Let cowards and laggards fall back! but alert to the saddle,
    Weather-worn and abreast, go men of our galloping legion,
    With a stirrup-cup each to the lily of women that loves him.

    The trail is through dolour and dread, over crags and morasses;
    There are shapes by the way, there are things that appal or entice us: 
    What odds?  We are Knights of the Grail, we are vowed to the riding.

    Thought’s self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb,
    And friendship a flower in the dust, and glory a sun-beam: 
    Not here is our prize, nor, alas! after these our pursuing.

    A dipping of plumes, a tear, a shake of the bridle,
    A passing salute to this world and her pitiful beauty: 
    We hurry with never a word in the track of our fathers.

    (I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses
    All day, on the road, the hoofs of invisible horses,
    All night, from their stalls, the importunate pawing and neighing.)

    We spur to a land of no name, out-racing the storm-wind;
    We leap to the infinite dark like sparks from the anvil. 
    Thou leadest, O God!  All’s well with Thy troopers that follow.

SUGGESTIONS FOR STUDY

This poem is somewhat like the Road-Hymn for the Start, on page 184.  It is about those people who go forward eagerly into the work of the world, without fearing, and without shrinking from difficulties.  Read it through completely, trying to get its meaning.  Regard the lines in italic as a kind of chorus, and study the meaning of the other stanzas first.  Who are the galloping legions?  A stirrup-cup was a draught of wine, taken just before a rider began his journey; it was usually drunk to some one’s health.  Is dolour a common word?  Is it good here?  Try to put into your own words the ideas in the “land of no name,” and “the infinite dark,” remembering what is said above about the general meaning of the poem.  What picture and what idea do you get from “like sparks from the anvil”?  Now go back to the lines in italic, and look for their meaning.

What do you notice about the length of the words in this poem?  Why has the author used this kind of words?  Notice carefully how the sound and the sense are made harmonious.  Look for the rhyme.  How does the poem differ from most short poems?

Bead the verses aloud, trying to make your reading suggest “the hoofs of invisible horses.”

OTHER POEMS TO READ

A Troop of the Guard Hermann Hagedorn
How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix Robert Browning
Through the Metidja to Abd-el-Kadr " "
Reveille Bret Harte
A Song of the Road