Classic Poem

The Empty Road

There were those at the close of a hunting day,
When the fields were dim and the woods were wet,
Who would search the road for a brown or bay
And the flash of a star or a coronet;
Who would hear the tap of a distant shoe
And see the pools in the pale light gleam
As the moon swung up in the misty blue
And changed the world to a world of dream.

The old oak leans to the lioned gate
With a leafless bough as it leant of yore,
But to-night there are watchers there who wait
For the sound of a hoof that comes no more;
Who find no glitter of pink and white
To gather shape from the shadowy blur,
Who look in vain to the empty night
For the play of the moon on bit and spur.

They have given their best to the goodliest cause,
These watchers that wait where the wet road gleams.
When the evening mist from the marshes draws
May the moon be kind to their broken dreams!
For well we know that the fiercest fight
'Mid the crashing shells and the crumpled wings
Was led by the men of the old First Flight
Who rode till dark in the Sport of Kings.English