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A
NEW edition of the Poetical Works of Gerald Massey, the
son of the canal boatman in Herts, and himself successively silk-mill worker,
errand-boy, and journalist, will be welcomed by the less fastidious readers of
poetry. Those who sympathize with fine feelings and delicate
susceptibilities, who delight in profuse imagery and florid diction, will
assuredly find much in this volume which they will regard, and which in some
sense they will rightly regard, as poetry. But those who demand
imaginative conception, who require, first, that the poet have something to
sing, and then that he sing it with purity, simplicity, and proportion, will not
find here the poetry which they seek. Mr. Massey is not an original
writer. He is scarcely a copyist indeed, but he reproduces, perhaps
unconsciously, the impressions which the poetry he admires have left on his
sensitive nature. In the very first page of his book we read,
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When Danaë-earth bares all her
charms,
And gives the God her perfect flower |
surely an echo of a line in The Princess, "Now lies the Earth all Danaë
to the stars." In fact, the whole of the Ballad of Babe Christabel, from which
these verses are taken, perpetually suggests its great precursor, the
In Memoriam of Tennyson, which we cannot but regard as, in this instance,
the immediate source of inspiration to Mr. Massey's muse. We
are far, however, from saying that this very poem is not instinct with beautiful
thoughts and fancies clothed in melodious language. For instance,—
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"When beauty walks in bravest
dress,
And, fed with Aprils mellow showers
The earth laughs out with sweet May-flowers,
That flush for very happiness;
"And Puck his web of wonder weaves
O' nights, and nooks of greening gloom
Are rich with violets that bloom
In the cool dark of dewy leaves." |
In this last verse the picturesque expression of
"greening gloom" would be more admired if it did not remind us of the "greening
gleam" of one of Mr. Tennyson's fine psalms. And a little below, Mr.
Gerald's "Song like a spirit sits i the trees" is too like the greater poet's
"The lark became a sightless song" for us to feel satisfied that it is not a
resetting of the same thought.
Perhaps Mr. Massey's best poem is that which idealizes a sad
experience, "The Mother's Idol Broken." It is graceful and touching; and
once at least nobly pathetic.
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"This is a curl of our poor
Splendid's hair!
A sunny burst of rare and ripe young gold," |
is a true and natural introduction to the "babe-wanderings and little tender
ways," to "the wee wax face that gradually withdrew and darkened into the great
cloud of death," to the three words of human speech
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"One for her mother, one for me,
and one
She crowed with for the fields and open heaven.
That last she sighed with a sweet farewell
pathos
A minute ere she left the house of life,
To come for kisses never any more.
* *
* *
* *
* *
*
And there our darling lay in coffined calm:
Beyond the breakers and the moaning now!
And o'er her flowed the white eternal peace:
The breathing miracle into silence passed
Never to stretch wee hands, with her dear
smile
As soft as light-fall on unfolding flowers:
Never to wake us crying in the night
Our little hindering thing forever gone,
In tearful quiet now we might toil on.
All dim the living lustres motion makes
No life-dew in the sweet cups of her eyes,
Naught there of our poor Splendid but her
brow." |
We doubt if Mr. Massey has written any thing better than that. His
Craigbrook Castle is often musical, and is prodigally fanciful. Fancy
indeed is his most prominent attribute. The third section of the poem last
mentioned contains a succession of mental coruscations that dazzle, rather than
delight, "the wondering eyes of men."
Of Mr. Massey's political poems we say nothing.
He does not value them highly himself, retaining them only "as memorials of the
past, as one might keep some worn-out garment because he had passed through the
furnace in it." One or two of his rhyming compositions are slightly humorous,
that for example about the lion who shook his incredulous head, and wagged his
dubious tail. There is one, too, on England and an illustrious living
personage, which, without going the whole way with the sarcastic poet, we can
read with some degree of satisfaction. It begins,—
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"There was a poor old woman once,
a daughter
of our nation,
Before the Devils portrait stood in ignorant
adoration.
You re bowing down to Satan, maam, said
some spectator civil,
Ah sir, it s best to he polite, for we may go
to the Devil,
Bow, how, bow,
We may go the Devil, so it is just as well to
bow." |
The edition of Mr. Gerald Massey's poems from which we are now quoting
contains a biographic sketch, which is not without interest, and the poets own
preface to the third issue of "Babe Christabel." This poem, as now
published, thus appears for the fourth time—a proof of the author's popularity.
If we admire his productions less than others, it is that our standard is higher
than that of others. Let Mr. Massey write more slowly, take more pains
with his versification, be less with Queen Mab, and dwell more among the great
central facts of human life, with its perennial joys and griefs, and we shall
not be backward to recognize his superiority. But let us have no more
stars and flowers, no more "Titan pulses" and "purple rondures." The highest
poetry can afford to dress plainly. |
