Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume VI. Fancy. 1904. | | | | Poems of Sentiment: II. Life | | The Wild Ride | | Louise Imogen Guiney (1861–1920) |
| | | I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses, | |
| All day, the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses; | |
| All night, from their cells, the importunate tramping and neighing. | |
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| Cowards and laggards fall back; but alert to the saddle, | |
| Straight, grim, and abreast, vault our weather-worn, galloping legion, | 5 |
| With stirrup-cup each to the one gracious woman that loves him. | |
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| The road is through dolor and dread, over crags and morasses; | |
| There are shapes by the way, there are things that appall or entice us: | |
| What odds? We are knights, and our souls are but bent on the riding! | |
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| Thought’s self is a vanishing wing, and joy is a cobweb, | 10 |
| And friendship a flower in the dust, and glory a sunbeam: | |
| Not here is our prize, nor, alas! after these our pursuing. | |
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| 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. | 15 |
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| I hear in my heart, I hear in its ominous pulses, | |
| All day, the commotion of sinewy, mane-tossing horses, | |
| All night, from their cells, the importunate tramping and neighing. | |
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| We spur to a land of no name, outracing the storm-wind; | |
| We leap to the infinite dark, like the sparks from the anvil. | 20 |
| Thou leadest, O God! All ’s well with Thy troopers that follow! | | | | |
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