Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Isaac and Rebekah

T. Sturge Moore

IN the cave, which he had paid for with his gold,

Had Abraham laid Sarah unto rest;

And, being past the ordinary old,

Sent forth his steward on a far behest—

To bring from out his fatherland a wife

Of their own kindred for his son. But life

Ebbed from him ere the man had long been gone.

Yet died he calmly, dreaming all was done

Because he wished it and so loved his son.

Isaac was gentle; his full beard was soft;

His eyes were often on the sky, and oft

They wandered o’er the grass, for much he mused

Though rarely spoke; in ample robes was used

Reserved to walk. A long slow summer dawn,

His youth had stretched beyond the usual bound;

Most men are fathers ere his heart had found

Preluding stir, desire that to be born

Grows urgent. Now one afternoon he went

To sigh out in lone fields the sadness pent

By the day’s toil; for they had been his friends

Who were his parents. Age at times descends

As youth to fill her place grows ripe when, though

Offices be mutually transferred, yet no

Breach ever yawns, though he tend who was tended.

Fresh start they never made, since nothing ended,

Till even the last parting had proved kind.

And, underneath a sycamore reclined,

Isaac thought of them till he ceased to think;

For all the cordial stillness of the weather

Had passed into his soul, and, link by link,

Had melted sorrow’s chain. Attuned together,

The fields, the trees, the dipping dales and tops

Russet and mellow with their ripening crops,

The far-off stretches where rich aliens dwelt,

The sky’s vast peace, worked through him till he felt

So happy that he laughed there to himself—

A governed laugh of sound uneager health,

The warm content of every wholesome limb.

Then, when at sundown hints were borne to him

Of tinkling camel-bells and dogs that barked,

He backed his ear with hollow hand and harked,

Saying, “A coming of much folk is clear!”—

Rising, “’Tis from the north-east that they near!”—

Then smiled: for all at once his mind awoke;

With bliss poured in, as red wine brims a cup,

Swam richly round, conceiving beauty’s charm,

The presence of a person sooth as balm

Perpetual in his tent. So he walked on

To meet them with wild heart. Shapes wound anon

Up from the vale, where deepened more and more

The phantom dusk. ’Twas Eliezer sate

The foremost camel; but the next in state

Surpassed all others; to her whom it bore

The trusty steward, questioned, prompt replied;

She veiled herself forthwith. Holding his side,

Isaac was forced to stop; and they stopped then,

While down she lighted ’mong the serving-men,

Who parted; and half-running forth she came.

Surely, though soft, a new voice called his name?

He waited to make sure. She was so young….

But lo! her veil hung in her way; his tongue

Seemed tied; she tripped, tripped, stumbled, fell—too soon

Was touching to the earth her brow in sign

She owned him lord. Mute at portent malign

He sobbed, ran, raised, and saw her face—a boon

For utter wonder. She was very fair,

And seemed but frail to carry so much hair;

Strung pearls, looped round her brow by tens and twelves.

From tapping soft-brown temples scarce had ceased;

Her eyes abashed looked up despite themselves—

They did so long to see; and were so pleased,

Seeing, to rest on him. He did not kiss;

She kissed him—curbed the impulse, forward rushed

And gasped, while he blushed even as she blushed;

For thought grew purple with conceiving his

Strange backwardness to kiss. Suffered to doubt,

Hangs she in two minds or to cry or pout?

There is not time; their lips are mutually met,

Till laughter part both radiant faces wet;

Since joy robs grief of tears, has all and wants more yet.

At length he found that his held both her hands,

Straight to be worshipped—gently smoothed of dust,

For she had soiled them falling. Who would thrust

On such absorption? Eliezer stands

And waits till they are speckless; then is heard,

But hardly listened to, though, duties said,

He has commenced his tale—stopped, when a word

The first time uttered turned his master’s head

With “Ah?—Rebekah? Is thy name so sweet?

Methinks I heard it broken at my feet,

Stooping to raise thee? Pieced again at last,

’Twas slow in coming; for it came too fast,

Even as thou didst, late to come to me….

Yet am I grown?…. for such felicity

I feel still childish.” Thus, with many a break

Toward the roused tents, they, through the gloaming, make;

The steward tells his tale, is questioned now,

And oft ignored before the time allow

A perfect answer. So to Sarah’s tent

They came, though stopping all the way they went.

She was inside; he had not longed for this

And yet it seemed to pass the bounds of bliss;

Enraptured he could neither act nor think.

But the whole weary journey forced her sink

Upon a camel’s saddle draped with skins,

All of a heap—bead-work and quilted things

Bunched up about her languid form, her head

Seeking with droop and loll a needed bed.

Two heavy lids had shut him from her eyes,

But one hand warm in his kept paradise

About her spirit, while the novel scent

Of new surroundings nourished its content.

Her nurse saw now and understood her case;

Calling for water, which his hand-maids brought,

Softly she bathed the almost sleeping face.

Isaac, by this made capable of thought,

Ordered the daintiest feast his stores could yield;

Sent for soft cushions, built a pillow throne

Before which, all devotion, down he kneeled,

Pressing choice morsels to her drowsy lips,

Wooing their toil as rivals of his own;

Or in the pure milk dipped her finger-tips

To please himself, which pleased her most of all.

But still the head would obstinately fall,

Fain of those pillows. So her nurse must plead

That sleep, not food, is now the crying need.

Like one who doth receive unlooked-for gift,

While friends uncord it, sits, and cannot lift

Finger to help them—he, whose full veins beat,

Whose eyes swim, kneels, while care uncases feet,

Plunges them in a basin of bright gold,

Despite their timid shrinking from the cold.

His worship of their beauty freed the tongue

Of the old crone, as she the towels wrung,

To tell how at a stream that morning they

Had halted, when, by parasol green-shaded,

Her mistress traced its windings some short way

To where, supported by each arm, she waded

Over worn hummocked rock. “Pools floored with sand

She lingered at—for pleasure, paced alone;

But out flew, like a scared bird, either hand

Soon as her toes encountered the least stone,

With ‘Ah! Oh!’ frightened—laughing at her fear

To find help still so opportunely near.

A special toilet afterward went through

To please thee—please her, all that we could do

Might barely that, my lord; the water failed

And, for it would distort her, was assailed

With numberless rebukes, half-laughing things

Which wed the rippling mischief that it sings.”

All this, as flowers the dew, he mute receives;

Watches lithe arms glide forth from quilted sleeves,

Watches two women lift her up and hold

Her off the ground while, broidered fold on fold,

Rich skirts creep down the white-stoled tender form,

Till her feet droop above an emptied nest

As some young almost mother bird’s, whose rest

Deserts her there, till she can lay her eggs.

She hovers just above with pendant legs

Until her time be come, and will not stray;

Thus speakingly suspended those feet sway

Helplessly there. Then at his breast he caught;

They moved her as a corpse is moved, he thought.

Straight, as by fresh disaster overtaken,

He sees her tresses, from their pearled net shaken,

Come tumbling forth in downy deluge black.

A bed had been preparing at the back;

Beyond the region of the lamp’s warm glow,

Whispering maids glid dimly to and fro;

Till, called at last, they round their mistress bent,

Then bore her o’er hush carpets through the tent,

And gave her leave to sleep “long as she could”,

Laughed and withdrew to share the dainty food.

Isaac sat long on through the night, aloof

From the rich bed where that soft breather slept.

Though she was near him, under the same roof,

He like a bodiless soul one station kept:

External things usurped him through and through;

His lips burned not to kiss, his voice to woo,

Nor for a great embrace did his arms ache;

Sheer bliss retained only his eyes awake,

Only his ears alert, only this thought,

Which could to clearness by no means be brought—

How, weighed with his good fortune, he was naught.

Ah! wakes she? Nay, but in her slumber speaks;

For back in Haran, gladdening friends, her mind

Goes through its smiling kingdom like a queen,

Bestowing praise and finding all things well.

At even, now, wends staidly down to draw

The water duly; and perchance, these words

Confused beyond his skill, once blessed the ear

Of faithful Eliezer—smiled she thus?

Ah, time goes fast with her, if it be so!

For now at last her words are audible:

“‘Thou art our sister, be thou mother fair

Unto a thousand million!’—so they said.”

She smiles, “O nurse! and it may be I shall!”

With that appears content and journeys on—

And happy journeys doubtless—all the way

A second time from Haran thitherward.

He knelt enraptured at so gracious sign.

Lay there no wonder here?—this virgin come

So far and trustfully for his content?

From inward question, overwhelmed, he ceased,

Yet marvelled in believing—borne to awe,

Yearned, stranded on that utmost shore of thought.

Half-drowned, thus, some exhausted seaman (late

Sport of proud crests on the high-running sea)

Scans long, with still bleared eyes, deep-wooded slopes

Close-folded up at dusk, where ocean ends.

So his mind fed not yet, but gazed and gazed,

By slow degrees assured of what it saw

Lie curled together, hugging ease. Rich forms,

Prepared for motherhood and ready now,

Wait ’neath warm wraps, as under snow the glebe,

Lowly and safe. She lies with face laid soft

To nest in both her hands, which hollow down

The pillow, while her hair mingles with night;—

One darkness, one deep odor, one repose

Divine with promise. Evenly breathe her lips:

Her face set to cleave the gulf of sleep,

As on tense rigid wings the kite high up

Holds its own way through limitless blue noon.

To watch her silent progress through an hour,

Real, yet a vision, drew him through flown days

And sucked him down like a grown plant shrunk back

Within its earliest compass green and fresh.

Till, in his brooding trance diminished, he,

Transformed into a lightsome child once more,

Found native just that way of settling down

To slumber which her weary limbs re-found.

Yet not to sleep; to hide is thus crouched low,

Ishmael bidding him. They are alone,

Strayed from the tents in bright discovery

Of common things and neighbor banks and trees.

He then, as bidden, ’neath a boulder curled,

Watches his elder, planted firm, await,

On sturdy legs among stout thistle-clumps,

A goat that butts full tilt—and all too weak

For such suspense, loses the feel of it.

Ishmael, triumphant, “Not afraid?” had laughed.

Himself then smiled, from absence coming back;

Nor tried to explain why he was found so calm.

Again, shrunk up with fear, bound hand and foot,

Upon an altar laid at noon, he aches;

A knife arrests its plunge—so long that fear

Escapes him; thus lies on in sweet content,

Even as she does, till the angel-voice

Cries “Abraham, Abraham!” bringing him his soul

Truant, as seemed, a long while—strange with awe.

The servants laugh outside; his dreams disperse;

But still he kneels spell-bound beside the bed

His need of prayer frustrating utterance.

Yet, sensible what stars watch oe’r the tent,

Silence and stillness give him strength to feel

His babyhood and boyhood, manhood, one

With her to be possessed soon, with his bride.

In attitude, relation and resource

One under heaven, one in peace and hope.

He knows his father’s wealth lies round him safe;

His mother’s life had used this furniture;

Unto his offspring for unnumbered years

These pastures, wells and pleasant distances

Are pledged by Elohim. It seems enough:

His spirit feels indeed—too much, too much!

A joyous wedding theirs in the old days;

No stint of cheer; to welcome limit none.

Yet tardily the promise worked for them:

Rebekah waited long ere she grew great,

Then went with twins who strove within her womb.

Made anxious thus, enquiring of the Lord,

To her was straight returned, for comfort, this:

“Two nations are within thy womb, and from

Thy bowels shall two peoples separate:

The one people shall be stronger than the other,

And the elder he shall serve the younger brother.”

Now when the day of her deliverance was,

Red and all over as an hairy coat

Forth came the first child: “Esau” called they him.

But since his brother grasped him by the heel

As he came forth the second, him they named

“Jacob”, for that he held him by the heel.

Her women had much mirth to witness it.

Bringing the sturdy boys for her to see,

When eased of pain, yea, merry were their hearts

Yet more; for that meek mother fears her babes

And shrinks from having them laid close to her,

So timid she. But when the younger yearns

And stretches both precocious greedy hands

Towards the fairest face yet seen, him swift

She takes, and holds henceforward next her heart.

For thus her soul had taken bent to love

Those who lay claim to service, but to dread

Those who in self-reliance ask for naught—

Even since, a child, she first had wended out

At herding-time, down to the village well,

Holding her mother’s hand; had picked her way

(Warned to avoid the puddles, choice of shoes

Silk-broidered by maternal love and pride)

And seen the poorer children splash and wade,

And not been bold, and learned no daring ways,

But had grown patient, sage, a nurse of dolls:

Who, late at length, was Jacob’s fond, fond nurse

But could not love her hardy Esau so.

Thus those whose life was peace, gave birth to strife.

Out of the meek came greed, and by content

Were clamoring nations reared to age-long war.