Two Poets
1
“The love-mad lark you sing of swooned,” they said,
“And speared his bosom on a thorn of last
Year’s rose; cease playing Orpheus; no blast
You blow can raise Eurydice once dead.
Our ears are cloyed with songs our fathers heard
Of how your lady’s face and form were fair;
Put by your fluting; swell a martial air,
And spur us on with some prophetic word.”
So, wearying, he changed his tune, and won
The praise of little men (who needed none) ...
But oh to see him smile as when dawn blew
A trumpet only he could hear, and dew
He could not brush away besieged his eyes
At sight of gulls departing from his skies.
2
“How could a woman love him; love, or wed?”
And thinking only of his tuneless face
And arms that held no hint of skill or grace,
They shook a slow, commiserative head
To see him amble by; but still they fed
Their wilting hearts on his, were fired to race
Once more, and panting at life’s deadly pace,
They drank as wine the blood-in-song he shed.
Yet in the dream-walled room where last he lay,
Soft garments gathered dust all night and day,
As women whom he loved and sang of came
To smooth his brow and wail a secret name.
A rose placed in his hand by Guinevere
Was drenched with Magdalen’s eternal tear.