Sidney Lanier

The Tournament

The Tournament.
There are several of Sidney Lanier's (1842-81) poems that children love to learn. "Tampa Robins," "The Tournament" (Joust I.), "Barnacles," "The Song of the Chattahoochee," and "The First Steamboat Up the Alabama" are among them. At our "poetry contests" the children have plainly demonstrated that this great poet has reached his hand down to the youngest. The time will doubtless come when it will be a part of education to be acquainted with Lanier, as it is now to be acquainted with Longfellow or Tennyson.
I.

Tournament Setup

Medieval jousting metaphor for intellectual and emotional conflict. 'Lists' refers to the enclosed arena where knights compete.

Bright shone the lists, blue bent the skies,
And the knights still hurried amain
To the tournament under the ladies' eyes,
Where the jousters were Heart and Brain.

Allegorical Characters

Heart and Brain are personified as knights, representing emotional and rational approaches to life.

II.
Flourished the trumpets, entered Heart,
A youth in crimson and gold;
Flourished again; Brain stood apart,
Steel-armoured, dark and cold.
III.

Character Contrast

Heart is emotional (crimson, gold, tra-li-ra), while Brain is analytical (steel-armoured, cold, silent).

Heart's palfrey caracoled gaily round,
Heart tra-li-ra'd merrily;
But Brain sat still, with never a sound,
So cynical-calm was he.
IV.
Heart's helmet-crest bore favours three
From his lady's white hand caught.
While Brain wore a plumeless casque; not he
Or favour gave or sought.
V.
The trumpet blew; Heart shot a glance
To catch his lady's eye,
But Brain gazed straight ahead, his lance
To aim more faithfully.
VI.
They charged, they struck; both fell, both bled;

Symbolic Combat

The battle reveals the ultimate weakness of pure emotion against calculated reason.

Brain rose again, ungloved;
Heart, dying, smiled and faintly said,
"My love to my beloved."
Sidney Lanier.
Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

Romantic Allegory of Reason vs. Emotion

Lanier uses a medieval tournament as an extended metaphor to explore the tension between intellectual rationality and passionate emotion. Heart represents pure feeling—impulsive, colorful, and performative, while Brain embodies cold calculation and precise focus.

The poem's structure mirrors a classic medieval jousting contest, but transforms it into a philosophical battle. Each stanza builds tension between these two modes of human experience, ultimately suggesting that pure emotion (Heart) is noble but ultimately vulnerable, while pure reason (Brain) remains detached and survives.

Technical Poetic Craft

Lanier employs a tight quatrain structure with consistent ABAB rhyme scheme, creating a sense of formal control that ironically mirrors Brain's character. The language blends romantic imagery (knights, ladies, tournaments) with psychological allegory.

Notice how the final stanza's emotional climax—Heart's dying declaration of love—subverts the entire rational framework, suggesting that emotional vulnerability might ultimately be more profound than calculated survival.