"You come to tread a bloody path of flowers. All the gold flowers are covered up with blood, And the bright bugles blow along the towers; The bugles triumph like the Plate in flood." His spilled life trickled down upon the mud Between weak, clutching fingers. "Oh," he cried, "This isn’t what we planned here years ago." He died. Lion lay still while the cold tides of death Came brimming up his channels. With one hand He groped to know if Michael still drew breath. His little hour was running out its sand. Then, in a mist, he saw his Mary stand Above. He cried aloud, "He was my brother. I was his comrade sworn, and we have killed each other. "Oh desolate grief, beloved, and through me. We wise who try to change. Oh, you wild birds, Help my unhappy spirit to the sea. The golden bowl is scattered into sherds." And Mary knelt and murmured passionate words To that poor body on the dabbled flowers: "Oh, beauty, oh, sweet soul, oh, little love of ours-- "Michael, my own heart’s darling, speak; it’s me, Mary. You know my voice. I’m here, dear, here. Oh, little golden-haired one, listen. See, It’s Mary, Michael. Speak to Mary, dear. Oh, Michael, little love, he cannot hear; And you have killed him, Lion; he is dead. My little friend, my love, my Michael, golden head. "We had such fun together, such sweet fun, My love and I, my merry love and I. Oh, love, you shone upon me like the sun. Oh, Michael, say some little last good-bye." Then in a great voice Lion called, "I die. Go home and tell my people. Mary. Hear. Though I have wrought this ruin, I have loved you, dear. "Better than he; not better, dear, as well. If you could kiss me, dearest, at this last. We have made bloody doorways from our hell, Cutting our tangle. Now, the murder past, We are but pitiful poor souls; and fast The darkness and the cold come. Kiss me, sweet; I loved you all my life; but some lives never meet "Though they go wandering side by side through Time. Kiss me," he cried. She bent, she kissed his brow: "Oh, friend," she said, "you’re lying in the slime." "Three blind ones, dear," he murmured, "in the slough, Caught fast for death; but never mind that now; Go home and tell my people. I am dying, Dying, dear, dying now." He died; she left him lying, And kissed her dead one’s head and crossed the field. "They have been killed," she called, in a great crying. "Killed, and our spirits’ eyes are all unsealed. The blood is scattered on the flowers drying." It was the hush of dusk, and owls were flying; They hooted as the Occleves ran to bring That sorry harvest home from Death’s red harvesting. They laid the bodies on the bed together. And "You were beautiful," she said, "and you Were my own darling in the April weather. You knew my very soul, you knew, you knew. Oh, my sweet, piteous love, I was not true. Fetch me fair water and the flowers of spring; My love is dead, and I must deck his burying."