Saturday, September 29, 2018

To George Sterling

This is one of several poems with the same title that Clark Ashton Smith (CAS) wrote.  This particular version was not published in CAS' lifetime, and likewise it is not available on The Eldritch Dark, so I'll begin with the text itself:


O Beauty, goddess known and sung of old
They say that thou our later world hast fled
Her altars cold, her worship past and dead;
Now to the high, insatiate god of Gold
Alone man's knees are bent, their prayers said.
Yet haply still there be a few that hold
Her faith, and to her secret temple led,
Enwreath with long white amaranths her head.

High priest of these by right divine though art
          Who singest here beside the western shore
                    Immortal threnodies in Beauty's praise
Nor can her faith and ritual depart.
          Though men at false and rival shrines implore,
While such as though to service give thine days.


Right off the bat, it strikes me that a couple of words in the second stanza were likely transcribed incorrectly in the Hippocampus Press collection that I'm reading.  It seems to me that the stanza ought to read (my changes in bold):


High priest of these by right divine thou art
          Who singest here beside the western shore
                    Immortal threnodies in Beauty's praise
Nor can her faith and ritual depart.
          Though men at false and rival shrines implore,
While such as thou to service give thine days.


Those quibbles aside, this poem is somewhat unremarkable even when compared to the two previous works by CAS with the same title that I have read.  The author's appreciation of George Sterling's work is evident, but perhaps not as well articulated as in the earlier companion pieces.

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