A Ballad of Death
Kneel down, fair Love, and fill thyself with tears,
Girdle thyself with sighing
for a girth
Upon the sides of
mirth,
Cover thy lips and eyelids,
let thine ears
Be filled with rumour of
people sorrowing;
Make thee soft raiment out
of woven sighs
Upon the flesh to
cleave,
Set pains therein and many
a grievous thing,
And many sorrows after each
his wise
For armlet and for gorget and for
sleeve.
O Love’s lute heard about the lands of
death,
Left hanged upon the trees
that were therein;
O Love and Time and
Sin,
Three singing mouths that
mourn now underbreath,
Three lovers, each one evil
spoken of;
O smitten lips wherethrough
this voice of mine
Came softer with her
praise;
Abide a little for our lady’s love.
The kisses of her mouth were more than
wine,
And more than peace the passage of her
days.
O Love, thou knowest if she were good to see.
O Time, thou shalt not find in any
land
Till, cast out of thine
hand,
The sunlight and the
moonlight fail from thee,
Another woman fashioned like as this.
O Sin, thou knowest that all thy shame
in her
Was made a goodly
thing;
Yea, she caught Shame and
shamed him with her kiss,
With her fair kiss, and
lips much lovelier
Than lips of amorous roses in late
spring.
By night there stood over against my
bed
Queen Venus with a hood
striped gold and black,
Both sides drawn fully
back
From brows wherein the sad
blood failed of red,
And temples drained of purple and full
of death.
Her curled hair had the wave of
sea-water
And the sea’s gold in it.
Her eyes were as a dove’s that sickeneth.
Strewn dust of gold she had shed over
her,
And pearl and purple and amber on her
feet.
Upon her raiment of dyed sendaline
Were painted all the secret
ways of love
And covered things
thereof,
That hold delight as
grape-flowers hold their wine;
Red mouths of maidens and
red feet of doves,
And brides that kept within
the bride-chamber
Their garment of soft
shame,
And weeping faces of the
wearied loves
That swoon in sleep and
awake wearier,
With heat of lips and hair shed out like
flame.
The tears that through her eyelids fell
on me
Made mine own bitter where
they ran between
As blood had fallen
therein,
She saying; Arise, lift up
thine eyes and see
If any glad thing be or any
good
Now the best thing is taken
forth of us;
Even she to whom all
praise
Was as one flower in a
great multitude,
One glorious flower of many
and glorious,
One day found gracious
among many days:
Even she whose handmaiden
was Love — to whom
At kissing times across her
stateliest bed
Kings bowed themselves and
shed
Pale wine, and honey with
the honeycomb,
And spikenard bruised for a
burnt-offering;
Even she between whose lips
the kiss became
As fire and
frankincense;
Whose hair was as gold
raiment on a king,
Whose eyes were as the
morning purged with flame,
Whose eyelids as sweet savour issuing
thence.
Then I beheld, and lo on the other
side
My lady’s likeness crowned and robed and
dead.
Sweet still, but now not red,
Was the shut mouth whereby men lived and
died.
And sweet, but emptied of the blood’s
blue shade,
The great curled eyelids that withheld
her eyes.
And sweet, but like spoilt gold,
The weight of colour in her tresses
weighed.
And sweet, but as a vesture with new
dyes,
The body that was clothed with love of
old.
Ah! that my tears filled all her woven
hair
And all the hollow bosom of
her gown —
Ah! that my tears ran
down
Even to the place where
many kisses were,
Even where her parted
breast-flowers have place,
Even where they are cloven apart — who
knows not this?
Ah! the flowers cleave apart
And their sweet fills the
tender interspace;
Ah! the leaves grown
thereof were things to kiss
Ere their fine gold was tarnished at the
heart.
Ah! in the days when God did good to
me,
Each part about her was a
righteous thing;
Her mouth an
almsgiving,
The glory of her garments
charity,
The beauty of her bosom a
good deed,
In the good days when God
kept sight of us;
Love lay upon her eyes,
And on that hair whereof
the world takes heed;
And all her body was more
virtuous
Than souls of women fashioned otherwise.
Now, ballad, gather poppies in thine
hands
And sheaves of brier and
many rusted sheaves
Rain-rotten in rank
lands,
Waste marigold and late
unhappy leaves
And grass that fades ere
any of it be mown;
And when thy bosom is
filled full thereof
Seek out Death’s face ere
the light altereth,
And say “My master that was
thrall to Love
Is become thrall to Death.”
Bow down before him, ballad, sigh and
groan,
But make no sojourn in thy
outgoing;
For haply it may be
That when thy feet return
at evening
Death shall come in with thee.