THE SICK MAN AND THE BIRDS
Alas for me! a dry desire
Is all my song,—a waste of fire
That will not fade nor fail;
To me, dim shapes of ancient crime.
Moan through the windy ways of time,
"Wail! wail!"
THE DYING OF TANNEGUY DU BOIS.
"En los nidas antaño no hay pajaros hogaño." -LAST WORDS OF DON QUIXOTE.
YEA, I am passed away, I think, from this;
Nor helps me herb, nor any leechcraft here,
But lift me hither the sweet cross to kiss,
And witness ye, I go without a fear.
Yea, I am sped, and never more shall see,
As once I dreamed, the show of shield and crest,
Gone southward to the fighting by the sea ;—
There is no bird in any last year's nest !
Yea, with me now all dreams are done, I ween,
Grown faint and unremembered; voices call
High up, like misty warders dimly seen
Moving at morn on some Burgundian wall;
And all things swim-as when the charger stands
Quivering between the knees, and East and West
Are filled with flash of scarves and waving hands;—
There is no bird in any last year's nest!
THE DYING OF TANNEGUY DU BOIS
Is she a dream I left in Acquitaine ?—
My wife Giselle,-who never spoke a word,
Although I knew her mouth was drawn with pain,
Her eyelids hung with tears; and though I heard
The strong sob shake her throat, and saw the cord
Her necklace made about it;—she that prest
To watch me trotting till I reached the ford ;—
There is no bird in any last year's nest !
Ah! I had hoped, God wot,-had longed that she
Should watch me from the little-lit tourelle,
Me, coming riding by the windy lea-
Me, coming back again to her, Giselle;
Yea, I had hoped once more to hear him call,
The curly-pate, who, rushen lance in rest,
Stormed at the lilies by the orchard wall ;-
There is no bird in any last year's nest!
But how, my Masters, ye are wrapt in gloom!
This Death will come, and whom he loves he cleaves
Sheer through the steel and leather; hating whom
He smites in shameful wise behind the greaves.
'Tis a fair time with Dennis and the Saints,
And weary work to age, and want for rest,
When harness groweth heavy, and one faints,
With no bird left in any last year's nest!
Give ye good hap, then, all. For me, I lie
Broken in Christ's sweet hand, with whom shall rest To keep me living, now that I must die;
There is no bird in any last year's nest!
THE MOSQUE OF THE CALIPH.
UNTO Seyd the vizier spake the Caliph Abdallah:-
"Now hearken and hear, I am weary, by Allah!
I am faint with the mere over-running of leisure;
I will rouse me and rear up a palace to Pleasure !"
To Abdallah the Caliph spake Seyd the vizier :
"All faces grow pale if my Lord draweth near;
And the breath of his mouth not a mortal shall scoff it ;—
They must bend and obey, by the beard of the Prophet!"
Then the Caliph that heard, with becoming sedateness, Drew his hand down his beard as he thought of his greatness;
Drained out the last bead of the wine in the chalice: "I have spoken, O Seyd; I will build it, my palace!
"As a drop from the wine where the wine-cup hath spilled it,
As a gem from the mine, O my Seyd, I will build it; Without price, without flaw, it shall stand for a token That the word is a law which the Caliph hath spoken !"
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