Saint George

By a broad flash the fog was split,
And Saint George, with gold and jewels lit,
Came down the slope of it,
With feathers foaming from his crest,
Riding a charger with a milky breast,
And in its mouth no bit.

With diamonds decked the two
Made of their fall a path of pity to
This earth of ours from Heaven's blue.

Heroes with helpful virtues dowered,
Sonorous with courage, heroes crystalline,
O through my heart now let the radiance shine
That from his aureolar sword is showered!
O let me hear the silver prattle
Of the wind around his coat of mail,
And around his spurs in battle;
Saint George, who shall prevail,
He who has heard the cries of my distress,
And comes to save from scaith
My poor arms stretched unto his great prowess!

Like a loud cry of faith,
He holds his lance at rest,
Saint George;
He passes, I behold
A victory as of a haggard gold,
I see his forehead with the Chrism blessed:
Saint George of duty,
Bright with his heart's and his own beauty.

Sound, all ye voices of my hope!
Sound in myself, and on the sun-swept slope,
And high roads, and the shaded avenue!
And, gleams of silver between stones, be you
Joy, and you pebbles white with waters ope
Your eyes, and look
Up through the brook
Whose ripples o'er you roll,
And, landscape with thy crimson lakes, be thou
The mirror of the flights of flame that now
Saint George takes to my soul!

Against the black dragon's teeth,
Against the pustules of a leprous skin
He is the glaive and the miraculous sheath.
Charity on his cuirass burns, and in
His courage is the bounding overthrow
Of instinct swart with sin.

Fire golden-sifted, fire that wheels,
And eddying stars in which his glory lies,
Flashed from his charger's galloping heels,
Dazzle my memory's eyes.

The beautiful ambassador is he
From the white country that with marble glows,
Where in the parks, on the sea's strand, and on the tree
Of goodness, kindness gently grows.

The port, he knows it, where the vessels ride,
With angels filled, upon a rippling tide;
And the long evenings lighting islands fair
But motionless upon their waters, where,
And in eyes also, firmaments are seen.

This kingdom hath the Virgin for its Queen,
And St. George is the humble joy of her palace,
In the air his falchion glimmers like a chalice;
Saint George with his devouring light,
Who like a fire of gold dispels my spirit's night.

He knows how far my feet have wandered,
He knows the strength that I have squandered,
And with what fogs my brain has fought,
He knows what keen assassin knives
Have cut black crosses in my thought,
He knows my scorn of rich men's lives,
He knows the mask of wrath and folly
Upon the dregs of my melancholy.

I was a coward in my flight
Out of the world in my sick, vain defiance;
I have lifted, under the roofs of night,
The golden marbles of a hostile science
To the barred summits of black oracles;
But the King of the Night is Death;
And man but in the dawning's breath
His enigmatic effort spells;
When flowers unclose, prayer too uncloses,
With the scent of prayer their lips are sweet,
And the white sun on a nacreous water-sheet
Is a kiss that on man's lips reposes;
Dawn is a counsel to be bold,
And he who hearkens is tenfold
Saved from the marsh that never yet cleansed sin.

Saint George in cuirass glittering
With leaps of fire sprung
Unto my soul through the fresh morning;
He was beautiful with faith and young;

And more to me he bent
As he beheld me penitent;
As from an intimate golden phial
He filled me with his soaring;
Though he was proud unto my sight,
I laid the sweet flowers of my trial
In his pale hand of blest restoring;
Then signed he, ere he did depart,
My brow with his lance's cross of gold,
Bade me be of good cheer and bold,
And soared, and bore to God my heart.