool even amidst the furor,
out tent was set apart, with Octavius

always near to sound the alert
and help him with his armour;

within my thought, I prayed the Dioscouri,
no marble set in Hermas' corridor,

but beings in reality and near;
give us a ship, we'll sail down this wide river,

the sea is not so far, I would forget
anxiety and ceaseless threat and war,

for we would find a city, greater
and with more power, even than ancient Rome.

XXXIV

28.

No god set in an alcove, no god upon a plinth,
no plain Adonis, no slain Hyacinth,

for none slays he who is consequent and unpredictable;
for none slays Love, inconsistent and unpredictable,
he comes how, no man knows,

and all the rest is levelled to the ground,
the city walls, the fortress and the Tower;

we stand alone, Julius and Julia,
the past, the future and the present, one;

what if we meet and do not know each other?
we'll meet again - we talked philosophy, Lucretius,
Plato;

what if we meet, and one has gone the right,
the other on the left-hand path?

so we discussed the Eastern mysteries,
Pythagoras and re-birth; how often have we met like
this,

how often have we separated, torn apart
in hate, in bitterness and in disgrace?

29.

XXXV

Ave and vale, but the parting came
before the greeting, it was vale ,ave,

keep the wine till the last,
I hold this cup, I need not taste this sleep,

I hold the globe, as once so long ago
(or once, some centuries later),

I clutched the apple in my helpless hands
and could not break it - who would break this sphere,

this perfect crystal of reflected rose and red
and purple of the sanctuary, the tent - folds,

or long ago ( or was it centuries later ?)
the crimson cover of an ark, a bed,

Sanctum Sanctorum where a stranger lay,
who always flung his cloak upon a chair,

and paced the room in urgency and fever,
and always said, "I must go soon."

XXXVI

30.

The best wine came last, as we learnt long ago,
(or was it centuries later ? ) at the marriage-feast;

the best will come, I know, when I drink this,
who knows, my Lord, how long before we meet ?

what claims you now ? do you instruct
new legions, do you plan a sudden sortile

on the race of man, and on the peril
of the man-made metiers ?

would you destroy the whole to build again
the radiant city where man walks with man,

in confidence, invoking the benign
omnipotence, who yet explains the pattern,

the pattern, so we see even the smallest act,
in its proportion and significance ;

but no - stay as you are a little longer,
stay as you are for years, for centuries,

and give me time to re-invoke the past
and read the future in this gazing-glass,

this crystal of reflected rose and red,
for the best wine came last.

XXXVII

31.

Now there are gold reflections on the water,
how old am I and how have the years passed ?

I do not know your age nor mine, nor when you died,
I only know your stark, hypnotic eyes

are different and other eyes meet mine, amber and fire,
in the changed content of the gazing-glass ;

Oh, I am old, old, old and my cold hand
clutches my shawl about my shivering shoulders,

I have no power against this bitter cold,
this weakness and this trembling, I am old ;

who am I, why do I wait here, what have I lost ?
nothing or everything but I gain this,

an image in the sacred lotus-pool, lotus pool,
a hand that hesitates to break

the lily from the lily-stalk and spoil
what may be image of a Pharoah's face.
Vision

32.

XXXVIII

---

"She is not grown, my Lord, a child
and without grace," an arm about my shoulder,

a voice- a gardner or a temple-servant ( Hermas ? ),
a dark, ironic face, a gesture and a glance,

the sound of metal on the marble pavement,
the bronze-edged sandal of a charioteer ?

a captain soldier, captain or mere household-keeper,
one of the Pharoah's men but not the Pharoah,

one of the palace-guard, not greater
than my protector, scribe and foster-father ;

"later, my Lord, review the temple-dancers
with me, there are new girls from Cos

and overseas, brought back since you last left ;
my Lord, I am your servant,

and your campaign," he bowed, ✓
"we learn, was most felicitous."

XXXIX

33.

Then or much later, then or earlier,
then when time paused, for, time must pause
even so

at a command - whose ? - neither god nor Pharoah
can subdue his stride, can laugh at time, the tyrant

and his scythe; reap armies, populations, whet your
begin again on hoplites and the legions,
even Alexander

stops at the horizon, but not we; there is a brazier
in a corridor, there is a blue cloth slung across
a door,

there is the sound of curtain-rings along the rod,
that then slide back and the blue curtain falls in
its old folds,

and we are standing on a mosaic floor,
whose pattern is familiar, fish in water,

birds in the reeds, and a papyrus-scroll
hangs on the wall; I see them there forever,

nor need turn and read the inscription
and translate the letters- for he can not read -

no business of a soldier - call a scribe-
but there are other symbols which he knows and sees,

and turns to appraise- one purple lily
in an alabaster vase.

XL

34.

If there is urgency, there is no fear,
hail, yes, but not farewell,

Amenti flowered long before Eden's tree;
His hand invites the delta underneath

the half-transparent folds of the soft pleats,
and does not tear but draws the veil aside,

then both his hands grasp my bare thighs,
and clutch/tighten, bird-claws or a beast

that would tear open, tear apart, but keep
the appetite at bay, to gratify a greater hunger

or to anticipate deeper enjoyment;
yet his commanding knees keep my knees locked,

even while his virility soothes and quickens,
till in agony, my own hands clutch and tear,

and my lips part, as he releases me,
and my famished mouth opens

and knows his hunger and his power;
and this is the achievement and we know the answer

to ritual and to all/philosophy,
in the appeasement of the ravished flower.

XLI

35.

the house belongs to me,
I must have married Hugh, because the house belongs to me
the fields, the little river; visitors come and go,

even the Lady Abbess, a niece or daughter or a
of an old friend of my mother; — grand-daughter

she is aristocratic and at ease but always says,
"Lady Elizabeth belongs to us ;

she would have more leisure and more peace
at our Retreat, " and she begs me come

not far across the fields, to Matins or Compline ;
I smile apology and I decline,

remembering the old days and the old loyalties ;
she does not know how once and feverishly,

I read my Missel till the pages faded
and the Aves cried, " it is another Ave that you seek,

a prayer within a prayer,
let life not spoil the hope of Paradise."

XLII

36.

O, that was long ago, the purple lily,
and that was long ago, the vale, ave,

and that was long, long after, but the same
hunger, the same desire, the same appeasement,

in London, near the Tower, "my Lizeth, are you mad ?"
for years, I faced Sir Hugh across the table,

after his father's death, for years, I spoke with
and kind, Hugh's cousins and gentlefolk
our neighbours,

for years, I said, " when Hugh comes back",
wearing the gowns he choose; a visitor

would look askance at Lady Elizabeth,
the ancient in her out-moded dress,

even although they had prepared the stranger,
"her husband's death - the shock - his ship Seaspray

was lost - you won't remember - off the coast
of Portugal, I think it was - long ago, James was
king,

she's old - O, very old - she can't remember
what happened yesterday ...

XLIII

37.

What happened yesterday ? a way of living,
a way of plunging reckless through the fires,
waiting

a way of thinking, "O, they'll soon pass over,"

a way of thinking, "where is Phoebe, do you think,

Amico, Amico,

that one was nearer us or nearer her ?

we might have sent her overseas -

if anything should happen -" "
the door-bell on the telephone ? O, its you,

we were just wondering - "its all right,
the all-clear's sounded somewhere."

XLIV

-----

What happened yesterday ? a field of thorns,
grasp them, they turn to lilies,

the door-bell or the telephone ? O, do come in,
he flung his hat and coat upon a chair,

it seemed we were familiar, semblables,
we were "familiars" and total strangers,

his eyes stared as his eyes had stared before,
nothing was changed, where everything was different,

the eagles and the legions, death and war,
the bronze-edged sandal of a charioteer,

London as always, it was just the same,
the coast-guards and the signals and the fire.

XLV

38.

There was no time to dream till it was over,
hail and farewell; there was no time

in which to read the pictures,
the message and the writing on the wall,

true, I transcribed the scroll,
he said he could not read -

no business of a soldier - call a scribe -
I did not know that he saw more and further

than I could ever see - I did not know
that he knew everything, yet waited for an answer

in Egypt, in a sort of trance
of patience and of fury, Oedipus, the King;

I gave the answer though I played the part
of prophetess or Sphinx, unknowingly,

I did not know how was invisible,
like Gyges with the ring.

39.

XLVI

It took a long time to decipher this,
the Mystery, the Writing and the Scroll,

infinity portrayed in simple things,
in courteous answer or abrupt reply,

I read the surface script, it was enough,
no hat, no coat, but gloves flung on a chair,

"I wonder if I left my car in order", and he was off, down the three flights of stairs

and back, I waited for him at the door;
"I have less than an hour," he said,

and laid his watch beside him on the table;
he said, "I must rush off to meet my daughter ";

what did I know? I poured the tea,
I offered cigarettes, "no, no," and he took up his watch,
"now I must go", and this was one of seven
short visits to decipher, seven meetings to decode.
short visits

40.

XLVII

I transcribed the scroll, I wrote it out
and then I wrote it over, a palimpsest of course,

but it came clear, at last, I had the answer
or the seven answers to the seven riddles,

the why and why and why- the meetings and the parting
and his anger - it took some time, though five years is not
long

to write a story, set in eternity but lived in - England;
I left of course; I travelled to the Tessin from Lausanne,

to Zürich and around and back again,
and I wrote furiously; he got the last of this
prose Trilogy,

this record, set in time or fancy-dressed in history,
five years ago, then I had five years left

to break all barriers, to surpass myself
with Helen and Achilles ...

an epic poem? unquestionably that,
I would not trouble him to read the script.

41.

XLVIII

But bitterness sets in, a different sort of bitterness
but the same, the fear of fear that runs within my veins,

the fear of helplessness, of being lost;
O, I have many friends, Phæbe is safe,

I have three grand-children; O, I have hosts
of friends- letters -the post? there's no anxiety,

is that the catch? let them lie there until I finish
I need not run them through, America, Italy, even a
German stamp,

England of course; I need not fear to find or not to find
the envelope with the somewhat cramped address

and my name, the post-mark not the same, not London now
but somewhere in the country ;

O, that was long ago, the fire, the frenzy
and the Egyptian lily -

then let it go at that, he's safe, children, grand-children
and a second wife.

42.

XLIX

I wrote of course, congratulations and felicity,
a friend sent me the notice from a London paper,

Bridegroom of the Week, with the picture,
she smiled under a festive little hat,

her age ? just young enough to be his daughter;
he looked older, rather commonplace, I thought;

the place ? outside the official registrar;
the caption said, she wore sage-green, was widow of one

of his former pilots, with a son,
how very suitable; he wrote a letter,

thanking me for mine, it was near Christmas,
and he enclosed the Christmas-card from Lord-and-Lady,

and I sent back my card, addressed to both,
it was five years ago, and that was that.

43.

L
-----

It is not over, it has just begun; I read somewhere
in French I can not quote, only the word semblables,
*I can't remember who*,

death

that these "familiars" have the power of life and death
over each other; I think if I thought anything,

that I could help most with detachment and serenity,
"O, just keep out of it," I said when Christmas came,

and I could send a greeting with a Crown and Star,
something abstract, no angels at the manger,

O, wholly formal and in perfect taste,
and this made looking for my Christmas-cards a game,

but no, I knew that I would never write,
"I'll never write again."

44.

LI

I waited sixteen weeks and I was good,
at least, I think I was, "patience," they said,

Trude said,
"more patience" and "Geduld" they said, and Schwester Trude
"God wanted this, so you could have a rest;"

I waited sixteen weeks and then was free, I thought,
"but at your age," they said," the bone won't set,

you must go back to bed;" I said, "I'll try rebellion",
for my prayers, I felt had failed;

I thought of you and then another picture came,
and an article, Amico sent, "the usual thing," she wrote,

"the au-dela by your friend," and she enclosed
the cutting from the Sunday Times, your picture

and your comment on the other lives, Hell, Paradise,
and your pilots who were dead;

"your friend"? we've hardly named you through the years,
but you were there - and here - for suddenly,

I forged another prayer, hear me, O Master of the Air,
I cried, Light-bearer, pre-Adamic, Lucifer.

45.

LII

the
Leave her, Elizabeth Dyer, the stage, and center,
she could walk, she could climb the attic stair,

could pray after a fashion, for awhile anyway,
could invoke the past, could pore over the ancient books,

half-guilty, half-prophetic and half-mad,
could believe in infinity and remember

how once her lover left the cup of sleep,
of death and of oblivion, within reach ;

leave her, she can dream better than we,
remembering Sir Walter, she can see

further than we can see, can conjure up,
invoke, entreat, implore

the outline of an alabaster jar
and an Egyptian lily.

46.

LIII

---

My friend, the river Thames ran past the door,
or not so far; barges and pageants now, for that was
long ago,

the threat from Spain or somewhere else, the fire
that charred the warehouse and the priceless
merchants' store

along the lower river; it ran a silver ribbon in the
you can't disguise the river, put
night,
out the light,

torch, lantern, brazier, lamp ; crowd indoors by a candle,
you fortunate ones who can afford a candle ;

wait, for your hour has come, O sinful city,
with a heretic upon the throne, wait, for no
watchman calls,

no voice is heard, and then the watchman woke
and the Lord God proclaimed, "your fate is in the
balance,"

and the scales quivered and the seven weights showed
three one side, four the other, and the dark
angels fell,

and the Apocalypse was clear to read,
not then in din and furore, but long after.

LIV

47.

I mix my metaphors and history, my friend,
"I do not care for modern poetry," you wrote,

that ?
"I do not care for music or astrology -"why tell me/
"I do not care for ceremonial" - and you gave a list,

all wrong, of what you called the rays, well, not wrong,
but illiterate or uninformed, the ray of healing,

and the mental ray, I quite forget, but the impression
that you meant to give, remains, as of an amateur

recreation,
dabbling in psychic matters, seriously but as a
~~repeated~~
do you see ? you left the way open for discussion,

could you trap me, you would trap me,
but we trapped each other, it was a serious matter,

Circe -
Gyges ...

LV

48.

world,
And what had I ? the common courtesies of a wrecked
"another cup of tea - a cigarette ?" "no, no - do you
mind this ?"

and he pulled out his pipe, "of course, not- smoke",
he did not stuff tobacco in the bowl, he lounged in
the big chair

and nursed his pipe, and all confusion vanished, it
he could call up enchantment, was home,
and enchanters, the hero of the moment

and all time, he was invisible but he was there ;
I let the telephone ring on, ring on, I need not
answer,

"but possibly, perhaps it is for you ?" "no, no";
nothing could spoil this moment, what we. said

was immaterial, but we had to talk of something,
for the silence spoke of threat now past,

of the incalculable moment, when tense and resolute,
he flung the weight of "England's treasure", as he
wrote of it,

into the balance and the balance swayed and hesitated,
and his heroic wings held and his wings beat back

the enemy, and in the silence there was all of this,
and of his thousand English pilots dead.

LVI

49.

I am ashamed to think of my predicament-
how long a prisoner ? I who am so free,
speak

my plight is nothing, I am fortunate ;
"with bones like yours," the doctor said,

"so elegant, you can't expect a sudden miracle;"
he did not say, "at seventy, it takes forever

for a bone to be found
heal ;"

and then there came the thought beyond the fear,
maybe there'll be a miracle, after all;
therefore

and then there came as answer to a prayer,
the thought, "maybe, I'll write a letter ",

I could simply say that I had read his article
and I could ask what else he'd written lately,

perhaps he'd like to hear, to know another
who'd travelled the same path, had got so far ;

as far as what, as where? an arm-chair in a room,
a bed, a table, six months in Purgatory, no, not that,

five months perhaps, then this month, April,
with a breath from Paradise, when I seized my pencil

and my pencil wrote of the enchantment and the purple tent
following inexorable destiny, we met.
and now

LVII

50.

A sort of brusqueness and no nonesense,
but he liked the story; it was a game we played
around a table,

Amico, a young Indian and his English mother;
I wrote of it after I heard him lecture, and he
wrote back,
of course,
it was the war and threat of death
that opened doors into this spirit-life;

after his retirement,
his lectures were a sort of challenge; he had
I crowded with the retired; of course,
rest to hear him speak,

our Indian friend had given me the ticket;
I squeezed in at the very last and thought,

how strange it was to hear him publicly,
speaking of messages and ghosts and spirits.

LVIII

51.

The great days of the war had gone, we waited on,
he had retired; after he broke the might

The Battle of See-Lowe and the threat of the invasion;
he seemed kind, fatherly and professorial;

one thought, he's / talking down to us, an audience
who has faced annihilation with a joke

and cups of tea, common-or-garden English heroism,
girls in uniform and girls without, and older women,

rapt in ecstacy to hear the great and simple man
hold forth, talk to us in an easy friendly manner,

of people who were "here" and "there" as one,
stories and anecdotes, the sea, the Russian snow,

reports, he stated, given him by others,
automatic writers, mediums, extraneous matters,

no mention, it seemed odd, of his own men,
the part they played "before", what happened to them "after".

LIX

52.

Our ancient vows - I lie alone- and everything is over -
no, not over, just begun - and if I think of Hugh,

it is the earlier England, I remember; I am forced
to think of things "before", in contrast to the "after",

the venom and the anger, as of a Dragon standing guard
before a door - and I remember Hugh and How Sir Walter,

they said, had contact with daemonic powers and Spirits of
and this in only my comparison, / the dead,
who would accuse

who would accuse
the Master of the Air, the Air Marshall
who opened doors for many and for me -

and flung his hat and coat upon a chair,
and paced the floor and turned on me in fury ...

and so rememberance brings us to this hour
in which I strive to save identity,

the Man - Angel or Devil - the primum mobile ,
the mediator, destroyer and creator.

LX

53.

And he was right and Hugh was right," no woman should explore these devious rites," how could I know

that he was Gyges and invisible, how could I know
that I was Circe with a secret key

and when the door swung open and was closed
swiftly, and he turned, the Dragón on the threshold,

in his fury, how could I know his fury was to save me,
that his repudiation was salvation.

LXI

Now you are old and tired and valiant, seventy-five
I wrote you for your birthday, I

once or twice,
for actually, I only knew you that one year,
though I had found you earlier through your lectures,

and we wrote and I sent messages from our Indian friend
and cards at Christmas and so on;

I followed out the guidance of Alli, so we called him,
or so he called himself or so his "guide", he said,
had called him;

I find this is one of the over-seventy names of God,
seventy-two in fact, of which Elizabeth spoke ;

I found her book in Lausanne on a shelf,
devoted to occult books, mostly French.

LXII

54.

So I found your God-name or Elizabeth Dyer found it,
and your degree, thinking of your birthday,

Alla oddly, Dieu adorable, and mine not far
from yours, Dieu qui inspire, and Teli,

and there is Alli, Dieu qui vivifie toute chose,
your letters that he "read" me in the dark,

not knowing who had written them, not taking them from their
with eyes closed, etairvoyantly (their envelopes,
seeing what the future held,

and "work" we had together, and some talk
of "a head off in the past", and of a monk

and of a being made for some great task,
but longing for retirement and a time for
contemplation and - a Ship;

the Ship was what inspired us, what brought Alla and Teli
to the ultimate goal of) (Alla and Teli)
their ambitions and their hopes,

for it had come over and above the stresses and the
bearing its priceless treasure, fury and the fear,

"So many," Alli said, "shouting and laughing;"
the Ship was for you.

LXIII

55.

I like to think, to make the almost unbearable story
that Hugh was there, I like to think that the Seaspray bearable,
that the Seaspray returned,

with other phantom ships, to hail them as they fell,
and gather them together on that one mysterious Ship

that brought Alla and Teli together, that the miracle
extended through all time, but that eternity

was not a vast conception of philosophy,
but a simple plane, a near extension of our own
common time,

where clocks tick and where no evil forces
shatter the continuity of young lives,

and where courtesy controls humanity,
and where the Master of the Air

says simply, "pride failed -
but all through time, I waited for you."

LXIV

56.

Now, you can laugh, my friend, I mean a cigarette,
this <u>near extension of our own common time</u>,

and chestnut-spires, so lovely in the dusk,
I saw them and I breathed their anodyne,

but they come and close the window when the light is on,
for the <u>Maikafer</u> bumps and zooms about my bed,

and he is hard to catch and the night-sister says,
"you can't have both, the open window and your
table-light ";

so now I tell you this and now I'll reach
for cigarette and match, and this will be

my high philosophy( I know you'll understand ),
rememberance of the seven times we met.

LXV

57.

How could anything so complicated be so simple,
how could anything so difficult be so clear ?

I mean "the cloud of witnesses" that worried us
as children and the Holy Ghost ?

but strangely, it couldn't have happened, not to us,
without the good and bad of our predicament,

without Elizabeth, a sort of Marguerite to your Faust,
without the undercurrent that just didn't wreck us,

an invisible Circe or disguised Lilith,
or Helen, Guinevere, Semiramis,

that we invoke as Graces, even Virtues,
not for their beauty only, but for their implacable search.

for the semblable, the haunting first cause,
the primum mobile that gave both Hell and Paradise
—to Dante;

perhaps, I boast, perhaps I should be cowed and disciplined
a woman of seventy, lying — no — not helpless,

for I called for light,
and Dieu qui inspire, Light came.

58.

LXVI

I should be too old for exaltation,
I am too old, but inexplicably,

spring threatens with enchantment
and I almost fear redemption through its beauty;

doors open, one door shut inexorably,
but I had sensed the depth and I was spared;

I travelled, I was happy, even although
the path had led from darkness

on through darkness, back to illumination,
and from illumination, to despair,

and from despair to inspiration,
and as answer to a prayer,

VALE AVE

the Vale Ave. (Ave Vale) and the thought beyond the fear,
perhaps *they'll* be a miracle, after all.

LXVII

59.

Does writing equate walking ?
well, here we are, my most august and dear Professor,

and my anxiety fades beside the contemplation
of your heroic suffering, and our meeting

in Vienna when you were seventy-seven,
and our parting, some seven years later,

and the many threads woven into the father-image,
and the Oedipus riddle solved; Geduld, Geduld,
and now waiting;

"she must have patience," the last consultant said,
Geduld, Geduld, Geduld; "she must have patience;
the last consultant said, "some of my cases

the
have to wait a year; we can later fortity
the pin, the wedge with a cross-wedge,

in three months possibly, but nature knows best,
better let her wait" - he was talking to Amico,

and she wrote," 'Patience, Geduld,' he says,
' why is she so impatient ? '

LXVIII

60.

He might have been an ancient Cabalist,
none other than Ezra-Azriel returned, or another,

or many others, Socrates, of course;
O, he was sly and secret and revealed infinite
secrets,

but the secrets kept were greater
than we dreamed of or dared dream;

I once apologized, " you must not think me
but you seventy-seven "I said, " a superstitious,
" is eloquent ;

I mean the number in itself " - and waited,
but he did not answer, he just let it go;

and once I had a dream-sequence of Houses and I said,
"I think its astrological, a friend in England

sends me star-charts and maps; this is outside
our work, I know ; I mention it only

because of the dream sequence and the association
with your Star, Venus ; " then he seemed to start

as if suddenly discovered and off-guard, and
with a sort of ironical amusement and half-worship,
"not Venus!" "not Venus."

LXIX

6I.

Why do these words seem suddenly to laugh ?
Onkelos, Hebrew ? ( it is my uncle's book),

or maybe it isn't Hebrew ; I read of the Targum
agreed to Onkelos - de Jérusalem,
is Onkelos Greek ? no matter,

it is a question of Traditions transmise par la parole,
and "Parole" is in Hebrew, Kabalah and in
french, Kabal ;

so he honoured his parole, I said,
meaning his personal word, his honour,

and maybe, there were other vows, impersonal, heiratic,
including whole cycles of lodges, Houses, canacles,

and an oath is sacred, and the punishment, I read,
for revealing initiation secrets, may be death ;

how could I laugh at this ? I do not laugh -
watch, O Father, Dieu, père secourable.

LXX

62.

I am frightened, I confess, to write of this,
and yet I flaunt the adventure, bear the secret

like a banner; I even laugh, or rather as I said,
the words laugh, though I added (slightly shivering,

following my pencil, slightly alarmed, wondering what
how could I laugh at this ? (would follow),

but there is laughter somewhere, far off at sea,
unconquerable, gay, heroic, unheard by us

but conveyed to us by Alli, and another sort of laughter,
sly, discreet and near, of another unconquered Spirit,

and the Star of our Father, whose God-name, I find
is Zaka and whose attribute, Dieu, père secourable.

LXXI

63.

He wrote in the end, that the messages were "frivolous", so Nemesis woke or Fate, symbolically wearing the crown

of metal spear-points from the shattered lance-staves, a crown to be worn proudly, not easily set aside,

and a dark mourning robe over the fragile stuff, the pleated linen hidden, the transparencies, semi-transparencies

of the bride; yet even these words are inadequate, for what happened, happened, it was a tour-de-force,

a trick of the hermetic "Joker" of the old alchemists, no need to wonder who or how, or invoke Nemesis.

64.

LXXII

Now there is only laughter, "O, so many," Alli said,
"shouting and laughing", and a name Teli,

Dieu qui inspire, and a bride; there is only now
and the hereafter, antithetical perhaps, but running
side by side,

body and soul, spirit and body, the old problem,
the old pattern, complicated, simplified, translated
and decoded,

Athens, Alexandria, Carthage, Rome, Freud -
he would have understood, followed the story

with admiration, sympathy, perhaps concern
lest I fall victim to abstract speculation,

or fall a victim to the Air Lord and his pride,
he would have felt the threat and the temptation,

he must have followed us, standing aside,
he must have hailed the Ship

that brought the messages, "Parole", the Word,
and added his breath to the breath of God.

LXXIII

65.

Light follows darkness, and the darkness light, (pit,
the Dragon-lover of mythology was not chained in the pit

Hannibal, Caesar, Martel,
but ploughed the earth inexorably,

and the sea, and last the *Dragon volant* sought the sky,
to inagurate a new age and a new mythology,

-a-

a new Circe, Helen, Lilith;
what she sees, Helen, Semiramis, *Teli*,

is at best inadequate, fragmentary, but she saw *Alla*,
a whole, complete, aimed for the divine event,

and unarmed when venemous before the threshold,
he turned to attack her, crowned.

66.

LXXIV

There is Alla, Teli and our Indian friend, Alli,
there is Zaka unquestionably, and Amico

who sent me your last picture, is Dieh,
with the attribute, Dieu qui delivrez de Maux,

there are all the others, on earth, a "cloud of
as in heaven; may these deliver us witnesses",

from all iniquity, questioning and distrust,
and at the last (I know they'll understand),

I ask for this, the blessing of the Ship, of the
in rememberance of the 1
seven times we met.

"Parole",