Then commanding to all women
Chastity, her breasts she laid
Bare unto the self-avenger.
Man in metal was the blade.
THE YOUNG PRINCESS
A BALLAD OF OLD LAWS OF LOVE
I
I
When the South sang like a nightingale
Above a bower in May,
The training of Love’s vine of flame
Was writ in laws, for lord and dame
To say their yea and nay.
II
When the South sang like a nightingale
Across the flowering night,
And lord and dame held gentle sport,
There came a young princess to Court,
A frost of beauty white.
III
The South sang like a nightingale
To thaw her glittering dream:
No vine of Love her bosom gave,
She drank no wine of Love, but grave
She held them to Love’s theme.