Transcribe
Translate
Polaris, v. 1, issue 4, September 1940
Page 19
More information
digital collection
archival collection guide
transcription tips
19 THE QUESTIONER by R H Barlow Crowned with Sirius Night sat broodingly in a grove. Her lips were laden with secrets: with a song once uttered by Vikings at a campfire whose perishing would be the signal to harry Christian towns asleep nearby; with the words a prince of India had said to his love when her mouth would let him speak; with groans and unuttered but thought of by sick men and feverish; with words caught up from children's lips as they dreamed. Of these things Night spoke not, but sat there receiving homage of the trees which in her honour were garments they show not to men. And for awhile she thought little of Dawn who yesterday and for a thousand years had overthrown her, coming through a land hidden by the mountains; though in six hours he would step over them. Then a poet who had loved the colour of her robes came questioning. "I would know most truthfully," he said, "from you who are guardian of ultimate truths, if they speak right who call you Queller of Unrest. A bird of yours shrieked it to me once, and I saw it written by moonlight on sand at a lake's margin, but since I have lived I mistrust. I would know if you will quench in time those fires consuming and reconsuming my heart; if you will feed them eventually ashes so that snarling of hunger they will die; if you will slay utterly several hours which lie bleeding within me; if your populous city a man may come and be equal in grandeur with the Pharaohs, in wisdom with the two Florentines, in content with whosoever has possessed content." Without looking at him she pointed her prodigious hand to a star no longer dwelt in, where graves had lain ruined and peaceful a thousand long years. THE END - - - - DREAM by Damon Knight (continued from Page 15) At this the soul of my body departed, and went into the body of the Emperor's son, on the banks of Eis. And presently I saw approaching the throne the barge carrying the three Orientals and their guards and oarsmen, and I watched it anxiously, for it seemed to met hat the green water of the lake was eating away the barge's side, making it sink swiftly lower in the water; for now there was in me no memory of the officer whom I had been. Yet after the crystal green waters had closed over the heads of the three smiling Orientals and their guards and oarsmen, I remembered nothing, for it was not in the brain of my new abode long to remember any matter; for which reason I continued my drinking. THE END - - - -
Saving...
prev
next
19 THE QUESTIONER by R H Barlow Crowned with Sirius Night sat broodingly in a grove. Her lips were laden with secrets: with a song once uttered by Vikings at a campfire whose perishing would be the signal to harry Christian towns asleep nearby; with the words a prince of India had said to his love when her mouth would let him speak; with groans and unuttered but thought of by sick men and feverish; with words caught up from children's lips as they dreamed. Of these things Night spoke not, but sat there receiving homage of the trees which in her honour were garments they show not to men. And for awhile she thought little of Dawn who yesterday and for a thousand years had overthrown her, coming through a land hidden by the mountains; though in six hours he would step over them. Then a poet who had loved the colour of her robes came questioning. "I would know most truthfully," he said, "from you who are guardian of ultimate truths, if they speak right who call you Queller of Unrest. A bird of yours shrieked it to me once, and I saw it written by moonlight on sand at a lake's margin, but since I have lived I mistrust. I would know if you will quench in time those fires consuming and reconsuming my heart; if you will feed them eventually ashes so that snarling of hunger they will die; if you will slay utterly several hours which lie bleeding within me; if your populous city a man may come and be equal in grandeur with the Pharaohs, in wisdom with the two Florentines, in content with whosoever has possessed content." Without looking at him she pointed her prodigious hand to a star no longer dwelt in, where graves had lain ruined and peaceful a thousand long years. THE END - - - - DREAM by Damon Knight (continued from Page 15) At this the soul of my body departed, and went into the body of the Emperor's son, on the banks of Eis. And presently I saw approaching the throne the barge carrying the three Orientals and their guards and oarsmen, and I watched it anxiously, for it seemed to met hat the green water of the lake was eating away the barge's side, making it sink swiftly lower in the water; for now there was in me no memory of the officer whom I had been. Yet after the crystal green waters had closed over the heads of the three smiling Orientals and their guards and oarsmen, I remembered nothing, for it was not in the brain of my new abode long to remember any matter; for which reason I continued my drinking. THE END - - - -
Hevelin Fanzines
sidebar
