From “Clarel” [The Recluse]

Ere yet they win that verge and line,

Reveal the stranger. Name him—Vine.

His home to tell—kin, tribe, estate—

Would naught avail. Alighting grow,

As on the tree the mistletoe, ⁠

All gifts unique. In seeds of fate

Borne on the winds these emigrate

And graft the stock.

                  Vine’s manner shy

A clog, a hindrance might imply; ⁠

A lack of parlor-wont. But grace

Which is in substance deep and grain

May, peradventure, well pass by

The polish of veneer. No trace

Of passion’s soil or lucre’s stain, ⁠

Though life was now half ferried o’er.

If use he served not, but forbore—

Such indolence might still but pine

In dearth of rich incentive high:

Apollo slave in Mammon’s mine? ⁠

Better Admetus’ shepherd lie.

  A charm of subtle virtue shed

A personal influence coveted,

Whose source was difficult to tell

As ever was that perfumed spell ⁠

Of Paradise-flowers invisible

Which angels round Cecilia bred.

   A saint then do we here unfold?

Nay, the ripe flush, Venetian mould

Evinced no nature saintly fine, ⁠

But blood like swart Vesuvian wine.

What cooled the current? Under cheer

Of opulent softness, reigned austere

Control of self. Flesh, but scarce pride,

Was curbed: desire was mortified; ⁠

But less indeed by moral sway

Than doubt if happiness thro’ clay

Be reachable. No sackclothed man;

Howbeit, in sort Carthusian

Tho’ born a Sybarite. And yet ⁠

Not beauty might he all forget,

The beauty of the world, and charm:

He prized it tho’ it scarce might warm.

Like to the nunnery’s denizen

His virgin soul communed with men ⁠

But thro’ the wicket. Was it clear

This coyness bordered not on fear—

Fear or an apprehensive sense?

Not wholly seemed it diffidence

Recluse. Nor less did strangely wind ⁠

Ambiguous elfishness behind

All that: an Ariel unknown.

It seemed his very speech in tone

Betrayed disuse. Thronged streets astir

To Vine but ampler cloisters were. ⁠

Cloisters? No monk he was, allow;

But gleamed the richer for the shade

About him, as in sombre glade

Of Virgil’s wood the Sibyl’s Golden Bough.