Canterbury Pilgrims

Pleasant and friendly in her ways, and straining

To counterfeit a courtly kind of grace,

In company she liked to laugh and chat

And knew the remedies for love’s mischances,

An art in which she knew the oldest dances.

Though as a philosopher, as I have told,

He had not found the stone for making gold.

He had a cross of metal set with stones

And, in a glass, a rubble of pigs’ bones.

He could make songs and poems and recite,

He knew how to joust and dance, to draw and write.

He was of sovereign values in all eyes.

And though so much distinguished, he was wise

And in his bearing modest as a maid.

Yet he was rather close as to expenses

And kept the gold he won in pestilences.

Gold stimulates the heart, or so we’re told,

He therefore had a special love of gold.

Courteous he was, lowly and serviceable, 

And carved to serve his father at the table.

Christ and His Twelve Apostles and their lore

He taught, but followed it himself before.

For he was qualified to hear confessions,

Or so he said, with more than priestly scope

He had a special license from the Pope.

Her forehead, certainly, was fair of spread,

Almost a span across the brow, I own;

She was by no means undergrown.

His only care was study, and indeed

He never spoke a word more than was need.

She wore a coral trinket on her arm,

A set of beads, the gaudies tricked in green,

Whence hung a golden brooch of brightest sheen…

She’d had five husbands, all at the church door,

He was the finest beggar of his batch.

Speaking of his equipment, he possessed

Fine horses, but he was not gaily dressed.

He wore a fustian tunic stained and dark

…had followed chivalry,/Truth , honor, generousness, and courtesy.

He knew the taverns well in every town

And every innkeeper and barmaid too

Better than lepers, beggars and that crew.

He stayed at home and watched over his fold

So that no wolf should make the sheep miscarry.

Garlic he loved, and onions too, and leeks,

And drinking strong red wine till all was hazy.

Then he would shout and jabber as if crazy,

…his horse was thinner than a rake

And he was not too fat, I undertake,

But had a hollow look, a sober stare;

The thread upon his overcoat was bare.

I judge he was a gelding, or a mare.

Bold in his speech, yet wise and full of tact,

There was no manly attribute he lacked,

What’s more he was a merry-hearted man.

But best of all he sang an Offertory,

For well he knew that when that song was sung

He’d have to preach and tune his honey-tongue

And (well he could) win silver from the crowd.

His face on fire, like a cherubin,/For he had carbuncles.

In his own diet he observed some measure;

There were no superfluities for pleasure,

Only digestives, nutritives and such.

She used to weep if she but saw a mouse

Caught in a trap, if it were dead or bleeding.

Nay rather he preferred beyond a doubt

Giving to poor parishioners round about

Both from church offerings and his property;

And she had thrice been to Jerusalem,

Seen many strange rivers and passed over them;

She’d been to Rome and also to Boulogne,

St. James of Compostella and Cologne,