Page:Poems by Christina Rossetti with illustrations by Florence Harrison.djvu/34

 Our grapes fresh from the vine

Pomegranates full and fine,

Dates and sharp bullaces,

Rare pears and greengages,

Damsons and bilberries,

Taste them and try:

Currants and gooseberries.

Bright fire-like barberries.

Figs to fill your mouth,

Citrons from the South,

Sweet to tongue and sound to eye;

Come buy, come buy."

Evening by evening

Among the brookside rushes,

Laura bowed her head to hear,

Lizzie veiled her blushes:

Crouching close together

In the cooling weather,

With clasping arms and cautioning lips

With tingling cheeks and finger tips.

"Lie close," Laura said.

Pricking up her golden head:

"We must not look at goblin men,

We must not buy their fruits:

Who knows upon what soil they fed

Their hungry, thirsty roots?"

"Come buy," call the goblins

Hobbling down the glen.

"Oh," cried Lizzie, "Laura, Laura,

You should not peep at goblin men."

Lizzie covered up her eyes,

Covered close lest they should look;