When Hugo Meets Shakespeare
Volume 3
My father, this hero, with the sweetest of smile,
Trailed by this one hussar he favored from the pile
For his great bravado and his majestic height,
Made round on his palfrey, a battleground, one night.
The ground paved with corpses, as the dusk spreads its veil,
He overheard a moan, from the shadow, exhaled.
Twas a Spaniard soldier of the routing army,
Dragging his bleeding self on the road so gloomy,
Broken, groaning, livid, to everyone, half dead,
Grumbling, all weak: “Water, please, some water”, with stead.
My father affected, to his favorite hussar,
Handed, from his saddle, the rum of his small jar…
…So she takes her lantern and her cape for it’s time
To check on his return, if he’s gotten his prime,
If it’s dawned, if the sea has gained some countenance,
If she can spot the light, signal of his advance.
Come on! And so she steps right out in the fresh air.
Nothing, she sees nothing. Not a line, not a glare,
Just the somber expanse where sea and sky embrace.
And it rains and the rain carries the dark sky trace.
It’s as though the dawn fears to point out today
And that the day trembles at passing its doorway.
So she heads on. No light. Not a soul is awake.
Her eyes scope the darkness though worn out by her wake…