And perfect justice; but our windy life Loses no time on niceties: for me, I gave such justice as I look for now; I swung a hammer on mine enemies, To forge the world anew unto my mind; My cause was justice in mine eyes, and those Who stood against me, enemies of God. Lo! I have failed of all my purposes, And age has come upon me like a cloud; And these old shoulders groan beneath the shame, The bitterness, the burden of defeat: Yet I have seen the star, where others saw Only the froth and spume of angry storms.” He gazed on her with patient, gentle eyes; Bowed, sate she, with her hands clasped round her knees, Incarnate sorrow: then her lion’s head She lifted; and spake once again to him: “When I came out of Spain to Sigebert The rude Franks wondered at my company, My Moorish falconers and deep-voiced hounds, My swift light-horsemen, harpers, lutanists; And prophesied my days would fly, like gold Out of the loose hands of a prodigal, With the delight of hunting and the glad Singing of minstrels in the crowded hall, Where the red torches mirror on the shields And burnished helmets their tempestuous lights: Ominous fires of slaughter, flickering, To flash out suddenly in angry flame. “But, for a while, my house was filled with smiles; And Love sate as a guest beside my hearth. Each morning heard the horns call to the chase The loud, glad music of the eager hounds, While huntsmen cheered them onward, and the rides Through woodlands, down the shadow-dappled ways, Woke, in the answering April of my youth, A pleasure that was one thing with the dawn. “So passed my days, in courtly wise, until Some whisper promised me another Spring Thrilling within my body, and I felt The first strange wakenings of motherhood, The pledge, and prophecy, of future Kings. And I went roaming through the woods no more; Intent on quiet business with my maids, Spinning new wool, or standing by the loom, Or broidering toy baldricks, with gold thread, Bright, to please baby eyes, that love bright things; Dreaming on all the promise, that I held, And all the storm and stress life held for him. “Then first I saw the doom that Nature laid On women, to be careful harvesters; To plan, and toil, and build for unborn sons, To shape the future out of their own time. These turbulent loud nobles with their feuds Carousing nightly, or in companies Changing their hunting-grounds from place to place, Vexed me with their unthrift and wantonness: I saw them as a hindrance to my son, And pitted craft against their stubborn strength, Fighting each step. They were dark, brooding days, Heavy with sullen menace of a storm; Yet found I friendly faces, in despite Of much unbodied anger, for mine eyes