Explore "Rouen, Place De La Pucelle" by Maria Lowell on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Here blooms the legend, fed by Time and Chance, / Fresh as the morning, though with centuries old, / The whitest lily on the shield of France, / With heart of virgin gold.
Along the square she moved, sweet Joan of Arc, / With face more pallid than a daylit star, / Half-seen, half-doubted, while before her dark
Stretched the array of war.
Swift passed the battle-smoke of lying breath
From off her path, as if a wind had blown, / Showing no faithless King, but righteous Death, / On the low wooden throne.
He would reward her: she who meekly wore
Alike the gilded mail and peasant gown, / As meekly now received one honor more, / The formless, fiery crown.
A white dove trembled up the heated air, / And in the opening zenith found its goal; / Soft as a downward feather, dropped a prayer
For each repentant soul.