The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Volume 2. Browning Elizabeth Barrett

      "Wake, nurse!" the lady said;

      "We are waking – he and I —

      I, on earth, and he, in sky:

      And thou must help me to o'erlay

      With garment white this little clay

      Which needs no more our lullaby.

      "I changed the cruel prayer I made,

      And bowed my meekened face, and prayed

      That God would do His will; and thus

      He did it, nurse! He parted us:

      And His sun shows victorious

      The dead calm face, – and I am calm,

      And Heaven is hearkening a new psalm.

      "This earthly noise is too anear,

      Too loud, and will not let me hear

      The little harp. My death will soon

      Make silence."

      And a sense of tune,

      A satisfied love meanwhile

      Which nothing earthly could despoil,

      Sang on within her soul.

      Oh you,

      Earth's tender and impassioned few,

      Take courage to entrust your love

      To Him so named who guards above

      Its ends and shall fulfil!

      Breaking the narrow prayers that may

      Befit your narrow hearts, away

      In His broad, loving will.

      A knight of gallant deeds

      And a young page at his side,

      From the holy war in Palestine

      Did slow and thoughtful ride,

      As each were a palmer and told for beads

      The dews of the eventide.

      "O young page," said the knight,

      "A noble page art thou!

      Thou fearest not to steep in blood

      The curls upon thy brow;

      And once in the tent, and twice in the fight,

      Didst ward me a mortal blow."

      "O brave knight," said the page,

      "Or ere we hither came,

      We talked in tent, we talked in field,

      Of the bloody battle-game;

      But here, below this greenwood bough,

      I cannot speak the same.

      "Our troop is far behind,

      The woodland calm is new;

      Our steeds, with slow grass-muffled hoofs,

      Tread deep the shadows through;

      And, in my mind, some blessing kind

      Is dropping with the dew.

      "The woodland calm is pure —

      I cannot choose but have

      A thought from these, o' the beechen-trees,

      Which in our England wave,

      And of the little finches fine

      Which sang there while in Palestine

      The warrior-hilt we drave.

      "Methinks, a moment gone,

      I heard my mother pray!

      I heard, sir knight, the prayer for me

      Wherein she passed away;

      And I know the heavens are leaning down

      To hear what I shall say."

      The page spake calm and high,

      As of no mean degree;

      Perhaps he felt in nature's broad

      Full heart, his own was free:

      And the knight looked up to his lifted eye,

      Then answered smilingly —

      "Sir page, I pray your grace!

      Certes, I meant not so

      To cross your pastoral mood, sir page,

      With the crook of the battle-bow;

      But a knight may speak of a lady's face,

      I ween, in any mood or place,

      If the grasses die or grow.

      "And this I meant to say —

      My lady's face shall shine

      As ladies' faces use, to greet

      My page from Palestine;

      Or, speak she fair or prank she gay,

      She is no lady of mine.

      "And this I meant to fear —

      Her bower may suit thee ill;

      For, sooth, in that same field and tent,

      Thy talk was somewhat still:

      And fitter thy hand for my knightly spear

      Than thy tongue for my lady's will!"

      Slowly and thankfully

      The young page bowed his head;

      His large eyes seemed to muse a smile,

      Until he blushed instead,

      And no lady in her bower, pardiè,

      Could blush more sudden red:

      "Sir Knight, – thy lady's bower to me

      Is suited well," he said.

      Beati, beati, mortui!

      From the convent on the sea,

      One mile off, or scarce so nigh,

      Swells the dirge as clear and high

      As if that, over brake and lea,

      Bodily the wind did carry

      The great altar of Saint Mary,

      And the fifty tapers burning o'er it,

      And the lady Abbess dead before it,

      And the chanting nuns whom yesterweek

      Her voice did charge and bless, —

      Chanting steady, chanting meek,

      Chanting with a solemn breath,

      Because that they are thinking less

      Upon the dead than upon death.

      Beati, beati, mortui!

      Now the vision in the sound

      Wheeleth on the wind around;

      Now it sweepeth back, away —

      The uplands will not let it stay

      To