Page:Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918.djvu/981

 DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI

'When round his head the aureole clings,

And he is clothed in white, I'll take his hand and go with him

To the deep wells of light; As unto a stream we will step down,

And bathe there in God's sight.

We two will stand beside that shrine,

Occult, withheld, untrod, Whose lamps arc stirred continually

With prayer sent up to God, And see our old prayers, granted, melt

Each like a little cloud.

'We two will lie i' the shadow of

That living mystic tree, Within whose secret growth the Dove

Is sometimes felt to be, While every leaf that His plumes touch

Saith His Name audibly.

'And I mvsclf will teach to him,

I myself, lying so, The songs I sing here, which his voice

Shall pause in, hush'd and slow, And find some knowledge at each pause,

Or some new thing to know.'

(Alas ! We two, we two, thou say'st !

Yea, one wast thou with me That once of old. But shall God lift

To endless unity The soul whose likeness with thy soul

Was but its love for thee ? )

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