Four Riddles

I

There was an ancient City, stricken down
With a strange frenzy, and for many a day
They paced from morn to eve the crowded town,
And danced the night away.

I asked the cause: the aged man grew sad:
They pointed to a building gray and tall,
And hoarsely answered "Step inside, my lad,
And then you'll see it all."

Yet what are all such gaieties to me
Whose thoughts are full of indices and surds?

x*x + 7x + 53 = 11/3

But something whispered "It will soon be done:
Bands cannot always play, nor ladies smile:
Endure with patience the distasteful fun
For just a little while!"

A change came o'er my Vision - it was night:
We clove a pathway through a frantic throng:
The steeds, wild-plunging, filled us with affright:
The chariots whirled along.

Within a marble hall a river ran -
A living tide, half muslin and half cloth:
And here one mourned a broken wreath or fan,
Yet swallowed down her wrath;

And here one offered to a thirsty fair
(His words half-drowned amid those thunders tuneful)
Some frozen viand (there were many there),
A tooth-ache in each spoonful.

There comes a happy pause, for human strength
Will not endure to dance without cessation;
And every one must reach the point at length
Of absolute prostration.

At such a moment ladies learn to give,
To partners who would urge them over-much,
A flat and yet decided negative -
Photographers love such.

There comes a welcome summons - hope revives,
And fading eyes grow bright, and pulses quicken:
Incessant pop the corks, and busy knives
Dispense the tongue and chicken.

Flushed with new life, the crowd flows back again:
And all is tangled talk and mazy motion -
Much like a waving field of golden grain,
Or a tempestuous ocean.

And thus they give the time, that Nature meant
For peaceful sleep and meditative snores,
To ceaseless din and mindless merriment
And waste of shoes and floors.

And One (we name him not) that flies the flowers,
That dreads the dances, and that shuns the salads,
They doom to pass in solitude the hours,
Writing acrostic-ballads.

How late it grows! The hour is surely past
That should have warned us with its double knock?
The twilight wanes, and morning comes at last -
"Oh, Uncle, what's o'clock?"

The Uncle gravely nods, and wisely winks.
It MAY mean much, but how is one to know?
He opens his mouth - yet out of it, methinks,
No words of wisdom flow.

II

Empress of Art, for thee I twine
This wreath with all too slender skill.
Forgive my Muse each halting line,
And for the deed accept the will!

O day of tears! Whence comes this spectre grim,
Parting, like Death's cold river, souls that love?
Is not he bound to thee, as thou to him,
By vows, unwhispered here, yet heard above?

And still it lives, that keen and heavenward flame,
Lives in his eye, and trembles in his tone:
And these wild words of fury but proclaim
A heart that beats for thee, for thee alone!

But all is lost: that mighty mind o'erthrown,
Like sweet bells jangled, piteous sight to see!
"Doubt that the stars are fire," so runs his moan,
"Doubt Truth herself, but not my love for thee!"

A sadder vision yet: thine aged sire
Shaming his hoary locks with treacherous wile!
And dost thou now doubt Truth to be a liar?
And wilt thou die, that hast forgot to smile?

Nay, get thee hence! Leave all thy winsome ways
And the faint fragrance of thy scattered flowers:
In holy silence wait the appointed days,
And weep away the leaden-footed hours.

III

The air is bright with hues of light
And rich with laughter and with singing:
Young hearts beat high in ecstasy,
And banners wave, and bells are ringing:
But silence falls with fading day,
And there's an end to mirth and play.
Ah, well-a-day

Rest your old bones, ye wrinkled crones!
The kettle sings, the firelight dances.
Deep be it quaffed, the magic draught
That fills the soul with golden fancies!
For Youth and Pleasance will not stay,
And ye are withered, worn, and gray.
Ah, well-a-day!

O fair cold face! O form of grace,
For human passion madly yearning!
O weary air of dumb despair,
From marble won, to marble turning!
"Leave us not thus!" we fondly pray.
"We cannot let thee pass away!"
Ah, well-a-day!

IV

My First is singular at best:
More plural is my Second:
My Third is far the pluralest -
So plural-plural, I protest
It scarcely can be reckoned!

My First is followed by a bird:
My Second by believers
In magic art: my simple Third
Follows, too often, hopes absurd
And plausible deceivers.

My First to get at wisdom tries -
A failure melancholy!
My Second men revered as wise:
My Third from heights of wisdom flies
To depths of frantic folly.

My First is ageing day by day:
My Second's age is ended:
My Third enjoys an age, they say,
That never seems to fade away,
Through centuries extended.

My Whole? I need a poet's pen
To paint her myriad phases:
The monarch, and the slave, of men -
A mountain-summit, and a den
Of dark and deadly mazes -

A flashing light - a fleeting shade -
Beginning, end, and middle
Of all that human art hath made
Or wit devised! Go, seek HER aid,
If you would read my riddle.

Background and Analysis of This Poem

Lewis Carroll's Four Riddles belongs to the puzzle-making side of his literary imagination, the same mind that gave readers the logic games, verbal twists and delightful absurdities of the Alice books. The sequence appeared in Rhyme? and Reason?, published in 1883, while one of the riddles had earlier appeared in Phantasmagoria and Other Poems in 1869. Wikisource usefully notes the different publication versions, while the Poetry Foundation gives broader background on Carroll as the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, the Oxford mathematician, logician, photographer and author. That mixture of poet and mathematician matters here. Four Riddles is playful verse, but its play is highly organised.

The title is plain, but the pieces themselves are anything but ordinary question-and-answer riddles. Carroll presents two double acrostics and two charades, forms that ask readers to pay attention not only to meaning, but to arrangement. In a double acrostic, for example, words are solved so that letters at the beginning and end may spell other hidden words or names. A charade breaks a word into parts, teasing the reader towards the whole through clues. Carroll loved these structures because they allowed language to become both toy and puzzle box. A word is not just a word; it is a little building with hidden rooms.

What makes Four Riddles charming is that Carroll does not simply state clues in dry puzzle-book language. He gives them rhythm, comic movement and little bursts of character. The riddles often sound as if someone is telling a story while secretly laying traps for the alphabet. That dual pleasure is very Carrollian. The reader enjoys the surface music of the lines, then realises the poem has been quietly demanding a second kind of attention. It is not enough to read along; one must listen for hinges, seams and concealed mechanisms.

Carroll's fascination with puzzles was not a side hobby disconnected from his literary work. It was part of the way he thought. As a mathematician and logician, he delighted in rules, reversals, categories and the absurdities that appear when language is pressed too literally. The University of Florida's Recess! feature on Carroll's poetic puzzles points to the close relationship between his nonsense verse and his puzzle-making habits, and modern readers can see the same energy in Four Riddles. The poems do not merely decorate puzzles; they turn puzzling into a poetic experience.

There is also something generous about the form. A riddle invites participation. Unlike a lyric that asks mainly to be felt, or a narrative that asks to be followed, a riddle asks the reader to join the work of making sense. Carroll's riddles may sometimes be maddening, but their difficulty is sociable. They create the pleasure of shared guessing, of leaning over the page and trying not to feel personally insulted by a clever arrangement of letters. In that sense, Four Riddles belongs to a tradition of parlour games and family entertainment, but Carroll's verbal elegance lifts it above mere pastime.

For modern readers, Four Riddles offers a useful reminder that poetry need not always confess, mourn, praise or argue. Sometimes it can play. Yet Carroll's play is not careless. It depends on precision, pattern and a deep trust that language will reward close attention. The poems are minor works compared with the Alice books or The Hunting of the Snark, but they reveal the same nimble intelligence. Carroll invites us to treat words as puzzles, puzzles as poems, and reading as a game in which the alphabet keeps a straight face while quietly misbehaving.