Clay Wingate was the last to feel The prick of that spur of tarnished steel, Gilt, but crossed with the dubious bar Of arms won under the bastard’s star, Rowel his mind, at that time or this, With thoughts and visions that were not his. A sorrow of laughter, a mournful glamor And the ghostly stroke of an airy hammer Shaking his heart with pity and pride That had nothing to do with the things he eyed. He was happy and young, he was strong and stout, His body was hard to weary out. When he thought of life, he thought of a shout. But⁠—there was a sword in a blackened sheath, There was a shape with a mourning wreath: And a place in his mind was a wrestling-ring Where the crownless form of an outlawed king Fought with a shadow too like his own, And, late or early, was overthrown.