Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 1.pdf/120

86

Fearing the night will never die,

Nor dawn relieve my misery.

Longing for light my spirit cries:

O sun, for God’s sake, haste to rise

Above the hills, delay thou not,

But cast thy beams on this drear spot,

And chase, by thy resistless power,

Night, and the clouds that round me lower.’

Thus shalt thou wear the night away

Reft of repose, for well the play

Of lovers’ thoughts to me is known.

And then at last, impatient grown

Of vainly courting scornful sleep,

From off thy restless couch thou’lt leap,

And set thyself in haste to don

Thy raiment, and thy shoes put on,

Although the dawning still delays

Its coming, and by secret ways

Wilt haste through storm of rain, or sleet,

To seek the house where dwells thy sweet,

Who, whilst thou wakest, in profound

And blissful dreams perchance is drowned,

Of thee unmindful: then shalt thou

Seek if the postern door allow

Some entry, but an hour or more

Must bide, content, on stony floor,

Beaten by wind and rain, to sit:

Then to the portal shalt thou flit,

And seek with diligent eye some place

Unbolted, or some window space

Left open, so that thou mayst find,

With anxious ear, if slumber bind