GKC
his poetry
One chapter of my first book is on G.K. Chesterton, one of my favorite writers; it is mostly on his fiction, essays and ideas but he was also a poet.
In an earlier post I described how I got to know Frank Meyer and his sons and ended up spending spring vacation of my sophomore year with the Meyers where I first encountered Lepanto, still one of my favorite poems and, I think, my first introduction to Chesterton. That was more than sixty years ago but I still remember hearing it for the first time, read by Frank.
Like much of Chesterton’s work, the poem is both a story and an argument, a defense of his religious, historical and philosophical views. The story is the battle of Lepanto, the 16th century naval victory of a combined Christian fleet over the Ottomans. The argument contrasts Medieval Europe, represented by the Christian commander Don John of Austria, the bastard son of Charles V of Spain,
The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung, That once went singing southward when all the world was young,
With
The cold queen of England is looking in the glass; The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass;
…
The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise,
And with Islam:
We have set the seal of Solomon on all things under sun, Of knowledge and of sorrow and endurance of things done, But a noise is in the mountains, in the mountains, and I know The voice that shook our palaces—four hundred years ago: It is he that saith not ‘Kismet’; it is he that knows not Fate ; It is Richard, it is Raymond, it is Godfrey in the gate! It is he whose loss is laughter when he counts the wager worth, Put down your feet upon him, that our peace be on the earth.”
And ends:
Cervantes on his galley sets the sword back in the sheath (Don John of Austria rides homeward with a wreath.) And he sees across a weary land a straggling road in Spain, Up which a lean and foolish knight forever rides in vain, And he smiles, but not as Sultans smile, and settles back the blade.... …
Chesterton does the same thing at greater length — 95 pages — in The Ballad of the White Horse. The story this time is Alfred against the Danes, the contrast Christianity against paganism. It is dedicated to his wife:
…
Lady, by one light only We look from Alfred’s eyes, We know he saw athwart the wreck The sign that hangs about your neck, Where One more than Melchizedek Is dead and never dies. Therefore I bring these rhymes to you, Who brought the cross to me, Since on you flaming without flaw I saw the sign that Guthrum saw When he let break his ships of awe, And laid peace on the sea. …
There is a great deal good in the poem, but the central scene is Alfred harping in the Danish camp, seen as a debate between paganism, represented by Guthrum and his three earls:
With three great earls King Guthrum Went the rounds from fire to fire, With Harold, nephew of the King, And Ogier of the Stone and Sling, And Elf, whose gold lute had a string That sighed like all desire.
Each earl gives his picture of paganism, starting with the youngest:
“For Rome was given to rule the world, And gat of it little joy — But we, but we shall enjoy the world, The whole huge world a toy.
And ending with Guthrum, who is an atheist:
When he shall read what is written So plain in clouds and clods, When he shall hunger without hope Even for evil gods.
And Alfred responds:
“What have the strong gods given? Where have the glad gods led? When Guthrum sits on a hero's throne And asks if he is dead? "Sirs, I am but a nameless man, A rhymester without home, Yet since I come to the Wessex clay And carry the cross of Rome, "I will even answer the mighty earl That asked of Wessex men Why they be meek and monkish folk, And bow to the White Lord's broken yoke; What sign have we save blood and smoke? Here is my answer then. "That on you is fallen the shadow, And not upon the Name; That though we scatter and though we fly And you hang over us like the sky You are more tired of victory, Than we are tired of shame. "That though you hunt the Christian man Like a hare in the hill-side The hare has still more heart to run Than you have heart to ride.
That — I have cut most of it — is the core of the argument, arguably of the poem, but there is a great deal more. Read it, all 95 pages.
I think these two are Chesterton’s best poems. Others I am fond of include:
A Ballade of Suicide: and why not to
… The wind blew out from Bergen to the dawning of the day, They ride and run with fifty spears to break and bar my way, I shall not die alone, alone, but kin to all the powers, As merry as the ancient sun and fighting like the flowers. How white their steel, how bright their eyes! I love each laughing knave, Cry high and bid him welcome to the banquet of the brave. Yea, I will bless them as they bend and love them where they lie, When on their skulls the sword I swing falls shattering from the sky. The hour when death is like a light and blood is like a rose,— You never loved your friends, my friends, as I shall love my foes. Know you what earth shall lose to-night, what rich uncounted loans, What heavy gold of tales untold you bury with my bones? My loves in deep dim meadows, my ships that rode at ease, Ruffling the purple plumage of strange and secret seas. To see this fair earth as it is to me alone was given, The blow that breaks my brow to-night shall break the dome of heaven. The skies I saw, the trees I saw after no eyes shall see. To-night I die the death of God; the stars shall die with me: One sound shall sunder all the spears and break the trumpet's breath: You never laughed in all your life as I shall laugh in death.
And, on a less serious and more political note, the ultimate horror story of paternalist regulation, The Horrible History of Jones, starting with
Jones had a dog; it had a chain; Not often worn, not causing pain; But, as the I.K.L. had passed Their 'Unleashed Cousins Act’ at last,
And ending with
The head fell off when it was hit: Then words did rise and honest doubt, And four Commissioners sat about Whether the slash that left him dead Cut off his body or his head. An author in the Isle of Wight Observed with unconcealed delight A land of just and old renown Where Freedom slowly broadened down From Precedent to Precedent. And this, I think, was what he meant.
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Love G.K. Chesterton...
What accounts for the allure of poetry? I love it myself, but most people I know seem indifferent. If you were trying to persuade someone to read more poetry in general, what argument would you make?