of Fate, Wearied with waiting for the World’s Desire, Aimlessly wandered in the House of gloom, Aimlessly sought some slumberous anodyne For wasted lives, for lingering wretchedness, Till we beheld thy re-arisen shrine, And the white glory of thy loveliness.

p. 61THE BURDEN OF ITYS

p. 61

p. 63This English Thames is holier far than Rome, Those harebells like a sudden flush of sea Breaking across the woodland, with the foam Of meadow-sweet and white anemone To fleck their blue waves,—God is likelier there Than hidden in that crystal-hearted star the pale monks bear!

p. 63

This

Those violet-gleaming butterflies that take Yon creamy lily for their pavilion Are monsignores, and where the rushes shake A lazy pike lies basking in the sun, His eyes half shut,—he is some mitred old Bishop in partibus! look at those gaudy scales all green and gold.

The wind the restless prisoner of the trees Does well for Palæstrina, one would say The mighty master’s hands were on the keys Of the Maria organ, which they play When early on some sapphire Easter morn In a high litter red as blood or sin the Pope is borne

p. 64From his dark House out to the Balcony Above the bronze gates and the crowded square, Whose very fountains seem for ecstasy To toss their silver lances in the air, And stretching out weak hands to East and West In vain sends peace to peaceless lands, to restless nations rest.

p. 64

Is not yon lingering orange after-glow That stays to vex the moon more fair than all Rome’s lordliest pageants! strange, a year ago I knelt before some crimson Cardinal Who bare the Host across the Esquiline, And now—those common poppies in the wheat seem twice as fine.

The blue-green beanfields yonder, tremulous With the last shower, sweeter perfume bring Through this cool evening than the odorous Flame-jewelled censers the young deacons swing, When the grey priest unlocks the curtained shrine, And makes God’s body from the common fruit of corn and vine.

p. 65Poor Fra Giovanni bawling at the mass Were out of tune now, for a small brown bird Sings overhead, and through the long cool grass I see that throbbing throat which once I heard On starlit hills of flower-starred Arcady, Once where the white 

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