‘A. E.’ (George William Russell) (1867–1935)

IN the wet dusk silver-sweet,

Down the violet-scented ways,

As I moved with quiet feet

I was met by mighty days.

On the hedge the hanging dew

Glass’d the eve and stars and skies;

While I gazed a madness grew

Into thunder’d battle-cries.

Where the hawthorn glimmer’d white,

Flashed the spear and fell the stroke,

Ah, what faces pale and bright

Where the dazzling battle broke!

There a hero-hearted queen

With young beauty lit the van.

Gone! the darkness flow’d between

All the ancient wars of man.

While I paced the valley’s gloom,

Where the rabbits patter’d near,

Shone a temple and a tomb

With a legend carven clear:

Time put by a myriad fates

That her day might dawn in glory:

Death made wide a million gates

So to close her tragic story.