I. WHEN that the Queen with all her maids came singing Across the daisies, through a dusk of May, Their spoils of fairy gold and silver bringing, You rang no chime in that sweet roundelay:— But held yourself a little way apart, Your hands above your heart,— A fair frail image robed in royal scarlet, Dreaming of splendours insolent and war-lit, Dreaming of crowns to wear,— Although your drooping head could hardly bear Its crown-imperial of yellow hair. II. Crowns, crowns of tournaments to lay before you! What was a wistful singer to your pride, A clerkly dreamer-Knight? Ah, to adore you, I gripped the lance, and threw the pen aside.— But oh! the crown of song is loveliest. Yea! I have loved you best,— Crowned you in dreams with faint white stars of glory, Kisses imagined from all antique story; —But you as bindweed hold My rare dream-jasmine. You would circlets cold Of wounding laurel and of bruising gold. III. Therefore I lie here vanquished. Let the victor Carry the crown before your red-shod feet: Love is a cruel god,—hath many a lictor To scourge with briar who found the Rose too sweet. Yon ring of hard bright faces hems me in, Branding like bitter sin: Yours flashes like a jewel,—crowned, unsated, My shame your honour. Thus, then, was it fated, O cold unheeding breast!— And yet the crown of love is loveliest. Farewell! Farewell! But I have loved you best. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ON THE PROSPECT OF PLANTING ARTS AND LEARNING IN AMERICA by GEORGE BERKELEY ARIZONA POEMS: 4. THE WINDMILLS by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER A ST. HELENA LULLABY by RUDYARD KIPLING SONNET: 18 by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE IN MEMORIAM A.H.H.: 47 by ALFRED TENNYSON A NEW PILGRIMAGE: 38 by WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT THE FUNERAL OF ANTONIO GIANNO by STIRLING BOWEN SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE: 15 by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING |