Olga Rudge & Ezra Pound: "What Thou Lovest Well..."

77 The Hidden Nest
ques allait de la voie lactée, etc. ziao!—elle est trop loin, hélas.’’ [She is an
oriental princess under occidental stars / with the teeth of an oriental
tiger / diminished by pilgrimages in the forests of the heavens. / She is a
dawn before the dawn, wandering in Slavic clouds penetrated by glacial
fires at the time of the Hittites / treading the complex labyrinth of concentric
spheres of the Milky Way, etc. / she is too far away, alas.]
Since no patron had come forward with two thousand francs, Olga’s
tenants allowed her to use the salon of the rue Chamfort apartment for the
Scriabin concert, but the whole character of the room had changed; her
mother’s beautiful salon, she wrote, was ‘‘like a concierge’s loge . . . paper
fans and large photographs of the husband and musical comedy celebrities,
the most god-dam awful vases of artificial flowers, and the books—
spiritualistic propaganda, cheap magazines.’’ Heymann played the sonata
she had been practicing for London, and two interesting Russians came,
one a composer who had known Scriabin. (‘‘He says Scriabin intended a
contrepoint de couleur over the music, not couleur illustrating it.’’)
In the spring of 1928, Olga again picked up correspondence with Egerton,
this time about the purchase of sleigh bells for Mary: ‘‘I had the idea of
musical toys, to teach ‘Moidile’ what a musical step was, each step a
semitone.’’ After a visit to the Mears and Stainbank Church Bell Foundry,
her faithful friend replied: ‘‘I think you will agree the sound is rather
dismal and not calculated either to inspire the young or solace and tranquilize
the aged. Awaiting your further esteemed orders, I am, madam,
yours interestingly, Egerton.’’ This would be his last letter to Olga, although
she did not know it then. The sleigh bells were still hanging on the
banister of the Venice house when she left for the last time in the 1980s.
The Leoncina was never far from Olga’s thoughts. In March, she purchased
a pinafore printed with lions and gira√es; in April, a whirligig from
a beautiful Chinese woman in the street. And Mary was often in her
dreams: ‘‘All the air went dark, and the Leoncina couldn’t understand
why, then she said, ‘God climbed a tree.’ ’’
She was planning to meet her brother Teddy on the anniversary of their
mother’s death, to return the ashes to the burial site of their brother Arthur
in Courrières, France. ‘‘Vienna l’ultimo del mese.’’ Ezra had not yet decided
to travel with her to Vienna. He was going to Gais in April. ‘‘She