We all know and love Raymond Chandler for his hard-boiled
detective novels, featuring Philip Marlow, as well as his other “pulp fiction”
type stories; and also his screenplays; for films like “Double Indemnity” and "The Big Sleep." But
what I didn't know was that he once wrote poetry. He was only 17 when he wrote
this one, which was published on December 19, 1908 in Chamber’s Journal, a
magazine out of London at the time.
I was reading a biography of Mr. Chandler by Tom Williams
(no relation) when I came across the first verse of the poem in the chapter
about Mr. Chandler’s years in London. He went to school there for a time, and evidently
wrote poetry as well.
This poem places an unknown woman on a pedestal, much as he
would do in his later writings. Actually; according to Tom Williams; the poem
holds all the elements of a Philip Marlowe story. There is a seductive, almost
unknowable woman, and then a man, seemingly trapped by his own passion for her,
in a relationship which is always doomed from the start. That’s pretty heavy
stuff for a 17 year old.
Anyway, here it is; a Raymond Chandler poem. I got the text
from a website which has all of his early poetry. It’s unpolished, and some
would say not that good. No matter; I really like it.
“The Unknown Love”
When the evening sun
is slanting,
When the crickets
raise their chanting,
And the dewdrops lie
a-twinkling on the grass,
As I climb the
pathway slowly,
With a mien half
proud, half lowly,
O'er the ground your
feet have trod I gently pass.
Round the empty house
I wander,
Where the ivy now is
fonder
Of your memory than
those long gone away;
And I feel a sweet
affection
For the plant that
lends protection
To the window whence
you looked on me that day.
Was it love or
recognition,
When you stormed my
weak position
And made prisoner my
heart for evermore?
For I felt I long had
known you,
That I'd knelt before
the throne you
Graced in Pharaoh's
days or centuries before.
Though your face from
me was hidden,
Yet the balm was not
forbidden
On your coffin just
to see the wreath I sent.
Though no word had
passed between us,
Yet I felt that God
had seen us
And had joined your
heart to mine e'en as you went.
Let them talk of love
and marriage,
Honeymoon and bridal
carriage,
And the glitter of a
wedding la mode!
Could they understand
the union
Of two hearts in dear
communion
Who were strangers in
the world of flesh and blood?
In my eyes the tears
are welling
As I stand before
your dwelling,
In my pilgrimage to
where you lived, my fair.
And ere I return to
duty
In this world of
weary beauty,
To the stillness of
the night I breathe my prayer:
When the last great
trump has sounded,
When life's barque
the point has rounded,
When the wheel of
human progress is at rest,
My beloved, may I
meet you,
With a lover's kiss
to greet you,
Where you wait me in
the gardens of the blest!
R. T. CHANDLER.
