Page:Early poems of William Morris.djvu/228



How weary is it none can tell,

How dismally the days go by!

I hear the tinkling of the bell,

I see the cross against the sky.

The year wears round to autumn-tide,

Yet comes no reaper to the corn;

The golden land is like a bride

When first she knows herself forlorn—

She sits and weeps with all her hair

Laid downward over tender hands;

For stained silk she hath no care,

No care for broken ivory wands;

The silver cups beside her stand;

The golden stars on the blue roof

Yet glitter, though against her hand

His cold sword presses for a proof

He is not dead, but gone away.

How many hours did she wait

For me, I wonder? Till the day

Had faded wholly, and the gate

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