THERE were trampling sounds of many feet, And music rushed through the crowded street: Proud music, such as tells the sky Of a chief returned from victory. There were banners to the winds unrolled, With haughty words on each blazoned fold; High battle-names, which had rung of yore When lances clashed on the Syrian shore. Borne from their dwellings, green and lone, There were flowers of the woods on the pathway strown; And wheels that crushed as they swept along; -- Oh! what doth the violet amidst the throng? I saw where a bright procession passed The gates of a minster old and vast; And a king to his crowning-place was led, Through a sculptured line of the warrior-dead. I saw, far gleaming, the long array Of trophies, on those high tombs that lay, And the coloured light, that wrapped them all, Rich, deep, and sad, as a royal pall. But a lowlier grave soon won mine eye Away from th' ancestral pageantry -- A grave by the lordly minster's gate, Unhonoured, and yet not desolate. It was a dewy greensward bed, Meet for the rest of a peasant head; But Love -- oh, lovelier than all beside! -- That lone place guarded and glorified. For a gentle form stood watching there, Young -- but how sorrowfully fair! Keeping the flowers of the holy spot, That reckless feet might profane them not. Clear, pale and clear, was the tender cheek, And her eye, though tearful, serenely meek; And I deemed, by its lifted gaze of love, That her sad heart's treasure was all above. For alone she seemed midst the throng to be, Like a bird of the waves far away at sea; Alone, in a mourner's vest arrayed, And with folded hands, e'en as if she prayed. It faded before me, that mask of pride, The haughty swell of the music died; Banner, and armour, and tossing plume, All melted away in the twilight's gloom. But that orphan form, with its willowy grace, And the speaking prayer in that pale, calm face, Still, still o'er my thoughts in the night-hour glide -- -- Oh! Love is lovelier than all beside! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...POE'S COTTAGE AT FORDHAM by JOHN HENRY BONER AFTER WINTER by STERLING ALLEN BROWN IN HOSPITAL: 28. DISCHARGED by WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY HYMN: 32. THE NATIVITY OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST by CHRISTOPHER SMART THE WEDDING FEAST: 5 by ANNA HEMPSTEAD BRANCH THE WANDERER: 5. IN HOLLAND: THE CANTICLE OF LOVE by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON |