A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields/Sonnet 3 (Ferdinand de Gramont)
SONNET.
Often of old, in Germany and France,
A knight enamoured of a fair unknown,
Put on his mail, and sallied forth alone
To search her, through the boundless earth's expanse.
His visor down, in rest his glittering lance,
He left behind the land he called his own,
And rocks and vales with flowers beloved strewn,
Until he met his heroine by chance.
Adventurous thus, in shores beyond the sea,
My bride of steel I seek, and cares discard,
And well my heart's whole love may rest in thee,
Sword, parted from me by a fate too hard,
For from thy point blood-tarnished flashes free
A lightning ever, answering my regard.