The Portrait of a Warrior

The Portrait of a Warrior written by Walter de la Mare

Songs of Childhood (1902)

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    His brow is seamed with line and scar;
      His cheek is red and dark as wine;
    The fires as of a Northern star
      Beneath his cap of sable shine.

    His right hand, bared of leathern glove,
      Hangs open like an iron gin,
    You stoop to see his pulses move,
      To hear the blood sweep out and in.

    He looks some king, so solitary
      In earnest thought he seems to stand,
    As if across a lonely sea
      He gazed impatient of the land.

    Out of the noisy centuries
      The foolish and the fearful fade;
    Yet burn unquenched these warrior eyes,
      Time hath not dimmed nor death dismayed.

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