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GLASTONBURY

Then Lancelot: "Though through the tale of years
That still are left before the longed-for earth
Receive my body, I should strive amain
To slay myself, and gain regenerate birth,
Alas it were all profitless and vain.
Verily, when I came unto this place
I railed on God, that I had lost my soul
And nothing gained: until a heavenly grace
Enwrapped me, like some sick man made half whole,
And now my grief is only for old sin.
But ah, what boots it? Lo, this barren tree
(He touched a shrub that grew beside the door),
This tree, methinks, shall bud and blossom before
I pass the gates divine, and enter in
To the fair country I must never see."

But even as he spoke, the hand of God
Worked on the sombre branches, and straightway
They were all green with sap, and bud, and leaf,
As at the very bidding of the spring,
Burst forth, and soon each tender branch was gay
With flowers that nodded in the winter's breeze
(So blossomed in old time the prophet's rod),
And Lancelot stood and saw the wondrous thing.

Then softly spake the hermit, "Now is grief
Reproved, and sorrow cast out with the lees;
For God beholds the living, not the dead;
And He that took the semblance of a child
Loves He but penance, and the drooping head,
Has He not sung for joy, has He not smiled?"

So they grew old together, and the years
Pressed no more to their lips the cup of tears
(They had drained all, maybe). And ever less
Seemed all things mortal, as in quietness
They pondered the eternal mysteries
(The noblest heritage of all men born),

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