PERCIVAL

"Keep silent; do not look the fool!"
So the wise man said to me.
I obeyed and held my tongue
While a strange and solemn chanting rung
And tapers blazed like a thousand suns
In the house of the Fisher-king.

A young man came with a bloody lance,
And a maid with a plate of gold.
And a Virgin came with a golden Grail--
It was covered o'er with a silken veil--
And the candle light was shining, pale,
And the castle strange and cold.

She--the Virgin who bore the Grail--
Had a face I though I'd seen.
Once, long before, in a city cold
I saw a minster, ruined and old,
Where a maiden wept in carven stone
At the foot of a gallows tree.

"Keep silent! Do not look the fool!"
So I did as I was told.
And the whole procession, strange and glad
Came slowly on, in samite clad,
While the smoke of incense caught the shafts
Of light like liquid gold.

I held my peace. My silent host
Watched me with meaning glance.
"It will come again," it seemed to say,
"The Grail and the plate and the Holy Maid;
One more chance have you to say:
'How serves this Grail and Lance?'"

So his silence spoke. It came again--
And the Grail shone forth with light.
Again there passed the bloody lance,
And the maidens in their stately dance,
Then through a door it seemed to pass--
And I thought I saw a Knight.

A handsome lord, pale with pain,
Was lying hurt upon a bed.
The Virgin from the gallows-tree
Wept beside his bleeding knees
While close at hand a stone stood free
And the hall was hung with red.

I thought some words were written there--
Carved upon the stone:
CORPUS CHRIS-- then all was dark,
And I sat alone with a broken heart
In an empty house and a silent yard
While the West Wind softly moaned.