A Grain of Mustard Seed Read online

  A Grain of Mustard Seed

  Poems

  May Sarton

  TO

  M. H. H.

  Contents

  Publisher’s Note

  “Have faith as a grain of mustard seed …” —MATTHEW XVII. 20

  Part One

  Ballad of the Sixties

  The Rock in the Snowball

  The Ballad of Ruby

  The Ballad of Johnny

  Easter, 1968

  The Invocation to Kali

  After The Tiger

  “We’ll to the woods no more”

  Night Watch

  Part Two

  Proteus

  A Last Word

  Girl with ’Cello

  An Intruder

  The Muse as Medusa

  A Seventy-fifth Birthday

  The Great Transparencies

  Friendship: The Storms

  Evening Walk in France

  Dutch Interior

  A Vision of Holland

  Part Three

  Bears and Waterfalls

  A Parrot

  Frogs and Photographers

  Eine Kleine Snailmusik

  The Fig

  Hawaiian Palm

  Part Four

  A Hard Death

  The Silence

  Annunciation

  At Chartres

  Once More at Chartres

  Jonah

  Easter Morning

  The Godhead as Lynx

  The Waves

  Beyond the Question

  Invocation

  Acknowledgments

  A Biography of May Sarton

  Publisher’s Note

  Long before they were ever written down, poems were organized in lines. Since the invention of the printing press, readers have become increasingly conscious of looking at poems, rather than hearing them, but the function of the poetic line remains primarily sonic. Whether a poem is written in meter or in free verse, the lines introduce some kind of pattern into the ongoing syntax of the poem’s sentences; the lines make us experience those sentences differently. Reading a prose poem, we feel the strategic absence of line.

  But precisely because we’ve become so used to looking at poems, the function of line can be hard to describe. As James Longenbach writes in The Art of the Poetic Line, “Line has no identity except in relation to other elements in the poem, especially the syntax of the poem’s sentences. It is not an abstract concept, and its qualities cannot be described generally or schematically. It cannot be associated reliably with the way we speak or breathe. Nor can its function be understood merely from its visual appearance on the page.” Printed books altered our relationship to poetry by allowing us to see the lines more readily. What new challenges do electronic reading devices pose?

  In a printed book, the width of the page and the size of the type are fixed. Usually, because the page is wide enough and the type small enough, a line of poetry fits comfortably on the page: What you see is what you’re supposed to hear as a unit of sound. Sometimes, however, a long line may exceed the width of the page; the line continues, indented just below the beginning of the line. Readers of printed books have become accustomed to this convention, even if it may on some occasions seem ambiguous—particularly when some of the lines of a poem are already indented from the left-hand margin of the page.

  But unlike a printed book, which is stable, an ebook is a shape-shifter. Electronic type may be reflowed across a galaxy of applications and interfaces, across a variety of screens, from phone to tablet to computer. And because the reader of an ebook is empowered to change the size of the type, a poem’s original lineation may seem to be altered in many different ways. As the size of the type increases, the likelihood of any given line running over increases.

  Our typesetting standard for poetry is designed to register that when a line of poetry exceeds the width of the screen, the resulting run-over line should be indented, as it might be in a printed book. Take a look at John Ashbery’s “Disclaimer” as it appears in two different type sizes.

  Each of these versions of the poem has the same number of lines: the number that Ashbery intended. But if you look at the second, third, and fifth lines of the second stanza in the right-hand version of “Disclaimer,” you’ll see the automatic indent; in the fifth line, for instance, the word ahead drops down and is indented. The automatic indent not only makes poems easier to read electronically; it also helps to retain the rhythmic shape of the line—the unit of sound—as the poet intended it. And to preserve the integrity of the line, words are never broken or hyphenated when the line must run over. Reading “Disclaimer” on the screen, you can be sure that the phrase “you pause before the little bridge, sigh, and turn ahead” is a complete line, while the phrase “you pause before the little bridge, sigh, and turn” is not.

  Open Road has adopted an electronic typesetting standard for poetry that ensures the clearest possible marking of both line breaks and stanza breaks, while at the same time handling the built-in function for resizing and reflowing text that all ereading devices possess. The first step is the appropriate semantic markup of the text, in which the formal elements distinguishing a poem, including lines, stanzas, and degrees of indentation, are tagged. Next, a style sheet that reads these tags must be designed, so that the formal elements of the poems are always displayed consistently. For instance, the style sheet reads the tags marking lines that the author himself has indented; should that indented line exceed the character capacity of a screen, the run-over part of the line will be indented further, and all such runovers will look the same. This combination of appropriate coding choices and style sheets makes it easy to display poems with complex indentations, no matter if the lines are metered or free, end-stopped or enjambed.

  Ultimately, there may be no way to account for every single variation in the way in which the lines of a poem are disposed visually on an electronic reading device, just as rare variations may challenge the conventions of the printed page, but with rigorous quality assessment and scrupulous proofreading, nearly every poem can be set electronically in accordance with its author’s intention. And in some regards, electronic typesetting increases our capacity to transcribe a poem accurately: In a printed book, there may be no way to distinguish a stanza break from a page break, but with an ereader, one has only to resize the text in question to discover if a break at the bottom of a page is intentional or accidental.

  Our goal in bringing out poetry in fully reflowable digital editions is to honor the sanctity of line and stanza as meticulously as possible—to allow readers to feel assured that the way the lines appear on the screen is an accurate embodiment of the way the author wants the lines to sound. Ever since poems began to be written down, the manner in which they ought to be written down has seemed equivocal; ambiguities have always resulted. By taking advantage of the technologies available in our time, our goal is to deliver the most satisfying reading experience possible.

  Part One

  Ballad of the Sixties

  In the west of the country where I was

  Hoping for some good news,

  Only the cripple had fire,

  Only the cripple knew the mind’s desire;

  In the wheel chair alone

  Poetry met the eyes

  That see and recognize,

  There in the wizened bone.

  For only the ill are well,

  And only the mad are sane.

  This is the sad truth plain,

  The story I have to tell.

  In the North of the country where I saw

  The anxious rich and the angry poor,

  Only the blasted life had reason;

  Only the stricken in the bitter season<
br />
  Looked out of loss and learned

  The waste of all that burned,

  Once cared and burned.

  For only the mad are sane,

  And only the lost are well,

  And loss of fire the bane

  Of this season in Hell.

  In the South of the country where I passed

  Looking for faith and hope at last,

  Only the black man knew

  The false dream from the true;

  Only the dark and grieving

  Could be the still believing.

  For only the ill are well,

  Only the hunted, free,

  So the story I have to tell

  In the South was told to me.

  In the East of the country where I came

  Back to my house, back to my name,

  Only the crazy girl was clear

  That all has been betrayed to fear;

  Only the mad girl knew the cost,

  And she, shut up from wind and rain

  And safely plucked out from her pain,

  Knew that our love is lost, is lost.

  For only the sick are well;

  The mad alone have truth to tell

  In the mad games they play—

  Our love has withered away.

  The Rock in the Snowball

  (for Mark Howe)

  How little I knew you, Mark, to mourn so wild

  As if death hit square in the mouth today.

  That snowball held a rock and it hurt hard.

  But even outraged, am I still a child

  To take death with raw grief and howl my way

  Hand against mouth to ward off the word?

  How little I knew you, Mark, but for the blue

  Those deep-set eyes shafted across a room

  To prick the ghost of pride or of pretence,

  That straight look into doom if it were true,

  That poker look that made our laughter bloom

  And burned up sham like paper with a glance.

  You were exposed, a man stripped down to care,

  Thin as a boy, tempest-torn as a boy,

  And sick with pity, conscience-caught-and-bound.

  Courage is easy—every boy can dare—

  But harder to keep justice from that joy,

  And bury feeling, your self-inflicted wound.

  And yet you burned. And yet you burned so deep,

  Mastering fire, controlling fire with wit,

  That eulogies seem pale beside your breath,

  And we are fools, since you would not, to weep.

  We mourn ourselves, that is the truth of it,

  Hit by the savage rock that is your death.

  Whatever end we hoped with you alive,

  To be those few, and happy, growing old,

  To talk of battles shared, of false and true,

  That light is gone. We shall have to survive

  As remnants in a world turned grim and cold

  Where once we laughed at Hell itself with you.

  The Ballad of Ruby*

  Her mother dressed the child in white,

  White ribbons plaited in her hair,

  And sent her off to school to fight

  Though it was very cruel there.

  “Ruby, we have to show our pride.

  Walk slow, and just be dignified.”

  So Ruby walked to school each day

  While the white mothers screamed “Black scum!”

  Never got dirty out at play

  For she spent recess in her room,

  And felt the hatred seeping in.

  “What is it, mother? What have I done?”

  But still her mother had to trust

  That that white dress so clean and neat

  Would show the truth because it must,

  Her Ruby was so bright and sweet.

  And every day the crowd grew bigger

  And threw stones at the “dirty nigger.”

  Then Ruby shook her ribboned head,

  Refused to eat a chocolate cookie,

  Had nightmares every night in bed,

  Broke her brown crayons—“They are mucky!

  “Ugly is black. Ugly is last.”

  (Ruby at six was learning fast).

  And when the teacher let them draw,

  Ruby made all black people lame,

  White people tall, strong, without flaw.

  Her drawing did not need a name.

  “It is plain black and white, you see.

  And black is ugly. Black is me.”

  “We’ll poison you” became the taunt.

  “You’ll learn to keep away from white!”

  And so a new fear came to haunt

  The child who had no appetite,

  Locked into blackness like some sin.

  “Why mother? Is it only my skin?”

  But still she walked to school with glory,

  And ran the gauntlet, dignified…

  Did she grow up to tell a different story?—

  “White folks are black, all dirty down inside.

  What makes them like they are, ugly within?

  Is it only the color of their skin?”

  * The story of Ruby is told by Robert Coles in Children of Crisis, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1967.

  The Ballad of Johnny

  (A News Item)

  For safety on the expedition

  A name-tag on each child was hung,

  A necklace-name, his very own,

  So he could not get lost for long.

  Johnny jumped up and down for joy

  To have a name forever true.

  “I’m Johnny,” cried the little boy.

  “Johnny is going to the zoo!”

  “Johnny,” he whispered in the subway.

  His whole face was suffused with bliss.

  This was the best, the greatest day.

  Boldly he gave his name a kiss.

  But soon forgot it at the zoo

  And let the name-tag swing out free,

  For could that elephant be true?

  And there was so much there to see…

  Look, Johnny, at the monkey swinging

  High in the air on his trapeze!

  He heard the gibbon’s sharp shrill singing

  And begged to hold the monkey, please.

  Then saw a goat and ran off fast

  To hug the dear fantastic thing,

  An animal to stroke at last,

  A living toy for all his loving.

  The soft lips nibbled at his sweater

  And Johnny laughed with joy to feel

  Such new-found friendliness and, better,

  To know this animal was real.

  His face was breathing in fur coat,

  He did not notice anything

  As gentle lips and greedy throat

  Swallowed the name-tag and the string.

  But when he found that they were gone

  And he had lost his name for good,

  Dreadful it was to be alone,

  And Johnny screamed his terror loud.

  The friendly goat was strange and wild,

  And the cold eyes’ indifferent stare

  Could give no comfort to the child

  Who had become No one, Nowhere.

  “I’ve lost my name. I’m going to die,”

  He shouted when his teacher came

  And found him too afraid to cry.

  “But, Johnny, you still have your name!

  “It’s not a tag, it’s in your head,

  And you are Johnny through and through.

  Look in the mirror,” teacher said,

  “There’s Johnny looking out at you.”

  But he had never had a mirror,

  And Johnny met there a strange child

  And screamed dismay at this worse error,

  And only grew more lost and wild.

  “No, no,” he screamed, “that is not me,

  That ugly boy I don’t know who…”
r />   Great treasure lost, identity,

  When a goat ate it at the zoo.

  Easter, 1968

  Now we have buried the face we never knew,

  Now we have silenced the voice we never heard,

  Now he is dead we look on him with awe…

  Dead king, dear martyr, and anointed Word.

  Where thousands followed, each must go home

  Into his secret heart and learn the pain,

  Stand there on rock and, utterly alone,

  Come to terms with this burning suffering man;

  Torn by his hunger from our fat and greed,

  And bitten by his thirst from careless sloth,

  Must wake, inflamed, to answer for his blood

  With the slow-moving inexorable truth

  That we can earn even a moment’s balm

  Only with acts of caring, and fierce calm.

  Head of an African, vital and young,

  The full lips fervent as an open rose,

  The high-domed forehead full of light and strong—

  Look on this man again. The blood still flows.

  Listen once more to the impassioned voice

  Till we are lifted on his golden throat

  And trumpet-call of agony and choice

  Out of our hesitating shame and doubt.

  Remember how he prayed before the task.

  Remember how he walked, eyes bright and still,

  Unarmed, his bronze face shining like a mask,

  Through stones and curses, hatred hard as hail.

  Now we have silenced the voice we never heard,

  Break open, heart, and listen to his word.

  The Invocation to Kali

  “…the Black Goddess Kali, the terrible one of many names, ‘difficult of approach,’ whose stomach is a void and so can never be filled, and whose womb is giving birth forever to all things…”

  —Joseph Campbell,

  The Masks of God: Oriental Mythology,