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The Maid Of Naaman's Wife

by John Drinkwater

That was the proud woman, Naaman's wife.

Basking at noon under the Syrian fans,

While Naaman, the leprous mighty captain,

Proud glowing flesh now silver-skinned and tainted,

Walked in contagion here and there, apart.

His wife, the unblemished Naaman in her mind,

The man who, coming with the spoils and shouts,

Had made a hundred triumphs hers, when all

The Syrian women courted her for that,

Now saw in the pestilent limbs shame and reproach,

Some treachery that made her, who was mate

Of Syria's pride, bondwoman of a leper.

She must nurse her blame, since he was Naaman still,

With an old honour paid by stedfastness,

The mark of Syria's compassion. Black

Thoughts were her only payment for betrayal,

But in secret she could play them without pity,,

Let the fans beat, they could not beguile her from that.

.....

And Naaman had loved her, but not now,

Knowing the uses that his love had been,

How given for her to squander it in pride.

.....

Syria out of Israel had brought

Captives, and among them one, a maid,

A little maid, just troubled with the touch

Of womanhood upon her body and thought,

And she served Naaman's wife, a lonely girl,

To answer bidding, and covet little tones

Of kindness that she heard go to and fro,

But not for her. She trembled as she stood

At the proud woman's couch, because a fault

In orders done meant scolding and even rods.

And she had but two joys. One, to remember

A Galilean town, and the blue waters

That washed the pebbles that she knew so well,

Yellow in sunlight, or frozen in the moon,

A little curve of beach, where she would walk

At any hour with an old silver man.

Her father's father, her sole companion,

Who told her tales of Moses and the prophets

That lived in the old days. And of that time

She had but now poor treasuries of the mind,

Little seclusions when, the day's work done,

She made thought into prayer before she slept;

These, and a faded gown that she had brought

Into captivity, patterned with sprigs of thyme,

And blades of wheat, and little curling shells,

And signs of heaven figured out in stars,

Made by a weaver that her grandsire knew,

A gift on some thanksgiving. She might not wear it,

Being suited as became a slave, but often

At night she would spread it in her loneliness,

And think how finely she too might be drest,

As finely as any proud woman of them all,

If the God of Israel had not visited her

Surely for sin, though she could not remember.

Thus one joy was. And then the Lord Naaman,

This wonder soiled, this pitiful great captain

Forbidden all that he had so proudly been,

To worship him, that was her other joy.

When the dusk came, and the city fell to silence,

And out of his poor banishment he would walk,

She followed him, knowing the very hour,

And all her heart was flooded through with pity,

Because she knew the leprosy left still

A Naaman untainted and lovely.

Then in her mind was the proud woman a loathing,

Who dared to waste a marvel such as this,

The right in the world's knowledge so to love.

O pitiful evil blasting so great a flesh,

Walling a spirit so governing itself

In spite of desolation. A maid's thought thus

Knew how the frames of mastery can suffer.

.....

Sometimes at night when not even lepers walked,

Solitary in the Syrian meadows she

Would wander in the old perplexity

That the moon makes of love. Never, she knew,

Could any adoration that she brought

Touch even the Lord Naaman's banishment,

The Naaman fallen from the time when even

Great ladies dare not speak the thing they felt.

She was nothing, or the world could never know

If she was more than nothing; a maid to bind

Tresses for beauty that was not her own.

And yet she knew that she had beauty too,

A little hermit beauty that might spend

Royally if it dare and a man would speak,,

Royally, Naaman, but he could not hear.

But still for all the silence of her lips,

And heart with promise nothing known, she loved,

Loved the sad leper walking in the dusk,

Loved the great lord, loved even his leprosy,

Since by it he came a little down to her,

Loved him, and knew that her love was the sum

Of all that loving, and must be. But even so,

She knew her love an honester thing than any

That the proud woman had. O moon, she thought,

Could you not make me truly tell this love,

This love pulsing along my blood and brain,

As midnight surges going through the sky?

And long she pondered how she best might serve.

.....

Then one day when the fans moved, and she stood

Ministering with her perfumes at the couch,

Her mistress, with eyes that meant the thought was nothing,

Said, "Is it not grievous that my lord goes thus?"

And the maid felt the colour at her throat

Flow round her neck and flood up to her temples,

But knowing, feared not, or put her fear aside,

And said "Would God my lord were in Samaria,

To seek Elisha there, a prophet, lady,

Whom God hath taught to cure whom he will cure."

She spoke, and the bright bowl trembled in her hands,

And fear because of her words made the tongue dry

As the woman looked with still cold eyes upon her.

But the word passed from lip to lip, and the king

Heard it, and sent for Naaman and said,

"A girl among the slaves that you brought in

From Israel has spoken a strange thing,

Of one Elisha, a prophet whom they obey,

Saying that he could bid the blemish off

That is cheating Syria of her proudest man.

Now therefore journey to him, and I will send

Word to Israel's king, that he shall bless

Favours from us in whom his fortune lies,

Bidding him call this prophet to your cause.

Go, and the love of Syria go with you."

.....

Then Naaman with his servants went at dawn,

And Naaman's wife saw how again might come

Her mastery among the women of Syria.

Yet was the little maid her hatred now,

Lest of her word should come this resurrection.

And Naaman went, and Israel's king was glad,

Because of Syria's favour, and sent down

The hill to where Elisha lived among

Farmers of flax and goatherds and a few

Unhappy men who brought their sorrow to God,

Asking his mercy on the Syrian lord.

And Naaman stood before the prophet of Israel,

And told his grief. And Elisha looked upon him,

Measured his faith, and bade him bathe his body

Seven times in the river of Jordan, and be

Whole. And Naaman questioned, and was wrath,

As was not any river of Damascus

Purer than Jordan, and in more virtue flowing?

But, little, his servants said, was this to do,

And, as persuasion led him, he went down

And seven times let Jordan cover him,

And came with a clean body as of old,

A strong man with the tides of blood before him,

With equal limbs for all the spirit could dare,

And into Syria he sang upon his riding.

.....

And tidings came to the Syrian king of this,

Heralding a Naaman mightier than ever,

With clean flesh and a wisdom all matured,

And all the city rang upon his coming,

The king and his estate, people and priests,

And soldiers glad of their old captain again.

And matrons with their girls, and the rich merchants,

All shouted Naaman, Naaman, through the streets.

And Naaman's wife stood at the king's right hand,

Her slave-borne canopy coloured and spangled,

While the great fans beat upon her pride again,

And Naaman in plumes and plate and mail

Again was master of the Syrian hosts.

.....

Afar, beyond the barriers of the streets,

Pressing among the crowd for a moment's seeing,

The Israelitish maid, between her duties,

Watched with a proud flush beating down her limbs.

And shyly she had on a faded gown,

Patterned with sprigs of thyme and blades of wheat,

And paling stars and little curling shells.

And as the shouting rose, she watched in silence,

With trembling lips, and Naaman passed by her,

And her hands moved towards him, and fell down,

Then stole upon her bosom, as they would ease

The aching beauty of her loneliness.

And there unnoted as he passed she stood,

With not a thought from all that world upon her.

Only, when service came again, she saw

A glowing hatred in the proud woman's eyes.

And in the night she thought of it, and wept,

But not for any hatred were her tears.