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THE MESSENGERS
One wandering nigh Parnassus chasing hares heard the high Muses.
"Take us a message to the Golden Town."
Thus sang the Muses.
- But the man said
- "They do not call to me. Not to such as me speak
the Muses."
And the Muses called him by name.
"Take us a message," they said, "to the Golden Town."
And the man was downcast for he would have chased hares.
And the Muses called again.
And when whether in valleys or on high crags of the hills he still
heard the Muses he went at last to them and heard their message,
though he would fain have left it to other men and chased the fleet
hares still in happy valleys.
And they gave him a wreath of laurels carved out of emeralds as
only the Muses can carve. "By this," they said, "they shall know that
you come from the Muses."
And the man went from that place and dressed in scarlet silks
as befitted one that came from the high Muses. And through the
gateway of the Golden Town he ran and cried his message, and his
cloak floated behind him. All silent sat the wise men and the aged,
they of the Golden Town; cross-legged they sat before their houses
reading from parchments a message of the Muses that they sent long
before.
And the young man cried his message from the Muses.
And they rose up and said: "Thou art not from the Muses. Otherwise
spake they." And they stoned him and he died.
And afterwards they carved his message upon gold; and read it in
their temples on holy days.
When will the Muses rest? When are they weary? They sent
another messenger to the Golden Town. And they gave him a
wand of ivory to carry in his hand with all the beautiful stories of
the world wondrously carved thereon. And only the Muses could
have carved it. "By this," they said, "they shall know that you come
from the Muses."
And he came through the gateway of the Golden Town with the
message he had for its people. And they rose up at once in the
Golden street, they rose from reading the message that they had
carved upon gold. "The last who came," they said, "came with a
wreath of laurels carved out of emeralds, as only the Muses can
carve. You are not from the Muses." And even as they had stoned
the last so also they stoned him. And afterwards they carved his
message on gold and laid it up in their temples.
When will the Muses rest? When are they weary? Even yet once
again they sent a messenger under the gateway into the Golden
Town. And for all that he wore a garland of gold that the high Muses
gave him, a garland of kingcups soft and yellow on his head, yet
fashioned of pure gold and by whom but the Muses, yet did they
stone him in the Golden Town. But they had the message, and what
care the Muses?
And yet they will not rest, for some while since I heard them call to me.
"Go take our message," they said, "unto the Golden Town."
But I would not go. And they spake a second time. "Go take our
message," they said.
And still I would not go, and they cried out a third time: "Go take
our message."
And though they cried a third time I would not go. But morning and
night they cried and through long evenings.
When will the Muses rest? When are they weary? And when they
would not cease to call to me I went to them and I said: "The
Golden Town is the Golden Town no longer. They have sold their
pillars for brass and their temples for money, they have made coins
out of their golden doors. It is become a dark town full of trouble,
there is no ease in its streets, beauty has left it and the old songs are
gone."
"Go take our message," they cried.
And I said to the high Muses: "You do not understand. You have
no message for the Golden Town, the holy city no longer."
"Go take our message," they cried.
"What is your message?" I said to the high Muses.
And when I heard their message I made excuses, dreading to speak
such things in the Golden Town; and again they bade me go.
And I said: "I will not go. None will believe me."
And still the Muses cry to me all night long.
They do not understand. How should they know?
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