The Tale of Two Sisters (What the Hell?)

This post will be the best thing you read today, it will be the worst thing you read today, it includes a poem of tragedy, it includes a poem of foolishness, the poem will defy belief, the poem will yield incredulity, I’ll put everything before you, I’ll put nothing before you, you’ll wish me direct to Heaven, you’ll curse me direct the other way – in short, this post will be so unlike any other post in the present period, that my most fervent readers will insist on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree to all other posts.

Be forewarned:  This post will include by far, the most ludicrous conclusion that you read today, than you have ever read before... this post will deliver by far, the most bizarre out-of-left-field finish you will know today, than you have ever known before.

First, some backstory from yesterday’s post:

Poet & critic Thomas Bailey Aldrich wrote a scathing review of Dickinson’s poetry in 1892 – and a few months ago, I found a poem he wrote in 1893 that I believe to be a tribute to Dickinson (though I’m sure he’d never admit it).  Furthermore, also in the late 1890s, poet and critic Andrew Lang wrote a harsh review on Dickinson and in his review, he quoted lines from another poem by Aldrich, one called “At the Funeral of a Minor Poet [One of the Bearers soliloquizes]" – and I wondered if it, too, might been some sort of veiled tribute to Dickinson (although he uses masculine pronouns in the “Minor Poet” to throw readers off the scent).
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Aldrich’s poem “At the Funeral of a Minor Poet [One of the Bearers soliloquizes]" first appeared in The Atlantic in 1887, and then it was later included in a collection of his works entitled The Sisters’ Tragedy, with Other Poems, Lyrical and Dramatic.  

Right:  The Sisters' Tragedy, with Other Poems, Lyrical and Dramatic

In yesterday’s post, I only briefly discussed Aldrich’s poem “The Sisters’ Tragedy,” and I promised to share the eponymous poem today – which I will do shortly (and believe me, it is worth the wait). Also in yesterday’s post, I called this “lyrical and dramatic” work by the gentleman who predicted “oblivion” for Dickinson “the soppiest, schmaltziest sapfest to which my optic nerves have been subjected.”  I added this: “If Hallmark movies were a thing back in Aldrich’s day, he surely would have been a lead writer.”

However, before we get to the poem, I have to admit, I Googled-searched something like “what are the sappiest Hallmark movies”; here are the top contenders:

1. “The Last Valentine”: An elderly woman returns to a train station every Valentine's Day for 65 years to wait for her pilot husband, who was declared missing in action during World War II
2. “A Princess for Christmas”:  A regular woman suddenly thrust into a European royal family with an instant castle romance.
3. “A Country Wedding”:  A famous country music star goes back to his small hometown and reconnects with his childhood sweetheart right before getting married to someone else.
4. “November Christmas”:  A deeply emotional story where a tight-knit community moved up Christmas to October for a seriously young girl.
5. “Crown for Christmas”: A fired hotel maid becomes a governess in a European castle and falls for a literal king who rides out on a horse to rescue and claim her.

Of course, the enduring allure of a Hallmark movie is that they are comforting, wholesome and predictable – and boy oh boy are they soppy, sappy, and schmaltzy – and cheesy and corny and mushy and – well, I could go on, but you get the picture!

​Now, morph that mawkish mush into a misty-eyed melodrama and voila, you have Thomas Bailey Aldrich’s “The Sisters’ Tragedy,” the tearful tale of Aglae, a widow, and Muriel, her unmarried sister.  Aldrich plopped his saga in “AD 1670” in a land that lies “twelvemonth wrapt in sombre skies” – and note, those skies are “sombre,” not “somber” – so right off we can tell, this is serious theatre, not artless theater.  

The drama takes off anon as the two grieving sisters, in sunset’s bloom, bare their souls, “each to each.”  Turns out the unwed sister, “her he had not wed,” loosed her lips in grief after all these many years masked in smiles; yes, dear reader, ’twas Muriel who loved Aglae’s dearly departed husband – and with that – BOOM – the moral of the story surfaces swiftly in lines 7 and 8:  “No purer love may mortals know than this / the hidden love that guards another’s bliss."

This is high drama, folks, with two grieving damsels, one with violet streaked hair, the other gold-tressed, and an abundance of archaic and melodramatic terms:  azure, vestal, crypt, and enow – along with one long kiss and a troubled brow (hence the need for “enow”).

And are you ready for this?  You might want to sit down.  Muriel speaks first, and you know what she says? 

“Be still, my heart!” 

I’m not making this up!  The first words out of Muriel’s lips are, “Be still, my heart” – and she quickly follows with a thine, a thou, and a shouldst.  She then extols her sister’s dead husband as a specimen of perfect manhood who knew no evil, spake with no offence (yes with a “c”), and was spotless – I’m not making this up – as the unfallen snow.

Unfallen snow?

I s'pose Aldrich needed that extra syllable, “un,” to keep things metrical.

Aglae then admits her wits had gone astray because the man to whom she'd plighted her troth had been too perfect; for all these many years she had to live in the shadow of that man’s luster.  “Had he been less perfection, happier I!” proclaims the grieving widow. “It was my cruel lot, My hell, to love him--for he loved me not!”
 
And then – oh my sweet cheeses – and then – the ending. 

Did I read what I think I read?  Did they – were they – what the hell –

Take a look.  Here's the complete poem:

THE SISTERS' TRAGEDY
By Thomas Bailey Aldrich
 
A. D. 1670
 
AGLAE, a widow
MURIEL, her unmarried sister.
 
IT happened once, in that brave land that lies
For half the twelvemonth wrapt in sombre skies,
Two sisters loved one man. He being dead,
Grief loosed the lips of her he had not wed,
And all the passion that through heavy years
Had masked in smiles unmasked itself in tears.
No purer love may mortals know than this,
The hidden love that guards another's bliss.
High in a turret's westward-facing room,
Whose painted window held the sunset's bloom,
The two together grieving, each to each
Unveiled her soul with sobs and broken speech.
Both still were young, in life's rich summer yet;
And one was dark, with tints of violet
In hair and eyes, and one was blond as she
Who rose—a second daybreak—from the sea,
Gold-tressed and azure-eyed. In that lone place,
Like dusk and dawn, they sat there face to face.
She spoke the first whose strangely silvering hair
No wreath had worn, nor widow's weed might wear,
And told her blameless love, and knew no shame--
Her holy love that, like a vestal flame
Beside the sacred body of some queen
Within a guarded crypt had burned unseen
From weary year to year. And she who heard
Smiled proudly through her tears and said no word,
But, drawing closer, on the troubled brow
Laid one long kiss, and that was words enow!
 
MURIEL.
Be still, my heart! Grown patient with thine ache,
Thou shouldst be dumb, yet needs must speak, or break.
The world is empty now that he is gone.

AGLAE.
Ay, sweetheart!
 
MURIEL.
                  None was like him, no, not one.
From other men he stood apart, alone
In honor spotless as unfallen snow.
Nothing all evil was it his to know;
His charity still found some germ, some spark
Of light in natures that seemed wholly dark.
He read men's souls; the lowly and the high
Moved on the self-same level in his eye.
Gracious to all, to none subservient,
Without offence he spake the word he meant--
His word no trick of tact or courtly art,
But the white flowering of the noble heart.
Careless he was of much the world counts gain,
Careless of self, too simple to be vain,
Yet strung so finely that for conscience-sake
He would have gone like Cranmer to the stake.
I saw—how could I help but love? And you--

AGLAE.
At this perfection did I worship too . . .
'Twas this that stabbed me. Heed not what I say!
I meant it not, my wits are gone astray,
With all that is and has been. No, I lie--
Had he been less perfection, happier I!

MURIEL.
Strange words and wild! 'Tis the distracted mind
Breathes them, not you, and I no meaning find.

AGLAE.
Yet 'twere as plain as writing on a scroll
Had you but eyes to read within my soul.--
How a grief hidden feeds on its own mood,
Poisons the healthful currents of the blood
With bitterness, and turns the heart to stone!
I think, in truth, 'twere better to make moan,
And so be done with it. This many a year,
Sweetheart, have I laughed lightly and made cheer,
Pierced through with sorrow!
                                Then the widowed one
With sorrowfullest eyes beneath the sun,
Faltered, irresolute, and bending low
Her head, half whispered,
                            Dear, how could you know?
What masks are faces!—yours, unread by me
These seven long summers; mine, so placidly
Shielding my woe! No tremble of the lip,
No cheek's quick pallor let our secret slip!
Mere players we, and she that played the queen,
Now in her homespun, looks how poor and mean!
How shall I say it, how find words to tell
What thing it was for me made earth a hell
That else had been my heaven! 'Twould blanch your cheek
Were I to speak it. Nay, but I will speak,
Since like two souls at compt we seem to stand,
Where nothing may be hidden. Hold my hand,
But look not at me! Noble 'twas, and meet,
To hide your heart, nor fling it at his feet
To lie despised there. Thus saved you our pride
And that white honor for which earls have died.
You were not all unhappy, loving so!
I with a difference wore my weight of woe.
My lord was he. It was my cruel lot,
My hell, to love him—for he loved me not!
Then came a silence. Suddenly like death
The truth flashed on them, and each held her breath--
A flash of light whereby they both were slain,
She that was loved and she that loved in vain!