Poems By the Way Part 33

She looked back o'er her shoulder fair: "The whelming poison-pool is here;

And now availeth nought the blade: O if my cherished trees might aid!

But now my feet fail. Leave me then!

And hold my memory dear of men."

He caught her in his arms again; Of her dear side was he full fain.

Her body in his arms was dear: "Sweet art thou, though we perish here!"

Like quicksilver came on the flood: But lo, the borders of the wood!

She slid from out his arms and stayed; Round a great oak her arms she laid.

"If e'er I saved thee, lovely tree, From axe and saw, now, succour me:

Look how the venom creeps anigh, Help! lest thou see me writhe and die."

She crouched beside the upheaved root, The bubbling venom touched her foot;

Then with a sucking gasping sound It ebbed back o'er the blighted ground.

Up then she rose and took his hand And never a moment did they stand.

"Come, love," she cried, "the ways I know, How thick soe'er the thickets grow.

O love, I love thee! O thine heart!

How mighty and how kind thou art!"

Therewith they saw the tree-dusk lit, Bright grey the great boles gleamed on it.

"O flee," she said, "the sword is nought Against the flickering fire-flaught."

"But this availeth yet," said he, "That Hallows All our love may see."

He turned about and faced the glare: "O Mother, help us, kind and fair!

Now help me, true St. Nicholas, If ever truly thine I was!"

Therewith the wild-fire waned and paled And in the wood the light nigh failed;

And all about 'twas as the night.

He said: "Now won is all our fight,

And now meseems all were but good If thou mightst bring us from the wood."

She fawned upon him, face and breast; She said: "It hangs 'twixt worst and best.

And yet, O love, if thou be true, One thing alone thou hast to do."

Sweetly he kissed her, cheek and chin: "What work thou biddest will I win."

"O love, my love, I needs must sleep; Wilt thou my slumbering body keep,

And, toiling sorely, still bear on The love thou seemest to have won?"

"O easy toil," he said, "to bless Mine arms with all thy loveliness."

She smiled; "Yea, easy it may seem, But harder is it than ye deem.

For hearken! Whatso thou mayst see, Piteous as it may seem to thee,

Heed not nor hearken! bear me forth, As though nought else were aught of worth,

For all earth's wealth that may be found Lay me not sleeping on the ground,

To help, to hinder, or to save!

Or there for me thou diggest a grave."

He took her body on his arm, Her slumbering head lay on his barm.

Then glad he bore her on the way, And the wood grew lighter with the day.

All still it was, till suddenly He heard a bitter wail near by.

Yet on he went until he heard The cry become a shapen word:

"Help me, O help, thou pa.s.ser by!

Turn from the path, let me not die!

I am a woman; bound and left To perish; of all help bereft."

Then died the voice out in a moan; He looked upon his love, his own,

And minding all she spake to him Strode onward through the wild-wood dim.

But lighter grew the woodland green Till clear the shapes of things were seen.

And therewith wild halloos he heard, And shrieks, and cries of one afeard.

Nigher it grew and yet more nigh Till burst from out a brake near by