William Rose Benét was born at Fort Hamilton, New York Harbor, February 2, 1886. He was educated at Albany Academy and graduated from Yale in 1907. After various experiences as free-lance writer, publisher's reader, magazine editor and second lieutenant in the U. S. Air Service, Benét became the Associate Editor of the New York Post's Literary Review in 1920. The outstanding feature of Benét's verse is its extraordinary whimsicality; an oriental imagination riots through his pages. Like the title-poem of his first volume, Merchants from Cathay (1913), all of Benét's volumes vibrate with a vigorous music; they are full of the sonorous stuff that one rolls out crossing wintry fields or tramping a road alone. But Benet's charm is not confined to the lift and swing of rollicking choruses. His The Falconer of God (1914), The Great White Wall (1916) and The Burglar of the Zodiac (1918) contain decorations as bold as they are brilliant; they ring with a strange and spicy music evoked from seemingly casual words; they glow with a half-lurid, half-humorous reflection of the grotesque. There are times when Benét seems to be forcing his ingenuity. The poet frequently lets his fantastic Pegasus run away with him, and what started out to be a gallop among the stars ends in a scraping of shins on the pavement. But he is saved by an acrobatic dexterity even when his energy betrays him. Moons of Grandeur (1920) represents the fullest development of Benét's unusual gifts; a combination of Eastern phantasy and Western vigor. How that MERCHANTS FROM CATHAY Their heels slapped their bumping mules; their fat chaps glowed. Glory unto Mary, each seemed to wear a crown! Of their And their With its Like sunset their robes were on the wide, white road: So we saw those mad merchants come dusting into town! Two paunchy beasts they rode on and two they drove before. May the Saints all help us, the tigerstripes they had! And the panniers upon them swelled full of stuffs and ore! The square buzzed and jostled at a sight so mad. They bawled in their beards, and their turbans they wried. They stopped by the stalls with curvetting and clatter. As bronze as the bracken their necks and faces dyed And a stave they sat singing, to tell us of the matter. "For your silks, to Sugarmago! For your Weird fruits from the Isle o' Lamaree. For treasure-trove and spice, Here's a catch and a carol to the great, grand Chan, The King of all the Kings across the sea! And A first Stave Fearsome, And a second To stomach And a third, "Here's a catch and a carol to the great, grand Chan; For we won through the deserts to his sunset barbican; And the mountains of his palace no Titan's reach may span Where he wields his seignorie! "Red-as-blood skins of Panthers, so bright against the sun On the walls of the halls where his pillared state is set They daze with a blaze no man may look upon. And with conduits of beverage those floors run wet. "His wives stiff with riches, they sit before him there. Bird and beast at his feast make song and clapping cheer. And jugglers and enchanters, all walking on the air, Make fall eclipse and thunder-make moons and suns appear! "Once the Chan, by his enemies soreprest, and sorely spent, Lay, so they say, in a thicket 'neath a tree Where the howl of an owl vexed his foes from their intent: Then that fowl for a holy bird of reverence made he! We gape to And are in And dread it is Devil's Work! " A catch and a carol to the great, grand Pastmasters of disasters, our desert caravan Where he wields his seignorie! And crowns he gave us! We end where we began: A catch and a carol to the great, grand Chan, The King of all the Kings across the sea!" Those mad, antic Merchants! . . . Their stripèd beasts did beat The market-square suddenly with hooves of beaten gold! The ground yawned gaping and flamed beneath our feet! They plunged to Pits Abysmal with their wealth untold! And some say the Chan himself in anger dealt the stroke For sharing of his secrets with silly, common folk: But Holy, Blessed Mary, preserve us as you may Lest once more those mad Merchants come chanting from Cathay! NIGHT 1 Let the night keep Let the night keep Love's burning bliss, Drowned in deep sleep Whisper and kiss, Thoughts like white flowers In hedges of May; Let such deep hours not Monarch is night Rapturous wings; Night the crown, night the sword Lifted to smite. Kneel to your overlord, Children of night! 1 From Moons of Grandeur by William Rose Benét. Copyright, 1920, George H. Doran Company, Publishers. |