AN OLD STORY

   I

   It was roses, roses, all the way,

           With myrtle mixed in my path like mad:

   The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway,

           The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,

   A year ago on this very day.

   II

   The air broke into a mist with bells,

           The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries.

   Had I said, "Good folk, mere noise repels—

           But give me your sun from yonder skies!"

   They had answered, "And afterward, what else?"                 10

   III

   Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun

           To give it my loving friends to keep!

   Nought man could do, have I left undone:

           And you see my harvest, what I reap

   This very day, now a year is run.

   IV

   There's nobody on the house-tops now—

            Just a palsied few at the windows set;

   For the best of the sight is, all allow,

           At the Shambles' Gate—or, better yet,

   By the very scaffold's foot, I trow.                           20

   V

   I go in the rain, and, more than needs,

           A rope cuts both my wrists behind;

   And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds,

           For they fling, whoever has a mind,

   Stones at me for my year's misdeeds.

   VI

   Thus I entered, and thus I go!

           In triumphs, people have dropped down dead.

   "Paid by the world, what dost thou owe

           Me?"—God might question; now instead,

   'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so.                           30

   NOTES:

   "The Patriot" is a hero's story of the reward and punishment

   dealt him for his services within one year. To act

   regardless of praise or blame, save God's, seems safer.