Enigma Of The Knight Poem by John Carter Brown

I dreamt that I was dreaming
And in my dream beheld
A knight in fading armour
His name from me withheld.
Relentlessly the tolling
Did saturate the air,
And filled the empty graveyard...
The one with no-one there.

His sword within his scabbard
Still sharp and virgin clean,
I wondered if to battle
This knight had ever been?
No blood upon the countenance
Beneath the iron hood;
No answer to my question,
The mystery still stood.

Of toil and sad confusion
And hatred and disgrace
He told me, then I looked again
And thought I knew his face;
I felt I recognised the voice
That whispered soft as mute:
'A song will be our epitaph,
Sung sweetly on the lute.'

The vision turned and made to leave,
I asked him not to go,
He drew a little closer saying:
'Do you wish to know?
The timer drawn of molten glass
Is running out of sand;
This dream within another
You will never understand.'

His life was nearly finished
And so, I thought, my dream,
I turned away and over
To try my sleep redeem;
Then dreamt that I had woken
Still puzzled by the knight,
Then woke again to find that
I, like he, had lost the fight.

(Written April/May 1996)