Page:Rosalind and Helen (Shelley, Forman).djvu/54

52 In some such solitude, its casements bright Shone thro' their vine-leaves in the morning sun, And even within 'twas scarce like Italy. And when she saw how all things there were planned, As in an English home, dim memory Disturbed poor Rosalind: she stood as one Whose mind is where his body cannot be, Till Helen led her where her child yet slept, And said," Observe, that brow was Lionel's, Those lips were his, and so he ever kept One arm in sleep, pillowing his head with it. You cannot see his eyes, they are two wells Of liquid love: let us not wake him yet." But Rosalind could bear no more, and wept A shower of burning tears, which fell upon His face, and so his opening lashes shone With tears unlike his own, as he did leap In sudden wonder from his innocent sleep.

So Rosalind and Helen lived together Thenceforth, changed in all else, yet friends again, Such as they were, when o'er the mountain heather They wandered in their youth, through sun and rain. And after many years, for human things Change even like the ocean and the wind, Her daughter was restored to Rosalind, And in their circle thence some visitings Of joy 'mid their new calm would intervene: A lovely child she was, of looks serene, And motions which o'er things indifferent shed The grace and gentleness from whence they came. And Helen's boy grew with her, and they fed From the same flowers of thought, until each mind Like springs which mingle in one flood became, And in their union soon their parents saw