Selected Poems (Penguin Classics) by Robert Browning

Roland to the Dark Tower Came’
    (See Edgar’s song in Lear )
    I
    My first thought was, he lied in every word,
That hoary cripple, with malicious eye
Askance to watch the working of his lie
    On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford
    Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored
Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.
    II
    What else should he be set for, with his staff?
What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare
All travellers who might find him posted there,
    [10] And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh
    Would break, what crutch ’gin write my epitaph
For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,
    III
    If at his counsel I should turn aside
Into that ominous tract which, all agree,
Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly
    I did turn as he pointed: neither pride
    Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,
So much as gladness that some end might be.
    IV
    For, what with my whole world-wide wandering,
[20] What with my search drawn out through years, my hope
    Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope
    With that obstreperous joy success would bring, –
    I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring
My heart made, finding failure in its scope.
    V
    As when a sick man very near to death
Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end
The tears and takes the farewell of each friend,
    And hears one bid the other go, draw breath
    Freelier outside, (‘since all is o’er,’ he saith,
[30] ‘And the blow fallen no grieving can amend’;)
    VI
    While some discuss if near the other graves
Be room enough for this, and when a day
Suits best for carrying the corpse away,
    With care about the banners, scarves and staves:
    And still the man hears all, and only craves
He may not shame such tender love and stay.
    VII
    Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,
Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ
So many times among ‘The Band’ – to wit,
    [40] The knights who to the Dark Tower’s search addressed
    Their steps – that just to fail as they, seemed best,
And all the doubt was now – should I be fit?
    VIII
    So, quiet as despair, I turned from him,
That hateful cripple, out of his highway
Into the path he pointed. All the day
    Had been a dreary one at best, and dim
    Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim
Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.
    IX
    For mark! no sooner was I fairly found
[50] Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,
    Than, pausing to throw backward a last view
    O’er the safe road, ’twas gone; grey plain all round:
    Nothing but plain to the horizon’s bound.
I might go on; naught else remained to do.
    X
    So, on I went. I think I never saw
Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve:
For flowers – as well expect a cedar grove!
    But cockle, spurge, according to their law
    Might propagate their kind, with none to awe,
[60] You’d think; a burr had been a treasure-trove.
    XI
    No! penury, inertness and grimace,
In some strange sort, were the land’s portion. ‘See
Or shut your eyes,’ said Nature peevishly,
    ‘It nothing skills: I cannot help my case:
    ’Tis the Last Judgement’s fire must cure this place,
Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.’
    XII
    If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk
Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents
Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents
    [70] In the dock’s harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to balk
    All hope of greenness? ’tis a brute must walk
Pashing their life out, with a brute’s intents.
    XIII
    As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair
In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud
Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.
    One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,
    Stood stupefied, however he came there:
Thrust out past service from the devil’s stud!
    XIV
    Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,
[80] With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,
    And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;
    Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;
    I never saw a brute I hated so;
He must be wicked to deserve such pain.
    XV
    I shut my