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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE THREE RIDERS by WILSON PUGSLEY MACDONALD

First Line: THREE MEN WENT RIDING DOWN A HILL
Last Line: "O WOMEN ARE STRANGE,"" THE OTHER TWO SAID."
I

THREE men went riding @3down@1 a hill
When the stars were bright and the winds were still.

Their tunics were red and their helmets were gold
And with scented wood were their sandals soled.

Their horses' flanks were like moistened silk,
Their horses' teeth were as white as milk.

The meadows around were sweet as a song,
But the road smoked dust as they passed along.

And two men whispered after a time:
"We'll leave the road with its dust and grime,

"For here our tunics will soil and fade,
And freeze the eye of some haughty maid."

So they left the road for a cool retreat,
But the third went on through the dust and heat,

Went on and on past meadow and town,
Until his red tunic was frayed and brown.

He saw strange things and he felt hard blows;
He touched a thorn but he gained a rose.

The gold of his helmet no longer shone,
But his soul had something to feast upon.

Many and many a year did he roam
And his face was bronze as he turned home.

II

Three men came riding @3up@1 a hill
When the stars were bright and the winds were still.

And two looked fine as upon that day
When they went @3down@1 the hill and away.

They had spent the years in a cool retreat,
Away from the dust and the grime and the heat.

Their tunics flashed red and their helmets shone,
But their souls had nothing to feast upon.

The garb of the third was frayed and torn,
And the two men laughed at him in scorn.

And they met a maiden whose hair fell down
On her shoulders like rain on a marble town.

And the two fine fellows in tunics of red
Bowed to the maiden fair, and said:

"What shall we do with this sad clown
Whose helmet is bent and whose robes are brown?

"We kept away from the strife and din
That we in your eyes might favor win.

"But he, poor fool, went travelling far;
And his face is covered with many a scar."

And the maiden cried: "In a near-by store
There are twenty fine tunics of red, and more.

"But I cannot buy in the great, wide town
A garment like his that is frayed and brown."

And she called aloud, and her eyes were stars:
"Come here, O man with the lovely scars!"

And she bathed his wounds and she gave him bed,
And covered with kisses his dark, bronze head.
"O women are strange," the other two said.



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