Clarel/Part 1/Canto 18

18. Night
Like sails convened when calms delay Off the twin forelands on fair day, So, on Damascus' plain behold Mid groves and gardens, girdling ones, White fleets of sprinkled villas, rolled In the green ocean of her environs. There when no minaret receives The sun that gilds yet St. Sophia, Which loath and later it bereaves, The peace fulfills the heart's desire. In orchards mellowed by eve's ray The prophet's son in turban green, Mild, with a patriarchal mien, Gathers his fruity spoil. In play Of hide-and-seek where alleys be,

The branching Eden brooks ye see Peeping, and fresh as on the day When haply Abram's steward went-- Mild Eliezer, musing, say-- By those same banks, to join the tent In Canaan pitched. From Hermon stray Cool airs that in a dream of snows Temper the ardor of the rose; While yet to moderate and reach A tone beyond our human speech, How steals from cloisters of the groves The ave of the vesper-doves. Such notes, translated into hues, Thy wall, Angelico, suffuse, Whose tender pigments melt from view-- Die down, die out, as sunsets do. But rustling trees aloft entice To many a house-top, old and young: Aerial people! see them throng; And the moon comes up from Paradise.

But in Jerusalem--not there Loungers at eve to roof repair So frequent. Haply two or three Small quiet groups far offyou see, Or some all uncompanioned one

(Like ship-boy at mast-head alone) Watching the star-rise. Silently So Clarel stands, his vaulted room Opening upon a terrace free, Lifted above each minor dome On grade beneath. Glides, glides away The twilight of the Wailing Day. The apostate's story fresh in mind, Fain Clarel here had mused thereon, But more upon Ruth's lot, so twined With clinging ill. But every thought Of Ruth was strangely underrun By Celio's image. Celio--sought

Vainly in body--now appeared As in the spiritual part, Haunting the air, and in the heart. Back to his charnber Clarel veered, Seeking that alms which unrest craves Of slumber alms withheld from him; For midnight, rending all her graves, Showed in a vision far and dim Still Celio and in pallid stress Fainting amid contending press Of shadowy fiends and cherubim. Later, anew he sought the roof; And started, for not far aloof, He caught some dubious object dark, Huddled and hooded, bowed, and set Under the breast-high parapet, And glimmering with a dusky spark. It moved, it murmured. In deep prayer 'Twas Abdon under talith. Rare That scarf of supplication--old, Of India stuff, with braid of gold In cipher. Did the Black Jew keep The saying--Prayer is more than sleep? Islam says that. The Hebrew rose, And, kindled by the starry sky, In broidered text that mystic flows The talith gleams. Divested then He turned, not knowing Clarel nigh, And would have passed him all unseen. But Clarel spake. It roused annoy-- An EasternJew in rapt employ Spied by the Gentile. But a word Dispelled distrust, good-will restored. "Stay with me," Clarel said; "go not. A shadow, but I scarce know what-- It haunts me. Is it presage?--Hark! That piercing cry from out the dark!" "'Tis for some parted spirit--gone, Just gone. The custom of the town

That cry is; yea, the watcher's breath Instant upon the stroke of death." "Anew! 'Tis like a tongue of flame Shot from the fissure;" and stood still: "Can fate the boding thus fulfill? First ever I, first to disclaim Such premonitions.--Thrillest yet I 'Tis over, but we might have met?-- - Hark, hark; again the cry is sped; For him it is--found now--nay, fled!"