This week’s choice is Alfred Noyes’s “Song” which I have chosen for Nicola.
When that I loved a maiden
I worshipped where she trod;
But, when she clove my heart, the cleft
Set free the imprisoned god:
Then was I king of all the world,
My soul had burst its bars,
For grief beyond the sunset
And love beyond the stars.
- Alfred Noyes (1880—1958)
Poem 400. Song
I
When that I loved a maiden
My heaven was in her eyes,
And when they bent above me
I knew no deeper skies;
But when her heart forsook me
My spirit broke its bars,
For grief beyond the sunset
And love beyond the stars.
II
When that I loved a maiden
She seemed the world to me:
Now is my soul the universe,
My dreams the sky and sea:
There is no heaven above me,
No glory binds or bars
My grief beyond the sunset,
My love beyond the stars.
III
When that I loved a maiden
I worshipped where she trod;
But, when she clove my heart, the cleft
Set free the imprisoned god:
Then was I king of all the world,
My soul had burst its bars,
For grief beyond the sunset
And love beyond the stars.
In this poem Noyes contrasts the feelings of loving another with those we feel when we are forsaken or bereaved.
Each stanza shows us the difference between the giddy feelings brought by love and the emotions that despair brings. The first stanza begins with an extravagant exposition of the narrator’s feelings: “When that I loved a maiden/My heaven was in her eyes,” and to the lover there is nothing like their beloved and their eyes—often used by poets as a metaphor for the soul—hold everything of value in the world and beyond it—“I knew no deeper skies” Here he introduces the contrasting note, saying that when he lost her love, his own yearning broke the confines of the earth and became infinite stretching beyond the stars, so that one extravagant metaphor is counterpointed by another.
The second stanza seems to suggest that although his love encompassed the world, his sorrow at losing her spreads “beyond the sunset…beyond the stars”—although their relationship seemed to be the whole world to him. its ending shows him a broader sweep of time and space in which his grief and love expand to infinity., his grief at its ending becomes limitless, his soul as big as the universe, his dreams as unending as the soughing of the seas and the sweep of the skies. Even heaven and its glories are lesser than his grief and his love.
The last stanza sharpens the contrast by comparing the traditional worshipping the places the beloved’s feet have trodden with the idea that within us is a power awaiting the moment when our world is shattered. Freeing “the imprisoned god” changes our outlook so that we feel as powerful as the “king of all the world” once the bonds of our love are sundered but this comes with the knowledge that our sorrow at its loss is beyond measurement.
I like this poem because it expresses the limitless nature of grief very well and contrasts it effectively with the joyous feeling of love for another. I like the repeated refrain of “grief beyond the sunset…love beyond the stars” and there are really beautifully put passages: “Now is my soul the universe/My dreams the sky and sea” and “when she clove my heart, the cleft/Set free the imprisoned god”.
As I have said before, Nicola often asked me, “How much do you love me?” and I was frequently stumped for an answer that would clearly express the magnitude of my feelings for her. Now that I can no longer tell her, I often find phrases that I wish I had known back then—if only I had told her more often that my love extended beyond the sunset, beyond the stars, I might have been able to adequately answer her question.
It seems that there are no performances of this poem online, which is a shame as I think it is rather lovely.
Note: thanks to my friend Kaja who prompted me to reconsider my thoughts on the second stanza.