The big, red-house is bare and lone <br />The stony garden waste and sere <br />With blight of breezes ocean blown <br />To pinch the wakening of the year; <br />My kindly friends with busy cheer <br />My wretchedness could plainly show. <br />They tell me I am lonely here— <br />What do they know? What do they know? <br /> <br />They think that while the gables moan <br />And easements creak in winter drear <br />I should be piteously alone <br />Without the speech of comrades dear; <br />And friendly for my sake they fear, <br />It grieves them thinking of me so <br />While all their happy life is near— <br />What do they know? What do they know? <br /> <br />That I have seen the Dagda’s throne <br />In sunny lands without a tear <br />And found a forest all my own <br />To ward with magic shield and spear, <br />Where, through the stately towers I rear <br />For my desire, around me go <br />Immortal shapes of beauty clear: <br />They do not know, they do not know. <br /> <br />L’ENVOI <br />The friends I have without a peer <br />Beyond the western ocean’s glow, <br />Whither the faerie galleys steer, <br />They do not know: how should they know?<br /><br />Clive Staples Lewis<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/ballade-mystique/
