281. Aleppo: a city of Syria; the blue-flowering borage was supposed to possess valuable medicinal virtues and exhilarating qualities.
301. Jerusalem’s repose shall make amends: he will avail himself of it to write a better letter than this one.
A Martyr’s Epitaph.
(From ‘Easter Day’.)
I was born sickly, poor, and mean,
A slave: no misery could screen
The holders of the pearl of price
From Caesar’s envy; therefore twice
I fought with beasts, and three times saw
My children suffer by his law;
At last my own release was earned:
I was some time in being burned,
But at the close a Hand came through
The fire above my head, and drew {10}
My soul to Christ, whom now I see.
Sergius, a brother, writes for me
This testimony on the wall—
For me, I have forgot it all.
Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister.
1.
Gr-r-r—there go, my heart’s abhorrence!
Water your damned flower-pots, do!
If hate killed men, Brother Lawrence,
God’s blood, would not mine kill you!
What? your myrtle-bush wants trimming?
Oh, that rose has prior claims—
Needs its leaden vase filled brimming?
Hell dry you up with its flames!
2.
At the meal we sit together:
‘Salve tibi!’ I must hear
Wise talk of the kind of weather,
Sort of season, time of year:
‘Not a plenteous cork-crop: scarcely
Dare we hope oak-galls, I doubt:
What’s the Latin name for “parsley”?’
What’s the Greek name for Swine’s Snout?