ENG LYRIC POETRY.pdf - STIBA Malang

THE ONCE AND FUTURE POET
In Regions mild of calm and serene Air,
Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot,
to the dramatically immediate utterances of a thoroughly proper but
momentarily confused fifteen-year old girl:
I should be loath
To meet the rudeness and swill’d insolence
Of such late Wassailers; yet O where else
Shall I inform my unacquainted feet
In the blind mazes of this tangl’d Wood?
177
(ll. 177–81)
to the suave commands put forward by a worldly and demanding Comus:
Nay Lady, sit; if I but wave this wand,
Your nerves are all chain’d up in Alabaster,
And you a statue; or as Daphne was,
Root-bound, that fled Apollo.
(ll. 659–62)
Indeed, Milton finds even more than a single purpose, a single register of
meaning, for the leaner tetrameter line. Associated initially with Comus, it is
used, in allegro-like fashion, to highlight the errant, hectic movement of his
midnight revels:
Meanwhile welcome Joy and Feast,
Midnight shout and revelry
Tipsy dance and Jollity.
Braid your Locks with rosy Twine
Dropping odors, dropping Wine.
(ll. 102–6)
But by the masque’s end it acquires a more disciplined purpose. As part of a
general chastening process, it is first used to underscore the ritual invocation
spoken by the Attendant Spirit,
Listen and appear to us
In name of great Oceanus,
By the earth-shaking Neptune’s mace
And Tethys’ grave majestic pace,
then as a charm Sabrina provides to release the ensnared Lady,
(ll. 867–70)