 | Brother Fabian's Manuscript |  |
252
Can meetly solve the arrears of glory due?
Can tell how wise thou wert, how brave, how true?
Can speak to after years
The fulness of our love, our loss, our tears?—
I who, unlessoned in the skill divine,
Hear of thy fall, as under a strange shield,
Far in the fameless outskirt of the field,
Namelessly warring, haply young Lavaine
Might hear of Lancelot smitten through the brain
Full in the fore-front of the Table Round!—
O peerless Knight, and flower of chivalry!
No more at trumpet's sound
Thy grasp shall whiten on that mighty hilt,
To cleave the brazen panoply of guilt,
Rescue his victims, set his captives free!—
No more, no more in Knightly brotherhood,
Thy presence cheer us in the Eternal Fight!—
There, where thy greatness stood
A gate of strength, unyielding 'gainst the flood,
253
Falsehood, and falsehood's kin,
Fair-kirtled foulness, snowy-mantled sin!—
| Brother Fabian's Manuscript | |