Bruges Poem by Ernest Raynaud

O THING of Spain in Flanders left behind,
O idle Delta severed from the sea,
Still worshipping a mystic Calvary,
Singing the self-same tune time out of mind!

The arms of Burgundy and Austria twined
Their glories to be now this ash of thee;
The swan that haunts thy lone canals is he
Upon the proudest blazon e'er designed.

I know thy quays, and nunneries, and the street
Whose grassy cobbles echo to the feet
Of some bedizined soldier of the line.

Thy belfry as thou diest tells the hours,
Shadowing thee like a relic in the shrine
Of thy dead water strewn with willow-flowers.

translated by Jethro Bithell