(And I have my dead),—
What then? Do not mock me. Ah, ring your bells low,
And burn your lights faintly! My country is there,
Above the star pricked by the last peak of snow:
My Italy’s THERE,—with my brave civic pair,
To disfranchise despair!
Forgive me. Some women bear children in strength,
And bite back the cry of their pain in self-scorn;
But the birth-pangs of nations will wring us at length
Into wail such as this,—and we sit on forlorn