Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and Holland: Vols. XIV–XV. 1876–79.

Spain: Guadalquivir, the River

The Dying Warrior

By Anonymous

THE STARS looked down on the battle-plain,

Where the night-winds were deeply sighing,

And with shattered lance, near his war-steed slain,

Lay a youthful warrior dying.

He had folded around his gallant breast

The banner, once o’er him streaming,

For a noble shroud, as he sunk to rest

On the couch that knows no dreaming.

Proudly he lay on his broken shield,

By the rushing Guadalquivir,

While, dark with the blood of his last red field,

Swept on the majestic river.

There were hands that came to bind his wound,

There were eyes o’er the warrior weeping;

But he raised his head from the dewy ground,

Where the land’s hearts were sleeping.

And “Away!” he cried, “your aid is vain,

My soul may not brook recalling:

I have seen the stately flower of Spain

Like autumn vine-leaves falling.

“I have seen the Moorish banners wave

O’er the halls where my youth was cherished;

I have drawn a sword that could not save;

I have stood where my king hath perished.

“Leave me to die, with the free and the brave,

On the banks of my own bright river;

Ye can give me naught but a warrior’s grave

By the chainless Guadalquivir.”