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Flute-Music, With An Accompaniment

by Robert Browning

He. Ah, the bird-like fluting

Through the ash-tops yonder,

Bullfinch-bubblings, soft sounds suiting

What sweet thoughts, I wonder?

Fine-pearled notes that surely

Gather, dewdrop-fashion,

Deep-down in some heart which purely

Secretes globuled passion,

Passion insuppressive,

Such is piped, for certain;

Love, no doubt, nay, love excessive

'Tis your ash-tops curtain.

Would your ash-tops open

We might spy the player,

Seek and find some sense which no pen

Yet from singer, sayer,

Ever has extracted:

Never, to my knowledge,

Yet has pedantry enacted

That, in Cupid's College,

Just this variation

Of the old, old yearning

Should by plain speech have salvation,

Yield new men new learning.

'Love!' but what love, nicely

New from old disparted,

Would the player teach precisely?

First of all, be started

In my brain Assurance,

Trust, entire Contentment,

Passion proved by much endurance;

Then came, not resentment,

No, but simply Sorrow:

What was seen had vanished:

Yesterday so blue! To-morrow

Blank, all sunshine banished.

Hark! 'Tis Hope resurges,

Struggling through obstruction,

Forces a poor smile which verges

On joy's introduction.

Now, perhaps, mere Musing:

'Holds earth such a wonder?

Fairy-mortal, soul-sense-fusing

Past thought's power to sunder!'

What? calm Acquiescence?

'Daisied turf gives room to

Trefoil, plucked once in her presence,

Growing by her tomb too!'

She. All's your fancy-spinning!

Here's the fact: a neighbor

Never-ending, still beginning,

Recreates his labor:

Deep o'er desk he drudges,

Adds, divides, subtracts and

Multiplies, until he judges

Noonday-hour's exact sand

Shows the hour-glass emptied:

Then comes lawful leisure,

Minutes rare from toil exempted,

Fit to spend in pleasure.

Out then with, what treatise?

Youth's Complete Instructor

How to play the Flute. Quid petis?

Follow Youth's conductor

On and on, through Easy,

Up to Harder, Hardest

Flute-piece, till thou, flautist wheezy,

Possibly discardest

Tootlings hoarse and husky,

Mayst expend with courage

Breath, on tunes once bright, now dusky,

Meant to cool thy porridge.

That's an air of Tulou's

He maltreats persistent,

Till as lief I'd hear some Zulu's

Bone-piped bag, breath-distent,

Madden native dances.

I'm the man's familiar:

Unexpectedness enhances

What your ear's auxiliar

Fancy, finds suggestive.

Listen! That's legato

Rightly played, his fingers restive

Touch as if staccato.

He. Ah, you trick-betrayer!

Telling tales, unwise one?

So the secret of the player

Was, he could surprise one

Well-nigh into trusting

Here was a musician

Skilled consummately, yet lusting

Through no vile ambition

After making captive

All the world, rewarded

Amply by one stranger's rapture.

Common praise discarded.

So, without assistance

Such as music rightly

Needs and claims, defying distance,

Overleaping lightly

Obstacles which hinder,

He, for my approval,

All the same and all the kinder

Made mine what might move all

Earth to kneel adoring:

Took, while he piped Gounod's

Bit of passionate imploring,

Me for Juliet: who knows?

No! as you explain things,

All's mere repetition,

Practise-pother: of all vain things

Why waste pooh or pish on

Toilsome effort, never

Ending, still beginning

After what should pay endeavor

Right-performance? winning

Weariness from you who,

Ready to admire some

Owl's fresh hooting, Tu-whit, to-who,

Find stale thrush-songs tiresome.

She. Songs, Spring thought perfection,

Summer criticises:

What in May escaped detection,

August, past surprises,

Notes, and names each blunder.

You, the just-initiate,

Praise to heart's content (what wonder?)

Tootings I hear vitiate

Romeo's serenading,

I who, times full twenty,

Turned to ice, no ash-tops aiding,

At his caldamente.

So, 'twas distance altered

Sharps to flats? The missing

Bar when syncopation faltered

(You thought, paused for kissing!)

Ash-tops too felonious

Intercepted? Rather

Say, they well-nigh made euphonious

Discord, helped to gather

Phrase, by phrase, turn patches

Into simulated

Unity which botching matches,

Scraps redintegrated.

He. Sweet, are you suggestive

Of an old suspicion

Which has always found me restive

To its admonition

When it ventured whisper

'Fool, the strifes and struggles

Of your trembler, blusher, lisper

Were so many juggles,

Tricks tried, oh, so often!

Which once more do duty,

Find again a heart to soften,

Soul to snare with beauty.'

Birth-blush of the briar-rose,

Mist-bloom of the hedge-sloe,

Some one gainst the prize: admire rose

Would he, when noon's wedge, slow,

Sure, has pushed, expanded

Rathe pink to raw redness?

Would he covet sloe when sanded

By road-dust to deadness?

So, restore their value!

Ply a water-sprinkle

Then guess sloe is fingered, shall you?

Find in rose a wrinkle?

Here what played Aquarius?

Distance, ash-tops aiding,

Reconciled scraps else contrarious,

Brightened stuff fast fading.

Distance, call your shyness:

Was the fair one peevish?

Coyness softened out of slyness.

Was she cunning, thievish,

All-but proved impostor?

Bear but one day's exile,

Ugly traits were wholly lost or

Screened by fancies flexile,

Ash-tops these, you take me?

Fancies' interference

Changed . . .

But since I sleep, don't wake me!

What if all's appearance?

Is not outside seeming

Real as substance inside?

Both are facts, so leave me dreaming:

If who loses wins I'd

Ever lose, conjecture,

From one phrase trilled deftly,

All the piece. So, end your lecture,

Let who lied be left lie!