This week’s choice is “La Belle Dame Sans Merci: A Ballad” by John Keats which I have chosen for a friend’s daughter.
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
John Keats (1795—1821)
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
Poem 439. La Belle Dame Sans Merci
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel’s granary is full,
And the harvest’s done.
I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery’s song.
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said—
‘I love thee true’.
She took me to her Elfin grot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.
And there she lullèd me asleep,
And there I dreamed—Ah! woe betide!—
The latest dream I ever dreamt
On the cold hill side.
I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried—‘La Belle Dame sans Merci
Thee hath in thrall!’
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gapèd wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill’s side.
And this is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
This is a haunting poem that tells the story of seduction by a ruthless faerie maid—the victim, a “knight-at-arms”, discovers too late that he is the latest in a long line of foolish men who have loved a heartless deceiver to their sorrow and ultimate destruction.
We encounter the knight at the edge of a lake: he is alone and appears to be dallying there for no reason. There are hints that summer is giving way to autumn: there are no birds, the grass (sedge) is withered even near the lake’s edge, the squirrels have gathered all the nuts they can find and the crops are all harvested. Nonetheless, this knight lingers by the lake and is strangely pale and haggard, his cheeks sallow and his brow moist. We see “a lily on thy brow”, suggesting that the knight is failing and death must claim him soon—lilies being traditionally associated with funerals.
On enquiry, the knight tells his story of meeting a lady “Full beautiful” whom he describes as “a faery’s child” and he was enthralled by her, plaiting garlands and bracelets for her as she charmed him with her singing and her “sweet moan” so that he was unconscious of anything but her and his desire. She feeds him “roots of relish sweet/And honey wild, and manna-dew” and tells him of her love, inviting him to her “Elfin grot” where they lie down to sleep together: he kisses her face and she lulls him to sleep.
As he sleeps though, he finds himself in a nightmarish scene, surrounded by “pale kings and princes too” and warriors, “death-pale were they all” and every one of them warns him that he is, like they were, beguiled by this faery woman who they call “La Belle Dame sans Merci”—the beautiful woman without pity. Their deathly faces and hollow cheeks horrify him so much that he wakes from the dream to find himself on the “cold hill’s side” rather than in the arms of his false paramour.
Like the princes and kings, he finds himself unable to leave and the implication is that like them, he is starving to death for love of the woman who has deceived him.
The poem is atmospheric and the knight’s adoration of his faery lady has been felt by many lovers down the ages, whether their love was returned or not. Folklore suggests that affection for a supernatural being is unlikely to end well even if it is returned, and there are many other examples of such liaisons that end disastrously. The modern equivalent is the proliferation of tales of mutual attraction between mortals and vampires—even if the affection is equal on both sides, the vast difference in age and experience would surely tell in time.
The poem has inspired artists, musicians, writers and actors—its Wikipedia page has a long list of its influences on popular culture. The phrase I have chosen as the title of this article is also the title of an E.F. Benson horror story in which a wood is inhabited by a supernatural entity that frightens birds and other natural creatures away.
On a lighter note, the poem’s title was often referenced by Michael Flanders in his monologues for “At the Drop of a Hat” and “At the Drop of Another Hat”—he would gently mock his friend and pianist Donald Swann, suggesting that Swann had courted a lady of a certain reputation whom Flanders described as “La Belle Dame Sans Merci—The Beautiful Lady Who Never Says ‘Thank You’!”.
Ben Whishaw’s performance of the poem from the Keats biopic Bright Star is on the BarefootBaby YouTube channel.
I chose this poem because a friend’s daughter has been studying it for her English Literature GCSE exam. I wish Molly well with her remaining exams and for her future.