The Collected Works of William Morris :: :: University of Virginia Library

SHE SINGETH.
Now is the rain upon the day,
And every water's wide;
Why busk ye then to wear the way,
And whither will ye ride?

HE SINGETH.
Our kine are on the eyot still,
The eddies lap them round;
All dykes the wind-worn waters fill,
And waneth grass and ground.

SHE SINGETH.
O ride ye to the river's brim
In war-weed fair to see?
Or winter waters will ye swim
In hauberks to the knee?

HE SINGETH.
Wild is the day, and dim with rain,
Our sheep are warded ill;
The wood-wolves gather for the plain,
Their ravening maws to fill.

SHE SINGETH.
Nay, what is this, and what have ye,
A hunter's band, to bear
The Banner of our Battle-glee
The skulking wolves to scare?

HE SINGETH.
O women, when we wend our ways
To deal with death and dread,
The Banner of our Fathers' Days
Must flap the wind o'erhead.

SHE SINGETH.
Ah, for the maidens that ye leave!
Who now shall save the hay?
What grooms shall kiss our lips at eve,
When June hath mastered May?

HE SINGETH.
The wheat is won, the seed is sown,
Here toileth many a maid,
And ere the hay knee-deep hath grown
Your grooms the grass shall wade.

THEY SING ALL TOGETHER.
Then fair befall the mountain-side
Whereon the play shall be!
And fair befall the summer-tide
That whoso lives shall see.

[The Song of the Ford.]

In hay-tide, through the day new-born,
Across the meads we come;
Our hauberks brush the blossomed corn
A furlong short of home.

Ere yet the gables we behold
Forth flasheth the red sun,
And smites our fallow helms and cold
Though all the fight be done.

In this last mead of mowing-grass
Sweet doth the clover smell,
Crushed 'neath our feet red with the pass
Where hell was blent with hell.

And now the willowy stream is nigh,
Down wend we to the ford;
No shafts across its fishes fly,
Nor flasheth there a sword.

But lo! what gleameth on the bank
Across the water wan,
As when our blood the mouse-ear drank
And red the river ran?

Nay, hasten to the ripple clear,
Look at the grass beyond!
Lo ye the dainty band and dear
Of maidens fair and fond!

Lo how they needs must take the stream!
The water hides their feet;
On fair kind arms the gold doth gleam,
And midst the ford we meet.

Up through the garden two and two,
And on the flowers we drip;
Their wet feet kiss the morning dew
As lip lies close to lip.

Here now we sing; here now we stay:
By these grey walls we tell
The love that lived from out the fray,
The love that fought and fell.