Page:Et Cetera, a Collector's Scrap-Book (1924).djvu/23



AS it some sad-eyed Florentine Within his cloistered cell of yore Who lit this painted page of thine With treasures from his ancient lore, And kneeling in the twilight bore The burden of his Saviour's pain, And even with the sunrise saw The coming of his Lord again?

And when he found the rest he sought, The shadows that he hungered for, Perchance a lady of the Court Within her jeweled bosom wore His books among her billets, or Beneath her scented pillow lain, Who daily in her life foreswore The coming of his Lord again.

And now beneath another sky, Amid the city's ceaseless roar Unheeded but for such as I, You wait upon a shelf before A dark and dusty bookshop's door, And long for loving hands in vain, As he in that dim corridor, The coming of his Lord again.

Book, as my lady's monitor, You shall forget the world's disdain, So had your master sighed no more The coming of his Lord again. —Anonymous.