'Neath the third one's mighty will All my soul lay very still, Feeling all its being thrill As she, smiling, said to me: "Thou dost know, and thou canst see: What thou art arise and be!"
To my lips her lips she pressed; And my new-born soul, thrice-blessed, Clasped her radiance and caressed: Mounted and, in glory clad, Soared with them who chorused glad: "Christ awaits thee, Galahad!"
_The good Knight_, SIR LIONELL DE GANIS, _wounded unto death, addresses his Lady_, EVALOTT, _in the Forest of Dean, whither he has been borne on his shield_.
And shall it be, when white thorns flake With blossoms all the Maytime brake, The rustle of a flower or leaf Will let thee know That I am near thee, as thy grief, As long ago?
Or shall it be, when blows and dies The wood-anemone, two eyes Will gaze in thine, as faint as frost? And thou, in dreams, Wilt hear the sigh of one long lost, Who near thee seems.
Or shall it be, where waters soothe The stillness, thou wilt hear the smooth Dim notes of a familiar lute, And in thine ears Old Provence melodies, long mute, Like falling tears?...
Now doff my helm.--Loop thy white arm Beneath my hair. So. Let thy warm Blue eyes gaze in mine for a space, A little while... Love, it will rest me... And thy face-- Ah, let it smile.
Now art thou thou. Yet--let thy hair, A golden wonder, fall; thy fair Full throat bend low; thy kiss be hot With love, not dry With anguish.--Sweet, my Evalott! Now let me die.
"_Childe Rowland to the dark tower came._"
The hills around were iron, The sky, a boundless black, Where wells of the lightning opened And boiled with blazing rack, When he came to the giant castle, The wild rain on his back.
Huge in the night and tempest, Over the cataract's bed, Its windows, ulcers of fire, Its gate, a hell-lit red, The Dark Tower loomed; and wildly A voice sang overhead.
Thrice, under its warlock turrets, Where the causeway of rock was laid; Thrice, there at its owlet portal, His scornful bugle brayed; And the drawbridge clanged at his summons, And he rode in unafraid.
The heavens were riven asunder, One glare of blinding storm; And the blackness, chasmed with thunder, Blazed form on demon form, As he rode in the court of the castle, The shield upon his arm.