Oliver Basselin

In the Valley of the Vire         Still is seen an ancient mill,     With its gables quaint and queer,         And beneath the window-sill,                 On the stone,                 These words alone:     "Oliver Basselin lived here."     Far above it, on the steep,         Ruined stands the old Chateau;     Nothing but the donjon-keep         Left for shelter or for show.                 Its vacant eyes                 Stare at the skies,     Stare at the valley green and deep.     Once a convent, old and brown,         Looked, but ah! it looks no more,     From the neighboring hillside down         On the rushing and the roar                 Of the stream                 Whose sunny gleam     Cheers the little Norman town.     In that darksome mill of stone,         To the water's dash and din,     Careless, humble, and unknown,         Sang the poet Basselin                 Songs that fill                 That ancient mill     With a splendor of its own.     Never feeling of unrest         Broke the pleasant dream he dreamed;     Only made to be his nest,         All the lovely valley seemed;                 No desire                 Of soaring higher     Stirred or fluttered in his breast.     True, his songs were not divine;         Were not songs of that high art,     Which, as winds do in the pine,         Find an answer in each heart;                 But the mirth                 Of this green earth     Laughed and revelled in his line.     From the alehouse and the inn,         Opening on the narrow street,     Came the loud, convivial din,         Singing and applause of feet,                 The laughing lays                 That in those days     Sang the poet Basselin.     In the castle, cased in steel,         Knights, who fought at Agincourt,     Watched and waited, spur on heel;         But the poet sang for sport                 Songs that rang                 Another clang,     Songs that lowlier hearts could feel.     In the convent, clad in gray,         Sat the monks in lonely cells,     Paced the cloisters, knelt to pray,         And the poet heard their bells;                 But his rhymes                 Found other chimes,     Nearer to the earth than they.     Gone are all the barons bold,         Gone are all the knights and squires,     Gone the abbot stern and cold,         And the brotherhood of friars;                 Not a name                 Remains to fame,     From those mouldering days of old!     But the poet's memory here         Of the landscape makes a part;     Like the river, swift and clear,         Flows his song through many a heart;                 Haunting still                 That ancient mill,     In the Valley of the Vire.