Page:Early poems of William Morris.djvu/57



"The back-toll'd bells of noisy Camelot."— "Now, Lord God, listen! listen, Guenevere, Though I am weak just now, I think there's not A man who dares to say, 'You hated her,

"'And left her moaning while you fought your fill In the daisied meadows;' lo you her thin hand, That on the carven stone can not keep still, Because she loves me against God's command,

"Has often been quite wet with tear on tear, Tears Launcelot keeps somewhere, surely not In his own heart, perhaps in Heaven, where He will not be these ages."—"Launcelot!

"Loud lips, wrung heart! I say, when the bells rang, The noisy back-toll'd bells of Camelot, There were two spots on earth, the thrushes sang In the lonely gardens where my love was not,

"Where I was almost weeping; I dared not Weep quite in those days, lest one maid should say, In tittering whispers; 'Where is Launcelot To wipe with some kerchief those tears away?'

"Another answer sharply with brows knit, And warning hand up, scarcely lower though, 'You speak too loud, see you, she heareth it, This tigress fair has claws, as I well know,

"'As Launcelot knows too, the poor knight! well-a-day! Why met he not with Iseult from the West, Or, better still, Iseult of Brittany, Perchance indeed quite ladyless were best.'