NOW I have fallen out of love
A year or two, I hold review
Of all the things I used to do,
Turning with fingers rational
The closed leaves of my passional.
And I am quite amazed, by Jove!
Wholly incredulous I smile—
So hard it is to reconcile
With this, my mere immediate me
The other self I used to be
You with the you that once was you—
Now I have fallen out of love
A year or two.
E. F. A. GEACH (HOME STUDENT)
D. E. A. WALLACE (SOMERVILLE)
BALLADE OF LADIES WHO DIED FOR LOVE
LADIES, why did ye all in vain
Seek death to end your misery?
Why did ye not forget your pain
In new loves and new ecstasy?
Ophelia racked with phantasy,
And Sigismunda, sick with rue—
Ladies, why did ye choose to die
When all the world was made for you?
Wild Phœdra by thy passion slain,
Œnone, nymph of Thessaly,
Dido and lily-white Elaine,
O Queen who died for Antony,
Sappho and all thy poesy,
Juliet to thy dead love true—
Ladies, why did ye choose to die
When all the world was made for you?
Fair Margaret distraught and fain
Beside thy phantom love to lie,
And Isabella who didst wane
Over thy pot of porphyry,
Aude and Isolde, tell me why,
Your lovers direly stricken thro’,
You chose by those same swords to die,
When all the world was made for you?
Envoy:
Love’s happiness had passed you by,
But there were other things to do.
Ladies, why did ye choose to die,
When all the world was made for you?
K. GIBBERD
(ST. HILDA’S HALL)