It is a clean place in the low countries,
all gleam, gold and azure between framing
cliffs, water-smooth reflection of white
town walls, sea-blue church spires, billow
clouds and distant in-sailing fleet.
What price, this peace?
What price, these burghers trotting
staid on horseback, wimpled wife
with her back to the half-door?
What price, the wide-open gates
and stream of people wending
curving path to crowning castle?
On the near green hill is violence.
It is a lonely scene, above the town,
screened from worthy citizens’ view.
If they looked up, they might catch
a glint of sun on armor or downstabbed
spear. They don’t look up.
The dragon is also blue and gold,
another part of the landscape.
Did he once come looming, blocking
the sun or kindling in the last glory
of sunset? Did they deliberate long,
in cliff-top towers, on the appropriate
sacrifice?
The princess prays but does not look
afraid. The knight dispassionately
does his duty, only his streaming
crimson sleeves a hint of where
this will end.
It is a clean town on the sea,
and for this the dragon must die.
The idyllic day continues unruffled,
like the water.
Inspired by We Drink Because We’re Poets: Write about a favorite painting. I was looking at Rogier van der Weyden’s Saint George and the Dragon, painted 1432-1435. You can see it and learn more at the U.S. National Gallery of Art’s website.
It’s nice to write a favorite painting, and I love the poetical tale you’ve written Weyden’s Saint George and the dragon! I especially like the first stanza
“It is a clean place in the low countries,
all gleam, gold and azure between framing
cliffs, water-smooth reflection of white
town walls, sea-blue church spires, billow
clouds and distant in-sailing fleet.”
and the words
“sea-blue church spires” have touched my heart (sea-blue church, église bleu-de-mer, beautiful!!!)
Thank you Jennifer.
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Église bleu-de-mer! I love that. Thanks so much for your comment. It was fun to spend time studying the details of the painting and musing over their meaning(s).
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There’s some good alliteration in S2, and I think some of the line-breaks are interesting like “The princess prays but does not look / afraid”. The last two lines are great and make the poem for me.
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Thanks for reading, and for commenting on the craft. I appreciate it!
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