THE OPENING OF THE GRAVE OF ARTHUR AND GUINEVERE AT GLASTONBURY[A]

ONE slender relic from the wreck of death, One golden hair from that far age, A gleaming memory, a momentary breath Of mystic times and Merlin sage! This only trace of that far-famous queen And of her beauty causing sin Recalled what Lancelot had whilom seen, What fame his compeers sought to win. Swift as a monk stoops down to grasp that hair The golden glint dissolves to dust, And naught of that old glory lieth there But bones, and armour gone to rust. Seek ye not thus to clutch the golden past Of legend and romance, for so Its splendour will dissolve and nothing last But Now, and dust of long ago.