MORNING.
Pack, clouds, away, and welcome day,
With night we banish sorrow,
Sweet air blow soft, mount lark aloft
To give my Love good morrow.
Wings from the wind, to please her mind,
Notes from the lark I'll borrow;
Bird prune thy wing, nightingale sing,
To give my Love good morrow;
To give my Love good morrow
Notes from them all I'll borrow.
Wake from thy nest, robin redbreast,
Sing birds in every furrow,
And from each hill, let music shrill,
Give my fair Love good morrow:
Blackbird and thrush, in every bush,
Stare, linnet, and cock sparrow!
You pretty elves, amongst yourselves
Sing my fair Love good morrow.
To give my Love good morrow
Sing birds in every furrow.
Thomas Heywood.
THE LADY OF SHALOTT.
PART I.
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And thro' the field the road runs by
To many-towered Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott.
Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Thro' the wave that runs forever
By the island in the river
Flowing down to Camelot.
Four gray walls, and four gray towers,
Overlook a space of flowers,
And the silent isle imbowers
The Lady of Shalott.
By the margin, willow-veiled,
Slide the heavy barges trailed
By slow horses; and unhailed
The shallop flitteth silken-sailed,
Skimming down to Camelot:
But who hath seen her wave her hand?
Or at the casement seen her stand?
Or is she known in all the land,
The Lady of Shalott?