* * * * *
Then out and spoke the forester,
As he came from the wood,
‘Now never saw I maid’s gold hair
Among the wild deer’s blood.
‘And I have hunted the wild deer
In east lands and in west;
And never saw I white doe yet
That had a maiden’s breast.’
Then up and spake her fair brother,
Between the wine and bread:
‘Behold I had but one sister,
And I have been her dead.
‘But ye must bury my sweet sister
With a stone at her foot and her head,
And ye must cover her fair body
With the white roses and red.
‘And I must out to the greenwood,
The roof shall never shelter me;
And I shall lie for seven long years
On the grass below the hawthorn tree.’
HELIODORE.
(MELEAGER.)
Pour wine, and cry again, again, again!
To Heliodore!
And mingle the sweet word ye call in vain
With that ye pour!
And bring to me her wreath of yesterday
That’s dank with myrrh;
Hesternæ Rosæ, ah my friends, but they
Remember her!
Lo the kind roses, loved of lovers, weep
As who repine,
For if on any breast they see her sleep
It is not mine!