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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=498259" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Music's Duel</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Now westward Sol had spent the richest beams<br>Of noon's high glory, when, hard by the streams<br>Of Tiber, on the scene of a green plat,<br>Under protection of an oak, there sat<br>A sweet lute's master : in whose gentle airs<br>He lost the day's heat, and his own hot cares.<br>Close in the covert of the leaves there stood<br>A nightingale, come from the neighbouring wood :—<br>The sweet inhabitant of each glad tree,<br>Their muse, their Syren, harmless Syren she,—<br>There stood she list'ning, and did entertain<br>The music's soft report, and mould the same<br>In her own murmurs, that what ever mood<br>His curious fingers lent, her voice made good.<br>The man preceived his rival, and her art ;<br>Disposed to give the light-foot lady sport,<br>Awakes his lute, and 'gainst the fight to come<br>Informs it, in a sweet <br>præludium</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of closer strains ; and ere the war begin<br>He slightly skirmishes on every string,<br>Charged with a flying touch ; and staightway she<br>Carves out her dainty voice as readily<br>Into a thousand sweet distinguish'd tones :<br>And reckons up in soft divisions<br>Quick volumes of wild notes, to let him know<br>By that shrill taste she could do something too.<br>His nimble hand's instinct then taught each string<br>A cap'ring cheerfulness ; and made them sing<br>To their own dance ; now negligently rash<br>He throws his arm, and with a long-drawn dash<br>Blends all together, then distinctly trips<br>From this to that, then, quick returning, skips<br>And snatches this again, and pauses there.<br>She measures every measure, everywhere<br>Meets art with art ; sometimes, as if in doubt—<br>Not perfect yet, and fearing to be out—<br>Trails her plain ditty in one long-spun note<br>Through the sleek passage of her open throat :<br>A clear unwrinkled song ; then doth she point it<br>With tender accents, and severely joint it<br>By short diminutives, that, being rear'd<br>In controverting warbles evenly shared,<br>With her sweet self she wrangles ; he, amazed<br>That from so small a channel should be raised<br>The torrent of a voice, whose melody<br>Could melt into such sweet variety,<br>Strains higher yet, that tickled with rare art<br>The tattling strings—each breathing in his part—<br>Most kindly do fall out ; the grumbling base<br>In surly groans disdains the treble's grace ;<br>The high-perch'd treble chirps at this, and chides<br>Until his finger—moderator—hides<br>And closes the sweet quarrel, rousing all,<br>Hoarse, shrill, at once : as when the trumpets call<br>Hot Mars to th' harvest of death's field, and woo<br>Men's hearts into their hands ; this lesson, too,<br>She gives him back, her supple breast thrills out<br>Sharp airs, and staggers in a warbling doubt<br>Of dallying sweetness, hovers o'er her skill,<br>And folds in waved notes, with a trembling bill,<br>The pliant series of her slippery song ;<br>Then starts she suddenly into a throng<br>Of short thick sobs, whose thundring volleys float<br>And roll themselves over her lubric throat<br>In panting murmurs, 'still'd out of her breast,<br>That ever-bubbling spring, the sugar'd nest<br>Of her delicious soul, that there does lie<br>Bathing in streams of liquid melody,—<br>Music's best seed-plot ; when in ripen'd airs<br>A golden-headed harvest fairly rears<br>His honey-dropping tops, plough'd by her breath,<br>Which there reciprocally laboureth.<br>In that sweet soil it seems a holy quire<br>Founded to th' name of great Apollo's lyre ;<br>Whose silver roof rings with the sprightly notes<br>Of sweet-lipp'd angel-imps, that swill their throats<br>In cream of morning Helicon ; and then<br>Prefer soft anthems to the ears of men,<br>To woo them from their beds, still murmuring<br>That men can sleep while they their matins sing ;—<br>Most divine service ! whose so early lay<br>Prevents the eyelids of the blushing day.<br>There might you hear her kindle her soft voice<br>In the close murmur of a sparkling noise,<br>And lay the ground-work of her hopeful song ;<br>Still keeping in the forward stream so long,<br>Till a sweet whirlwind, striving to get out,<br>Heaves her soft bosom, wanders round about,<br>And makes a pretty earthquake in her breast ;<br>Till the fledged notes at length forsake their nest,<br>Fluttering in wanton shoals, and to the sky,<br>Wing'd with their own wild echos, pratt'ling fly.<br>She opes the floodgate, and lets loose a tide<br>Of streaming sweetness, which in state doth ride<br>On the waved back of every swelling strain,<br>Rising and falling in a pompous train ;<br>And while she thus discharges a shrill peal<br>Of flashing airs, she qualifies their zeal<br>With the cool epode of a graver note ;<br>Thus high, thus low, as if her silver throat<br>Would reach the brazen voice of war's hoarse bird ;<br>Her little soul is ravish'd : and so pour'd<br>Into loose ecstasies, that she is placed<br>Above herself—music's enthusiast !<br>Shame now and anger mixed a double stain<br>In the musician's face ; yet once again,<br>Mistress, I come. Now reach a strain, my lute,<br>Above her mock, or be for ever mute ;<br>Or tune a song of victory to me,<br>Or to thyself sing thine own obsequy !<br>So said, his hands sprightly as fire he flings,<br>And with a quivering coyness tastes the strings :<br>The sweet-lipp'd sisters, musically frighted,<br>Singing their fears, are fearfully delighted :<br>Trembling as when Apollo's golden hairs<br>Are fann'd and frizzled in the wanton airs<br>Of his own breath, which, married to his lyre,<br>Doth tune the spheres, and make heaven's self look higher ;<br>From this to that, from that to this, he flies,<br>Feels music's pulse in all her arteries ;<br>Caught in a net which there Apollo spreads,<br>His fingers struggle with the vocal threads,<br>Following those little rills, he sinks into<br>A sea of Helicon : his hand does go<br>Those parts of sweetness which with nectar drop,<br>Softer than that which pants in Hebe's cup :<br>The humourous strings expound his learnèd touch<br>By various glosses ; now they seem to grutch,<br>And murmur in a buzzing din, then gingle<br>In shrill-tongued accents, striving to be single ;<br>Every smooth turn, every delicious stroke,<br>Gives life to some new grace : thus doth he invoke<br>Sweetness by all her names ; thus, bravely thus—<br>Fraught with a fury so harmonious—<br>The lute's light Genius now does proudly rise,<br>Heaved on the surges of swoll'n rhapsodies,<br>Whose flourish, meteor-like, doth curl the air<br>With flash of high-born fancies ; here and there<br>Dancing in lofty measures, and anon<br>Creeps on the soft touch of a tender tone,<br>Whose trembling murmurs, melting in wild airs<br>Runs to and fro, complaining his sweet cares ;<br>Because those precious mysteries that dwell<br>In music's ravish'd soul he dare not tell,<br>But whisper to the world : thus do they vary<br>Each string his note, as if they meant to carry<br>Their master's blest soul, snatch'd out at his ears<br>By a strong ecstacy, through all the spheres<br>Of music's heaven ; and seat it there on high<br>In th' <br>empyræum<br>of pure harmony.<br>At length—after so long, so loud a strife<br>Of all the strings, still breathing the best life<br>Of blest variety, attending on<br>His fingers' fairest revolution,<br>In many a sweet rise, many as sweet a fall—<br>A full-mouth'd diapason swallows all.<br>This done, he lists what she would say to this ;<br>And she, although her breath's late exercise<br>Had dealt too roughly with her tender throat,<br>Yet summons all her sweet powers for a note.<br>Alas, in vain ! for while, sweet soul, she tries<br>To measure all those wild diversities<br>Of chatt'ring strings, by the small size of one<br>Poor simple voice, raised in a natural tone,<br>She fails ; and failing, grieves ; and grieving, dies ;—<br>She dies, and leaves her life the victor's prize,<br>Falling upon his lute. O, fit to have—<br>That lived so sweetly—dead, so sweet a grave !</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Richard+Crashaw">Richard Crashaw</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=498259" data-title="Music's Duel de Richard Crashaw" data-description="Now westward Sol had spent the richest beams
Of noon's high glory, when, hard by the streams
Of Tiber, on the scene of a green plat,
Under protection of an oak, there sat
A sweet lute's master : in whose gentle airs
He lost the day's heat, and his..."></div>
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