ANDRÉ LE CHAPELAIN And suit for alms prefer Must I, as bondsman, kneel That none shall aught refuse To Love's own secrecy ; Avert, avert it, Queen! Let me at least be seen An usher in thy courts, Outworn, but still indued With badge of servitude. When I no more may go, As one who treads on air, To string-notes soft and slow, By maids found sweet and fair— When I no more may be Of Love's blithe company ; When I no more may sit Leave me at least to sing Thy mirth, thy festival; [Here ended Andre's words: But One, that writeth, saith— Betwixt his stricken chords He heard the Wheels of Death; And knew the fruits Love bare But Dead-Sea apples were.] THE DYING OF TANNEGUY DU BOIS THE DYING OF TANNEGUY DU BOIS En los nidos de antaño No hay pájaros hogaño. -SPANISH PROVERB. 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 Gone southward to the fighting by the sea;- Yea, with me now all dreams are done, I ween, 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! Is she a dream I left in Aquitaine?— 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 back again to her, Giselle ; But how, my Masters, ye are wrapt in gloom! 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 ! |