Page:Early poems of William Morris.djvu/217



Up and away through the drifting rain!

Let us ride to the Little Tower again,

Up and away from the council-board!

Do on the hauberk, gird on the sword.

The king is blind with gnashing his teeth.

Change gilded scabbard to leather sheath:

Though our arms are wet with the slanting rain,

This is joy to ride to my love again:

I laugh in his face when he bids me yield;

Who knows one field from the other field,

For the grey rain driveth all astray?—

Which way through the floods, good carle, I pray?

"The left side yet! the left side yet!

Till your hand strikes on the bridge parapet."

"Yea so: the causeway holdeth good

Under the water?" "Hard as wood;

"Right away to the uplands; speed, good knight."

Seven hours yet before the light.

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