AN OLD STORY. <br /> <br /> I. <br /> <br />It was roses, roses, all the way, <br /> With myrtle mixed in my path like mad: <br />The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway, <br /> The church-spires flamed, such flags they had, <br />A year ago on this very day. <br /> <br /> II. <br /> <br />The air broke into a mist with bells, <br /> The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries. <br />Had I said, ``Good folk, mere noise repels--- <br /> But give me your sun from yonder skies!'' <br />They had answered, ``And afterward, what else?'' <br /> <br /> III. <br /> <br />Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun <br /> To give it my loving friends to keep! <br />Nought man could do, have I left undone: <br /> And you see my harvest, what I reap <br />This very day, now a year is run. <br /> <br /> IV. <br /> <br />There's nobody on the house-tops now--- <br /> Just a palsied few at the windows set; <br />For the best of the sight is, all allow, <br /> At the Shambles' Gate---or, better yet, <br />By the very scaffold's foot, I trow. <br /> <br /> V. <br /> <br />I go in the rain, and, more than needs, <br /> A rope cuts both my wrists behind; <br />And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds, <br /> For they fling, whoever has a mind, <br />Stones at me for my year's misdeeds. <br /> <br /> VI. <br /> <br />Thus I entered, and thus I go! <br /> In triumphs, people have dropped down dead. <br />``Paid by the world, what dost thou owe <br /> ``Me?''---God might question; now instead, <br />'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so.<br /><br />Robert Browning<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/patriot-the/
