The Blazon Of Abenamar

By gloomy fortune overcast,
Vassal of one he held in scorn,
Complaining of the wintry world,
And by his lady left forlorn,
The wretched Abenamar mourned,
Because his country was unkind,
Had brought him to a lot of woe,
And to a foreign home resigned.
A stranger Moor had won the throne,
And in Granada sat in state.
Many the darlings of his soul
He claimed with love insatiate,
He, foul in face, of craven heart,
Had won the mistress of the knight;
Her blooming years of beauteous youth
Were Abenamar's own by right.
But royal favor had decreed
A foreign tyrant there should reign,
For many a galley owned him lord
And master, in the seas of Spain.
Oh, haply 'twas that Zaida's self,
Ungrateful like her changing sex,
Had chosen this emir, thus in scorn
Her Abenamar's soul to vex.
This was the thought that turned to tears
The eyes of the desponding knight,
As on his sufferings past he thought,
His labors and his present plight;
His hopes, to disappointment turned;
His wealth, now held in alien hands,
His agony o'er love betrayed,
Lost honor, confiscated lands.
And as his loyalty had met
Such ill requital from the King,
He called his page and bade him straight
A limner deft before him bring.
For he would have him paint at large,
In color, many a new device
And write his sufferings on his shield.
No single blazon would suffice.
And first a green field parched and seared;
A coal, in myriad blazes burned,
And like his ardent hopes of yore,
At length to dust and ashes turned.
And then a miser, rich in gold,
Who locks away some jewel bright,
For fear the thief a gem may steal,
Which yet can yield him no delight.
A fair Adonis done to death
Beneath the wild boar's cruel tusk.
A wintry dawn on pallid skies,
A summer's day that turns to dusk.
A lovely garden green and fair
Ravaged and slashed by strokes of steel;
Or wasted in its trim parterres
And trampled by the common heel.
So spake the brave heart-broken Moor;
Until his tears and struggling sighs
Turned to fierce rage; the painting then
He waited for with eager eyes.
He asks that one would fetch a steed,
Of his good mare no more he recks,
For womankind have done him wrong,
And she is woman in her sex.
The plumes of yellow, blue, and white
From off his bonnet brim he tears,
He will no longer carry them;
They are the colors Zaida wears.
He recks no more of woman's love,
His city now he bids farewell,
And swears he will no more return
Nor in Granada seek to dwell.