And brooding on the memory of lost things

That erst made glad those walls, so wan and bare.

Came Hope then unto him and bade him look

Upon the brightness of the cloudless hours,

And on the buds of yet unopened flowers;

But Love, being blind, all blank was nature’s book.

Sleep came to him, and would have brought him peace,

But dreams awoke Desire whose torturing flame

Made worse his case and left him agony:

Till one, with wreathèd brows, for his release,