The Ballad Of Zacho

(a Greek Legend.)



Zacho the King rode out of old
(And truth is what I tell)
With saddle and spurs and a rein of gold
To find the door of Hell.

And round around him surged the dead
With soft and lustrous eyes.
"Why came you here, old friend?" they said:
"Unwise . . . unwise . . . unwise!

"You should have left to the prince your son
Spurs and saddle and rein:
Your bright and morning days are done;
You ride not out again."

"I came to greet my friends who fell
Sword-scattered from my side;
And when I've drunk the wine of Hell
I'll out again and ride!"

But Charon rose and caught his hair
In fingers sharp and long.
"Loose me, old ferryman: play fair:
Try if my arm be strong."

Thrice drave he hard on Charon's breast,
And struck him thrice to ground,
Till stranger ghosts came out o' the west
And sat like stars around.

And thrice old Charon rose up high
And seized him as before.
"Loose me! a broken man am I,
And fight with you no more.''

"Zacho, arise, my home is near;
I pray you walk with me:
I've hung my tent so full of fear
You well may shake to see.

"Home to my home come they who fight,
Who fight but not to win:
Without, my tent is black as night,
And red as fire within.

"Though winds blow cold and I grow old,
My tent is fast and fair:
The pegs are dead men's stout right arms,
The cords, their golden hair."

James Elroy Flecker

James Elroy Flecker was an English poet and playwright born in London. He is best remembered for his poem "The Golden Journey to Samarkand" and his plays. Flecker was associated with the neo-romantic movement, and his works often explored themes of travel and classical antiquity. He died of tuberculosis at a young age, cutting short a promising literary career.

James Elroy Flecker

The Masque Of The Magi

James Elroy Flecker, Simple Poetry

Lord Arnaldos

James Elroy Flecker, Simple Poetry

The Ballad Of Iskander

James Elroy Flecker, Simple Poetry

Prayer

James Elroy Flecker, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

The Ride Back

        Before the coming of the dark, he dreamed
        An old-world faded story: of a knight,
        Much like in need to him, who was no knight!
        And of a road, much like the road his soul
        Groped over, desperate to meet Her soul.
        Beside the bed Death waited. And he dreamed.


        His limbs were heavy from the fight,
        His mail was dark with dust and blood;
        On his good horse they bound him tight,
        And on his breast they bound the rood
        To help him in the ride that night.

        When he crashed through the wood's wet rim,
        About the dabbled reeds a breeze
        Went moaning broken words and dim;
        The haggard shapes of twilight trees
        Caught with their scrawny ha...

William Vaughn Moody

A Story Of The Caracas Valley.

High-perch'd upon the rocky way,
Stands a Posada stern and grey;
Which from the valley, seems as if,
A condor there had paus'd to 'light
And rest upon that lonely cliff,
From some stupendous flight;
But when the road you gain at length,
It seems a ruin'd hold of strength,
With archway dark, and bridge of stone,
By waving shrubs all overgrown,
Which clings 'round that ruin'd gate,
Making it look less desolate;
For here and there, a wild flower's bloom
With brilliant hue relieves the gloom,
Which clings 'round that Posada's wall -
A sort of misty funeral pall.

The gulf spann'd by that olden arch
Might stop an army's onward march,
For dark and dim - far down below -
'Tis lost amid a torrent's flow;
And blending with the eagle's scream

James Barron Hope

The Missionary. Canto Fifth.

Argument.

Ocean Cave, Spanish Captive, Wild Indian Maid, Genius of Andes, and Spirits.

'Tis dawn: the distant Andes' rocky spires,
One after one, have caught the orient fires.
Where the dun condor shoots his upward flight,
His wings are touched with momentary light.
Meantime, beneath the mountains' glittering heads,
A boundless ocean of gray vapour spreads,
That o'er the champaign, stretching far below,
Moves now, in clustered masses, rising slow,
Till all the living landscape is displayed
In various pomp of colour, light, and shade,
Hills, forests, rivers, lakes, and level plain,
Lessening in sunshine to the southern main.
The Llama's fleece fumes with ascending dew;
The gem-like humming-birds their toils renew;
And there, by the wild river's devi...

William Lisle Bowles

The Missionary. Canto Sixth

Argument.

The City of Conception, The City of Penco, Castle, Lautaro, Wild Indian Maid, Zarinel, Missionary.

The second moon had now begun to wane,
Since bold Valdivia left the southern plain;
Goal of his labours, Penco's port and bay,
Far gleaming to the summer sunset lay.
The wayworn veteran, who had slowly passed
Through trackless woods, or o'er savannahs vast,
With hope impatient sees the city spires
Gild the horizon, like ascending fires.
Now well-known sounds salute him, as more near
The citadel and battlements appear;
The approaching trumpets ring at intervals;
The trumpet answers from the rampart walls,
Where many a maiden casts an anxious eye,
Some long-lost object of her love to espy,
Or watches, as the evening light illumes
The poin...

William Lisle Bowles

Zyps Of Zirl

The Alps of the Tyrol are dark with pines,
Where, foaming under the mountain spines,
The Inn's long water sounds and shines.

Beyond, are peaks where the morning weaves
An icy rose; and the evening leaves
The glittering gold of a thousand sheaves.

Deep vines and torrents and glimmering haze,
And sheep-bells tinkling on mountain ways,
And fluting shepherds make sweet the days.

The rolling mist, like a wandering fleece,
The great round moon in a mountain crease,
And a song of love make the nights all peace.

Beneath the blue Tyrolean skies
On the banks of the Inn, that foams and flies,
The storied city of Innsbruck lies.

With its mediaeval streets, that crook,
And its gabled houses, it has the look
Of a belfried town in a fairy-b...

Madison Julius Cawein

The Town Without A Market

There lies afar behind a western hill
The Town without a Market, white and still;
For six feet long and not a third as high
Are those small habitations. There stood I,
Waiting to hear the citizens beneath
Murmur and sigh and speak through tongueless teeth.
When all the world lay burning in the sun
I heard their voices speak to me. Said one:
"Bright lights I loved and colours, I who find
That death is darkness, and has struck me blind."
Another cried: "I used to sing and play,
But here the world is silent, day by day."
And one: "On earth I could not see or hear,
But with my fingers touched what I was near,
And knew things round and soft, and brass from gold,
And dipped my hand in water, to feel cold,
And thought the grave would cure me, and was glad
When t...

James Elroy Flecker