Winding

In the days of my youth did I hear the words of Chesterton, and they have never left me.

Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half-heard,
Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred,
Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall,
The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall,
The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung,
That once went singing southward when all the world was young.
In that enormous silence, tiny and unafraid,
Comes up along a winding road the noise of the Crusade.

The cross, it comes to the hill. And there, among thieves, it rests for a while. In the morning, a few days later, the white flowers bloom in the grey dawn.