Now candle-flames disperse the rout Of shadows and their giant wars; And though the roof of night without Be spanned with dusk and set with stars, ’Tis lullaby, The elm-tops cry, And lullaby, the leaves that pass In stealth across the window-glass.
The comb shall sleek your drooping head And through the darling tangles go And all your night attire is spread Before the fire to face the glow, And lullaby, The cinders sigh, For ev’ry rosy palace gone, Fall’n in their dwarfish Ilion.
Now rest, your prayers said aright And timely supped your milky bowl, Your little body all as white And sweet as your unsoilèd soul; And lullaby, Her melody, Who from the quilted bedside goes, A-tiptoe, when your eye-lids close.
RONDEAU OF SARUM CLOSE
In Sarum Close, when she had said her say, He stood bare-headed where dim vapours lay Heavy on vacant lawn, athwart the stone Of that great pile that stands unsought, alone,— Himself as still and derelict as they. Here, when morn’s gleaming hand had rolled away From the green plot of this their week-old play Her misty curtain, each to each was shown, In Sarum Close.
Void the discoloured fane before him lay, Void the dark-sodded precincts,—far away One closed a window, night’s appeal had grown Perchance too urgent, even as his own Had seemed to her whose friendship did with day In Sarum close.
THE KNOBBY-GREEN
O thou who ’neath the umbrageous trees That line the Avenue Louise Did’st spread in Belgian sun and breeze Thy buds about, I come to weep thy destinies My Brussels Sprout: