The Wild Knight and Other Poems. Gilbert Keith Chesterton

      Dark the sea was: but I saw him,

        One great head with goggle eyes,

      Like a diabolic cherub

        Flying in those fallen skies.

      I have heard the hoarse deniers,

        I have known the wordy wars;

      I have seen a man, by shouting,

        Seek to orphan all the stars.

      I have seen a fool half-fashioned

        Borrow from the heavens a tongue,

      So to curse them more at leisure —

        – And I trod him not as dung.

      For I saw that finny goblin

        Hidden in the abyss untrod;

      And I knew there can be laughter

        On the secret face of God.

      Blow the trumpets, crown the sages,

        Bring the age by reason fed!

      (He that sitteth in the heavens,

        'He shall laugh' – the prophet said.)

      Lo! I am come to autumn,

        When all the leaves are gold;

      Grey hairs and golden leaves cry out

        The year and I are old.

      In youth I sought the prince of men,

        Captain in cosmic wars,

      Our Titan, even the weeds would show

        Defiant, to the stars.

      But now a great thing in the street

        Seems any human nod,

      Where shift in strange democracy

        The million masks of God.

      In youth I sought the golden flower

        Hidden in wood or wold,

      But I am come to autumn,

        When all the leaves are gold.

      I had grown weary of him; of his breath

      And hands and features I was sick to death.

      Each day I heard the same dull voice and tread;

      I did not hate him: but I wished him dead.

      And he must with his blank face fill my life —

      Then my brain blackened; and I snatched a knife.

      But ere I struck, my soul's grey deserts through

      A voice cried, 'Know at least what thing you do.'

      'This is a common man: knowest thou, O soul,

      What this thing is? somewhere where seasons roll

      There is some living thing for whom this man

      Is as seven heavens girt into a span,

      For some one soul you take the world away —

      Now know you well your deed and purpose. Slay!'

      Then I cast down the knife upon the ground

      And saw that mean man for one moment crowned.

      I turned and laughed: for there was no one by —

      The man that I had sought to slay was I.

      That night the whole world mingled,

        The souls were babes at play,

      And angel danced with devil.

        And God cried, 'Holiday!'

      The sea had climbed the mountain peaks,

        And shouted to the stars

      To come to play: and down they came

        Splashing in happy wars.

      The pine grew apples for a whim,

        The cart-horse built a nest;

      The oxen flew, the flowers sang,

        The sun rose in the west.

      And 'neath the load of many worlds,

        The lowest life God made

      Lifted his huge and heavy limbs

        And into heaven strayed.

      To where the highest life God made

        Before His presence stands;

      But God himself cried, 'Holiday!'

        And she gave me both her hands.

      All day the nations climb and crawl and pray

        In one long pilgrimage to one white shrine,

      Where sleeps a saint whose pardon, like his peace,

        Is wide as death, as common, as divine.

      His statue in an aureole fills the shrine,

        The reckless nightingale, the roaming fawn,

      Share the broad blessing of his lifted hands,

        Under the canopy, above the lawn.

      But one strange night, a night of gale and flood,

        A sound came louder than the wild wind's tone;

      The grave-gates shook and opened: and one stood

        Blue in the moonlight, rotten to the bone.

      Then on the statue, graven with holy smiles,

        There came another smile – tremendous – one

      Of an Egyptian god. 'Why should you rise?

        'Do I not guard your secret from the sun?

      The nations come; they kneel among the flowers

        Sprung from your blood, blossoms of May and June,

      Which do not poison them – is it not strange?

        Speak!' And the dead man shuddered in the moon.

      Shall I not cry the truth?' – the dead man cowered —

        Is it not sad, with life so tame and cold,

      What earth should fade into the sun's white fires

        With the best jest in all its tales untold?

      'If I should cry that in this shrine lie hid

        Stories that Satan from his mouth would spew;

      Wild tales that men in hell tell hoarsely – speak!

        Saint and Deliverer! Should I slander you?'

      Slowly the cowering corse reared up its head,

        'Nay, I am vile … but when for all to see,

      You stand there, pure and painless – death of life!

        Let the stars fall – I say you slander me!

      'You make