The Poetical Works of William Motherwell/The Ritters Ride Home
The Ritters Ride Home.
As eagles return to their eyrie,
Gorged with the flesh of the young kid,
Even so we return from the battle—
The banquet of noble blood.
We are drunk with that ruddy wine;
We are stained with its droppings all over;
We have drunk till our full veins are bursting,
Till the vessel was drained to its dregs—
Till the tall flaggons fell from our hands,
That were wearied with ever uplifting them:
We have drank till we no longer could find
The liquor divine of heroes.
The Ritters ride home!
Ask where great glory is won?
Enquire of the desolate land;
Of the city that hath no life,
Of the bay that hath no white sail,
The land that is trenched with mad feet,
Which turned up the soil in despair;
The city is silent and fireless,
And each threshold is crowded with dry bones;
The bay glitters sheenly in sunlight,
No oar shivers now its clear mirror;
The mast of the bark is not there,
Nor the shout of the mariner bold.
But the sea-maidens know of strange men,
Beclasped in strong plaits of iron:
They know of the pale-faced and silent,
Who sleep underneath the waves,
And never shall waken again
To stride o'er the beautiful dales,
The green and the flower-studded land.
The Ritters ride home!
We have come from the strife of shields;
From the bristling of mighty spears;
From the smith-shop, where brynies were anvils,
And the hammers were long swords and axes.
We have come from the mounds of the dead,
Where hero forms lay like hewn forests;
Where rivers run red in the sun,
And the ravens of heaven were made glad!
The Ritters ride home!
The small ones of earth pass away,
As chaff they have drifted and gone.
When the angry winds rush from the North,
And sound their great trumpets of wrath,
The tempest-steeds rush forth to battle,
They plough up the earth in their course,
They hollow a grave for the dead,
As the share scoops a bed for the seed.
The Ritters ride home!
Beautiful! beautiful! beautiful!
Is the home-coming of the War-faring;
Of them who have swam on the ocean;
Of fountains that spring from great hearts.
The sunshine of glory's around them;
Their names are the burthen of songs;
Their armour and banners become
The richest adornments of halls.
The Ritters ride home!
Beautiful! beautiful! beautiful!
Sounds the home-coming of the War-faring;
And their triumph-song echoes for ever
'Mid the vastness of gloomy Valhalla.
The Ritters' last home!