Epic Poetry

"So Merlin riddling angered me; but thou Fear not to give this King thy only child, Guinevere: so great bards of him will sing Hereafter;"

"Merlin in our time Hath spoken also, not in jest, and sworn Though men may wound him that he will not die, But pass, again to come; and then or now Utterly smite the heathen underfoot, Till these and all men hail him for their king."

""Alas that ever a knight should be so false." Then turned, and so returned, and groaning laid The naked sword athwart their naked throats, There left it, and them sleeping; and she lay, The circlet of her tourney round her brows, And the sword of the tourney across her throat."

"One rose, a rose to gather by and by, One rose, a rose, to gather and to wear, No rose but one — what other rose had I? One rose, my rose; a rose that will not die, — He dies who loves it, — if the worm be there."

"A rose, but one, none other rose had I, A rose, one rose, and this was wondrous fair, One rose, a rose that gladdened earth and sky, One rose, my rose, that sweetened all mine air — I cared not for the thorns; the thorns were there."

"While thus he spake, she gazed upon the man Of princely bearing, though in bonds, and thought, "Why have I pushed him from me? this man loves, If love there be: yet him I loved not. Why? I deemed him fool? yea, so? or that in him A something — was it nobler than myself? Seemed my reproach? He is not of my kind. He could not love me, did he know me well. Nay, let him go — and quickly." And her knights Laughed not, but thrust him bounden out of door."

"Lady, for indeed I loved you and I deemed you beautiful, I cannot brook to see your beauty marred Through evil spite: and if ye love me not, I cannot bear to dream you so forsworn: I had liefer ye were worthy of my love, Than to be loved again of you — farewell; And though ye kill my hope, not yet my love, Vex not yourself: ye will not see me more."

"And Pelleas overthrew them, one to three; And they rose up, and bound, and brought him in. Then first her anger, leaving Pelleas, burned Full on her knights in many an evil name Of craven, weakling, and thrice-beaten hound"

"So Gawain, looking at the villainy done, Forbore, but in his heat and eagerness Trembled and quivered, as the dog, withheld A moment from the vermin that he sees Before him, shivers, ere he springs and kills."

"Gawain passing by, Bound upon solitary adventure, saw Low down beneath the shadow of those towers A villainy, three to one: and through his heart The fire of honour and all noble deeds Flashed, and he called, "I strike upon thy side — The caitiffs!" "Nay," said Pelleas, "but forbear; He needs no aid who doth his lady's will.""

"And after this, a week beyond, again She called them, saying, "There he watches yet, There like a dog before his master's door! Kicked, he returns: do ye not hate him, ye? Ye know yourselves: how can ye bide at peace, Affronted with his fulsome innocence? Are ye but creatures of the board and bed, No men to strike? Fall on him all at once, And if ye slay him I reck not: if ye fail, Give ye the slave mine order to be bound, Bind him as heretofore, and bring him in: It may be ye shall slay him in his bonds.""

"Then she began to rail so bitterly, With all her damsels, he was stricken mute; But when she mocked his vows and the great King, Lighted on words: "For pity of thine own self, Peace, Lady, peace: is he not thine and mine?" "Thou fool," she said, "I never heard his voice But longed to break away. Unbind him now, And thrust him out of doors; for save he be Fool to the midmost marrow of his bones, He will return no more." And those, her three, Laughed, and unbound, and thrust him from the gate."

"Then when he came before Ettarre, the sight Of her rich beauty made him at one glance More bondsman in his heart than in his bonds. Yet with good cheer he spake, "Behold me, Lady, A prisoner, and the vassal of thy will; And if thou keep me in thy donjon here, Content am I so that I see thy face But once a day: for I have sworn my vows, And thou hast given thy promise, and I know That all these pains are trials of my faith, And that thyself, when thou hast seen me strained And sifted to the utmost, wilt at length Yield me thy love and know me for thy knight.""

"He heard her voice; Then let the strong hand, which had overthrown Her minion-knights, by those he overthrew Be bounden straight, and so they brought him in."

"Thereon her wrath became a hate; and once, A week beyond, while walking on the walls With her three knights, she pointed downward, "Look, He haunts me — I cannot breathe — besieges me; Down! strike him! put my hate into your strokes, And drive him from my walls." And down they went, And Pelleas overthrew them one by one; And from the tower above him cried Ettarre, "Bind him, and bring him in.""

"This persistence turned her scorn to wrath. Then calling her three knights, she charged them, "Out! And drive him from the walls." And out they came But Pelleas overthrew them as they dashed Against him one by one; and these returned, But still he kept his watch beneath the wall."

"These be the ways of ladies," Pelleas thought, "To those who love them, trials of our faith. Yea, let her prove me to the uttermost, For loyal to the uttermost am I."

"Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow in the sky! A young man will be wiser by and by; An old man's wit may wander ere he die. Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow on the lea! And truth is this to me, and that to thee; And truth or clothed or naked let it be. Rain, sun, and rain! and the free blossom blows: Sun, rain, and sun! and where is he who knows? From the great deep to the great deep he goes."

""If he fly us, Small matter! let him." This her damsels heard, And mindful of her small and cruel hand, They, closing round him through the journey home, Acted her hest, and always from her side Restrained him with all manner of device, So that he could not come to speech with her. And when she gained her castle, upsprang the bridge, Down rang the grate of iron through the groove, And he was left alone in open field."

"I cannot bide Sir Baby. Keep him back Among yourselves. Would rather that we had Some rough old knight who knew the worldly way, Albeit grizzlier than a bear, to ride And jest with: take him to you, keep him off, And pamper him with papmeat, if ye will"

"Said Guinevere, "We marvel at thee much, O damsel, wearing this unsunny face To him who won thee glory!" And she said, "Had ye not held your Lancelot in your bower, My Queen, he had not won." Whereat the Queen, As one whose foot is bitten by an ant, Glanced down upon her, turned and went her way."

"Then rang the shout his lady loved: the heat Of pride and glory fired her face; her eye Sparkled; she caught the circlet from his lance, And there before the people crowned herself: So for the last time she was gracious to him."

"Pelleas looked Noble among the noble, for he dreamed His lady loved him, and he knew himself Loved of the King: and him his new-made knight Worshipt, whose lightest whisper moved him more Than all the rangd reasons of the world."

"The men who met him rounded on their heels And wondered after him, because his face Shone like the countenance of a priest of old Against the flame about a sacrifice Kindled by fire from heaven: so glad was he."

"When they reached Caerleon, ere they past to lodging, she, Taking his hand, "O the strong hand," she said, "See! look at mine! but wilt thou fight for me, And win me this fine circlet, Pelleas, That I may love thee?""

"She muttered, "I have lighted on a fool, Raw, yet so stale!""

"While he gazed The beauty of her flesh abashed the boy, As though it were the beauty of her soul: For as the base man, judging of the good, Puts his own baseness in him by default Of will and nature, so did Pelleas lend All the young beauty of his own soul to hers"

"Make me thy knight, because I know, Sir King, All that belongs to knighthood, and I love."

"So spake the King: I knew not all he meant."

"Some among you held, that if the King Had seen the sight he would have sworn the vow: Not easily, seeing that the King must guard That which he rules, and is but as the hind To whom a space of land is given to plow. Who may not wander from the allotted field Before his work be done; but, being done, Let visions of the night or of the day Come, as they will; and many a time they come, Until this earth he walks on seems not earth, This light that strikes his eyeball is not light, This air that smites his forehead is not air But vision — yea, his very hand and foot — In moments when he feels he cannot die, And knows himself no vision to himself, Nor the high God a vision, nor that One Who rose again: ye have seen what ye have seen."

"And spake I not too truly, O my knights? Was I too dark a prophet when I said To those who went upon the Holy Quest, That most of them would follow wandering fires, Lost in the quagmire? — lost to me and gone, And left me gazing at a barren board, And a lean Order — scarce returned a tithe — And out of those to whom the vision came My greatest hardly will believe he saw; Another hath beheld it afar off, And leaving human wrongs to right themselves, Cares but to pass into the silent life. And one hath had the vision face to face, And now his chair desires him here in vain, However they may crown him otherwhere."

"— But thou errest, Lancelot: never yet Could all of true and noble in knight and man Twine round one sin, whatever it might be, With such a closeness, but apart there grew, Save that he were the swine thou spakest of, Some root of knighthood and pure nobleness; Whereto see thou, that it may bear its flower."

"Deafer," said the blameless King, "Gawain, and blinder unto holy things Hope not to make thyself by idle vows, Being too blind to have desire to see. But if indeed there came a sign from heaven, Blessed are Bors, Lancelot and Percivale, For these have seen according to their sight. For every fiery prophet in old times, And all the sacred madness of the bard, When God made music through them, could but speak His music by the framework and the chord; And as ye saw it ye have spoken truth."

"Thy holy nun and thou have driven men mad, Yea, made our mightiest madder than our least. But by mine eyes and by mine ears I swear, I will be deafer than the blue-eyed cat, And thrice as blind as any noonday owl, To holy virgins in their ecstasies, Henceforward."

"Blasted and burnt, and blinded as I was, With such a fierceness that I swooned away — O, yet methought I saw the Holy Grail, All palled in crimson samite, and around Great angels, awful shapes, and wings and eyes. And but for all my madness and my sin, And then my swooning, I had sworn I saw That which I saw; but what I saw was veiled And covered; and this Quest was not for me."

"Forth I went, and while I yearned and strove To tear the twain asunder in my heart, My madness came upon me as of old, And whipt me into waste fields far away; There was I beaten down by little men, Mean knights, to whom the moving of my sword And shadow of my spear had been enow To scare them from me once."

"When thy knights Sware, I sware with them only in the hope That could I touch or see the Holy Grail They might be plucked asunder. Then I spake To one most holy saint, who wept and said, That save they could be plucked asunder, all My quest were but in vain"

"O King, my friend, if friend of thine I be, Happier are those that welter in their sin, Swine in the mud, that cannot see for slime, Slime of the ditch: but in me lived a sin So strange, of such a kind, that all of pure, Noble, and knightly in me twined and clung Round that one sin, until the wholesome flower And poisonous grew together, each as each, Not to be plucked asunder"

"Our Arthur kept his best until the last; "Thou, too, my Lancelot," asked the king, "my friend, Our mightiest, hath this Quest availed for thee?""

""Hail, Bors! if ever loyal man and true Could see it, thou hast seen the Grail;" and Bors, "Ask me not, for I may not speak of it: I saw it;" and the tears were in his eyes."

"O the pity To find thine own first love once more — to hold, Hold her a wealthy bride within thine arms, Or all but hold, and then — cast her aside, Foregoing all her sweetness, like a weed. For we that want the warmth of double life, We that are plagued with dreams of something sweet Beyond all sweetness in a life so rich, — Ah, blessd Lord, I speak too earthlywise, Seeing I never strayed beyond the cell."

"Poor men, when yule is cold, Must be content to sit by little fires."

"I rose and fled, But wailed and wept, and hated mine own self, And even the Holy Quest, and all but her; Then after I was joined with Galahad Cared not for her, nor anything upon earth."

"We have heard of thee: thou art our greatest knight, Our Lady says it, and we well believe: Wed thou our Lady, and rule over us, And thou shalt be as Arthur in our land."

"The Princess of that castle was the one, Brother, and that one only, who had ever Made my heart leap; for when I moved of old A slender page about her father's hall, And she a slender maiden, all my heart Went after her with longing: yet we twain Had never kissed a kiss, or vowed a vow. And now I came upon her once again, And one had wedded her, and he was dead, And all his land and wealth and state were hers."

"I chanced upon a goodly town With one great dwelling in the middle of it; Thither I made, and there was I disarmed By maidens each as fair as any flower"

"All men, to one so bound by such a vow, And women were as phantoms."

"I saw the spiritual city and all her spires And gateways in a glory like one pearl — No larger, though the goal of all the saints — Strike from the sea; and from the star there shot A rose-red sparkle to the city, and there Dwelt, and I knew it was the Holy Grail, Which never eyes on earth again shall see."

"O'er his head the Holy Vessel hung Redder than any rose, a joy to me, For now I knew the veil had been withdrawn."

"On either hand, as far as eye could see, A great black swamp and of an evil smell, Part black, part whitened with the bones of men, Not to be crost, save that some ancient king Had built a way, where, linked with many a bridge, A thousand piers ran into the great Sea. And Galahad fled along them bridge by bridge, And every bridge as quickly as he crost Sprang into fire and vanished, though I yearned To follow; and thrice above him all the heavens Opened and blazed with thunder such as seemed Shoutings of all the sons of God: and first At once I saw him far on the great Sea, In silver-shining armour starry-clear; And o'er his head the Holy Vessel hung Clothed in white samite or a luminous cloud."