Victorian Verse - In Memoriam - XCV - Tennyson

This poem comes much later in the In Memoriam sequence and reflects an element of consolation and solace - the third phase of classical mourning. The raw grief of VII - "Doors..." -  has given way to affectionate recollection and a more spiritual response to death.  Tennyson wrote In Memoriam over more than ten years, gradually exploring and coming to terms with what the death of his friend meant to him at the spiritual, religious and moral level.

What is happening?  A brief synopsis.

Tennyson has enjoyed a quiet evening with friends in a garden.  There is little noise and it is warm.  His friends go off to bed before him and, left alone, memories of Hallam return.  He seems to hear or see his dead friend speaking to him in the fallen leaves - it is so vivid that at one point their souls seem to unite.  Tennyson hears "truths" about the nature of Life, Faith, Love, Loss - he becomes in tune with spiritual matters - the "pulsations" of the world.  As the vision fades, he doubts for a moment what it is he has learned or what he "became" when he seemed unified with the dead Hallam and the spirit of the world.  But in that moment of doubt, a breeze blows across the garden as dawn breaks, bringing a promise of a new day.  If nothing else, this gives him a tentative feeling of hope or progression.

This is weighty stuff.  Tennyson himself admits that he can hardly put it into words. There is a mass of rather difficult writing on this poem on the internet, which is considered the climax of the whole sequence.  Taking it line by line can do little more than try and pick it apart and leave you to draw your own conclusions.

XCV

By night we linger'd on the lawn[LC1] ,
For underfoot the herb[LC2]  was dry;
And genial warmth; and o'er the sky
The silvery haze of summer drawn;

And calm that let the tapers burn
Unwavering: not a cricket chirr'd:[LC3] 
The brook alone far-off was heard,
And on the board the fluttering urn[LC4] :

And bats went round in fragrant skies,
And wheel'd or lit the filmy shapes
That haunt the dusk, with ermine[LC5]  capes
And woolly breasts and beaded eyes[LC6] ;

While now we sang old songs that peal'd[LC7] 
From knoll to knoll, where, couch'd at ease,
The white kine [LC8] glimmer'd, and the trees
Laid their dark arms [LC9] about the field.

But when those others[LC10] , one by one,
Withdrew themselves from me and night,
And in the house light after light
Went out, and I was all alone,

A hunger seized my heart; I read[LC11] 
Of that glad year which once had been,
In those fall'n leaves which kept their green[LC12] ,
The noble letters of the dead:

And strangely on the silence broke
The silent-speaking words, and strange
Was love's dumb cry defying change
To test his worth; and strangely spoke

The faith, the vigour, bold to dwell
On doubts that drive the coward back,
And keen thro' wordy snares to track
Suggestion to her inmost cell[LC13] . 

So word by word, and line by line,
The dead man touch'd me from the past,
And all at once it seem'd at last
The living soul was flash'd on mine[LC14] ,

And mine in his was wound, and whirl'd
About empyreal heights of thought,
And came on that which is[LC15] , and caught
The deep pulsations of the world,

Aeonian music [LC16] measuring out
The steps of Time--the shocks of Chance--
The blows of Death. At length my trance
Was cancell'd, stricken thro' with doubt[LC17] .

Vague words! but ah, how hard to frame
In matter-moulded forms of speech,
Or ev'n for intellect to reach
Thro' memory that which I became[LC18] :

Till now [LC19] the doubtful dusk reveal'd
The knolls once more where, couch'd at ease,
The white kine glimmer'd, and the trees
Laid their dark arms about the field[LC20] ;

And suck'd from out the distant gloom
A breeze began to tremble o'er
The large leaves of the sycamore,
And fluctuate all the still perfume[LC21] ,

And gathering freshlier overhead,
Rock'd the full-foliaged elms, and swung
The heavy-folded rose, and flung[LC22] 
The lilies to and fro, and said[LC23] ,

'The dawn, the dawn,' and died away;
And East and West, without a breath,
Mixt their dim lights, like life and death,
To broaden into boundless day.[LC24] 

---

 [LC1]Note the alliteration to give a feeling of indolence

 [LC2]grass

 [LC3]onomatopoeia – focus here is on the silence by mentioning sounds that are NOT heard

 [LC4]A “board” is a table. I think it is a candle in a pot which is giving a wavering flame and a faint sound.

 [LC5]A fur which is white with black spots; from the winter coat of a stoat.

 [LC6]It is not entirely clear whether he is referring to the bats themselves or the moths they are catching.  The “or” suggests he is talking about something other than the bats, as does the “ermine”.  Bats are not spotted – some moths are. Tennyson is quite particular  in his descriptions of nature.

 [LC7]Their singing rang out like bells

 [LC8]Archaic word for cattle.  Tennyson uses archaisms for romantic effect

 [LC9]Personification – to give a feeling of safety and protection, enclosure

 [LC10]His friends

 [LC11]“Read” means “took meaning from” rather than literally reading as a book

 [LC12]He sees the green leaves on the ground as a symbol of the dead Hallam, dead before his time like the leaves.  He reads in them a “message” from the dead man.

 [LC13]These two stanzas can be paraphrased:

He “hears” the words of the dead break the “silence”.  His love cries out in defiance as “change” (time? distance?) tests the worth of his love; his “faith and vigour” (life-force) speak out showing his boldness in daring to doubt or wonder what happens to the dead and he is brave enough to follow trains of thought (“wordy snares”) that might even lead him to dark conclusions (“inmost cell”) about death (and by inference, faith and religion).

 [LC14]The “at last” suggests that this is the communication with Hallam that he has been seeking – at first, he missed his physical presence, but over time this has mutated into a more spiritual need.

 [LC15]The “is” is a noun, not a verb, here.  It means the essence of things, the “deep pulsations”.  What these actually ARE is not clear except that it appears, from the next stanza, to be a sense of the unity or harmony of the world, both physical and spiritual - a totality of experience to be lived – which is made up of Time, Chance and Death.

 [LC16]Everlasting music – this is probably also a reference to the “music of the spheres” which the heavens were believed to make as they rotated in harmony.

 [LC17]This moment of clarity does not last long.

 [LC18]He admits that it is difficult to express what he felt in words or even thought

 [LC19]“Until now” – there is clarification and renewed confidence coming in what happens next

 [LC20]He recaps the opening scene of the poem

 [LC21]A breeze blows over the scene bringing a message

 [LC22]Note the movement in these verbs as the wind blows over the garden, compared with the “linger’d”.  Suggests the strength of his conviction.

 [LC23]The wind is speaking to him, heralding the dawn – a symbol of new beginnings.

 [LC24]Resolution comes in the realisation that the world is a totality, there is both life and death, and that this enables him to move on.  The possible hope for the future – is it a religious afterlife?  It is an interpretation which the Victorians would have appreciated, but not necessarily one that Tennyson is advocating here.