Latest / Paradise Lost / Goblin Market and Other Poems - Christina Rossetti
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- 0:00Speaker 1: Section one of Goblin Market and Other Poems. This is
- 0:05Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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- 0:17Speaker 1: Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti, read by
- 0:23Speaker 1: Elizabeth Klett. Section one, Goblin Market. Morning and evening maids
- 0:33Speaker 1: heard the goblins cry, come buy our orchard fruits, come buy,
- 0:38Speaker 1: Come buy apples and quinces, lemons and oranges, plump, unpecked cherries,
- 0:46Speaker 1: melons and raspberries, bloom down cheeked peaches, swart headed mulberries, wild,
- 0:53Speaker 1: free born cranberries, crab apples, dewberries, pine apples, blackberries, apricots, strawberries,
- 1:01Speaker 1: all ripe together in summer weather. Morns that pass by,
- 1:06Speaker 1: fair eaves that fly, come by. Come by, are grapes
- 1:12Speaker 1: fresh from the vine, pomegranates, full and fine, dates and
- 1:17Speaker 1: sharp boulaces, rare pears and green gages, damsons and billberries.
- 1:23Speaker 1: Taste them and try currants and gooseberries bright fire like barberries,
- 1:29Speaker 1: figs to fill your mouth. Citrons from the south, sweet
- 1:34Speaker 1: to tongue and sound to eye. Come by, come by,
- 1:40Speaker 1: evening by evening among the brookside rushes. Laura bowed her
- 1:45Speaker 1: head to hear. Lizzie veiled her blushes. Crouching close together
- 1:50Speaker 1: in the cooling weather, with clasping arms and cautioning lips,
- 1:54Speaker 1: with tingling cheeks and finger tips, lie close, Laura said,
- 2:00Speaker 1: pricking up her golden head. We must not look at
- 2:03Speaker 1: goblin men. We must not buy their fruits. Who knows
- 2:07Speaker 1: upon what soil they fed their hungry, thirsty roots. Come by,
- 2:13Speaker 1: call the goblins hobbling down the glen, Oh, cried Lizzie. Laura, Laura,
- 2:20Speaker 1: you should not peep at goblin men. Lizzie covered up
- 2:24Speaker 1: her eyes, covered close lest they should look. Laura reared
- 2:28Speaker 1: her glossy head and whispered, like the restless brook Look, Lizzie, look,
- 2:34Speaker 1: Lizzie down the glen tramp little men. One hauls a basket,
- 2:39Speaker 1: one bears a plate, one lugs a golden dish of
- 2:42Speaker 1: many pounds weight. How fair the vine must grow, whose
- 2:46Speaker 1: grapes are so luscious? How warm the wind must blow
- 2:50Speaker 1: through the fruit bushes. No, said Lizzie, No, no, no,
- 2:56Speaker 1: Their offers should not charm us, Their evil gifts would
- 2:59Speaker 1: harm us. She thrust a dimpled finger in each ear,
- 3:03Speaker 1: shut eyes, and ran curious. Laura chose to linger, wondering
- 3:08Speaker 1: at each merchantman. One had a cat's face, one whisked
- 3:13Speaker 1: a tail, one tramped at a rat's pace. One crawled
- 3:18Speaker 1: like a snail, one like a wombat, prowled obtuse and furry,
- 3:24Speaker 1: one like a rattle, tumbled, hurry, scurry. She heard a
- 3:28Speaker 1: voice like voice of doves cooing. All together they sounded
- 3:32Speaker 1: kind and full of loves in the pleasant weather. Laura
- 3:36Speaker 1: stretched her gleaming neck like a rush imbedded swan, like
- 3:41Speaker 1: a lily, from the beck, like a moonlit poplar branch,
- 3:45Speaker 1: like a vessel at the launch, when its last restraint
- 3:49Speaker 1: is gone. Backwards up the mossy glen turned and trooped
- 3:53Speaker 1: the goblin men with their shrill repeated cry, come by,
- 3:58Speaker 1: come by. When they reached where Laura was, they stood
- 4:02Speaker 1: stock still upon the moss, leering at each other, brother
- 4:06Speaker 1: with queer brother, signaling each other brother with sly brother.
- 4:12Speaker 1: One set his basket down, one reared his plate. One
- 4:16Speaker 1: began to weave a crown of tendrils, leaves, and rough nuts.
- 4:20Speaker 1: Brown men sell not such in any town. One heaved
- 4:24Speaker 1: the golden weight of dish and fruit to offer her.
- 4:28Speaker 1: Come by, Come by, was still their cry. Laura stared,
- 4:33Speaker 1: but did not stir, longed, but had no money. The
- 4:37Speaker 1: whisk tailed merchant bade her taste in tones as smooth
- 4:41Speaker 1: as honey. The cat faced purred, the rat paste spoke
- 4:45Speaker 1: a word of welcome, and the snail paste even was heard.
- 4:49Speaker 1: One parrot voiced and jolly cried pretty goblin still for
- 4:54Speaker 1: pretty parley. One whistled like a bird, but wheat tooth.
- 5:00Speaker 1: Laura spoke, in haste, good folk, I have no coin
- 5:05Speaker 1: to take or to purloin. I have no copper in
- 5:08Speaker 1: my purse. I have no silver either, and all my
- 5:11Speaker 1: gold is on the furs that shakes in windy weather,
- 5:14Speaker 1: above the rusty heather. You have much gold upon your head,
- 5:20Speaker 1: they answered, altogether. Buy from us with a golden curl.
- 5:26Speaker 1: She clipped a precious golden lock. She dropped a tear
- 5:29Speaker 1: more rare than pearl, then sucked their fruit, globes fair
- 5:34Speaker 1: or red, sweeter than honey, from the rock, stronger than man, rejoicing,
- 5:39Speaker 1: wine clearer than water flowed that juice. She never tasted
- 5:44Speaker 1: such before, How should it cloy? With length of use?
- 5:48Speaker 1: She sucked and sucked and sucked the more fruits which
- 5:52Speaker 1: that unknown orchard bore. She sucked until her lips were sore,
- 5:58Speaker 1: then flung the emptied rind away, but gathered up one
- 6:02Speaker 1: kernel stone and knew not was it night or day.
- 6:06Speaker 1: As she turned home alone, Lizzie met her at the gate,
- 6:11Speaker 1: full of wise upbraidings. Dear, you should not stay so late.
- 6:16Speaker 1: Twilight is not good for maidens. Should not loiter in
- 6:19Speaker 1: the glen in the haunts of goblin men. Do you
- 6:22Speaker 1: not remember Genie? How she met them in the moonlight,
- 6:26Speaker 1: took their gifts, both choice and many, ate their fruits,
- 6:29Speaker 1: and wore their flowers, plucked from bowers where summer ripens
- 6:33Speaker 1: at all hours, but ever in the moonlight. She pined
- 6:37Speaker 1: and pined away, sought them by night and day, found
- 6:41Speaker 1: them no more, but dwindled and grew gray, then fell
- 6:46Speaker 1: with the first snow, while to this day no grass
- 6:49Speaker 1: will grow where she lies low. I planted daisies there
- 6:53Speaker 1: a year ago that never blow. You should not loiter, so,
- 6:58Speaker 1: nay hush, said Laura. Nay hush, my sister, I ate
- 7:03Speaker 1: and ate my fill, yet my mouth waters still. Tomorrow
- 7:08Speaker 1: night I will buy more, And kissed her have done
- 7:12Speaker 1: with sorrow. I'll bring you plums to morrow, fresh on
- 7:16Speaker 1: their mother twigs, cherries worth getting. You cannot think what
- 7:20Speaker 1: figs my teeth of metton, What melons icy cold, piled
- 7:25Speaker 1: on a dish of gold too huge for me to hold?
- 7:28Speaker 1: What peaches with a velvet nap, pellucid grapes without one seed? Odorous? Indeed,
- 7:35Speaker 1: must be the mead whereon they grow and pure the
- 7:38Speaker 1: wave They drink with lilies at the brink, and sugar
- 7:42Speaker 1: sweet their sap, golden head by golden head, Like two
- 7:47Speaker 1: pigeons in one nest, folded in each other's wings. They
- 7:52Speaker 1: lay down in their curtained bed, like two blossoms on
- 7:55Speaker 1: one stem, like two flakes of new fallen snow, like
- 8:00Speaker 1: two wands of ivory tipped with gold. For awful kings,
- 8:04Speaker 1: moon and stars gazed in at them. Wind sang to
- 8:08Speaker 1: them lullaby, lumbering owls forbore to fly, not a bat,
- 8:13Speaker 1: flapped to and fro round their rest, cheek to cheek
- 8:17Speaker 1: and breast to breast, locked together in one nest. Early
- 8:23Speaker 1: in the morning, when the first cock crowed his warning,
- 8:26Speaker 1: neat like bees as sweet and busy, Laura rose with
- 8:30Speaker 1: Lizzie fetched in honey, milked the cows, aired and set
- 8:35Speaker 1: to rights. The house kneaded cakes of whitest wheat cakes
- 8:39Speaker 1: for dainty mouths to eat. Next, churned butter, whipped up cream,
- 8:44Speaker 1: fed their poultry, sat and sewed, talked as modest maidens should.
- 8:49Speaker 1: Lizzy with an open heart, Laura in an absent dream,
- 8:54Speaker 1: one content one sick in part one, warbling for the mere, bright,
- 8:59Speaker 1: dazed day light, one longing for the night. At length,
- 9:04Speaker 1: slow evening came. They went with pitchers to the reedy brook,
- 9:08Speaker 1: Lizzie most placid in her look, Laura most like a
- 9:12Speaker 1: leaping flame. They drew the gurgling water from its deep.
- 9:17Speaker 1: Lizzie plucked purple and rich golden flags, then, turning homeward,
- 9:21Speaker 1: said the sunset flushes those furthest loftiest crags. Come Laura,
- 9:27Speaker 1: not another maiden lags, no wilful squirrel wags. The beasts
- 9:31Speaker 1: and birds are fast asleep. But Laura loitered still among
- 9:36Speaker 1: the rushes, and said the bank was steep, and said
- 9:41Speaker 1: the hour was early, still, the dew not fallen, the
- 9:44Speaker 1: wind not chill. Listening ever, but not catching the customary cry,
- 9:49Speaker 1: come by, come by with its iterated jingle of sugar
- 9:53Speaker 1: baited words. Not for all her watching, once discerning even
- 9:57Speaker 1: one goblin racing, whisky, tumbling, hobbling, Let alone the herds
- 10:02Speaker 1: that used to tramp along the glen in groups or
- 10:05Speaker 1: single of brisk fruit merchant men till Lizzie urged, Oh, Laura, come,
- 10:12Speaker 1: I hear the fruit call, but I dare not look.
- 10:15Speaker 1: You should not loiter longer at this brook. Come with
- 10:18Speaker 1: me home. The stars rise, the moon bends her arc,
- 10:22Speaker 1: each glowworm winks her spark. Let us get home before
- 10:25Speaker 1: the night grows dark, for clouds may gather, though this
- 10:29Speaker 1: is summer weather. Put out the lights and drench us through.
- 10:33Speaker 1: Then if we lost our way, what should we do?
- 10:37Speaker 1: Laura turned as cold as stone to find her sister
- 10:40Speaker 1: heard that cry alone, that goblin cry, come by our
- 10:45Speaker 1: fruits come by. Must she then buy no more such
- 10:49Speaker 1: dainty fruit? Must she no more such suck us pasture?
- 10:53Speaker 1: Find gone deaf and blind? Her tree of life drooped
- 10:58Speaker 1: from the root. She said, not one word in her
- 11:01Speaker 1: heart's sore ache, But peering through the dimness, not discerning,
- 11:05Speaker 1: trudged home, her pitcher dripping all the way, so crept
- 11:10Speaker 1: to bed and lay silent till Lizzie slept, then sat
- 11:14Speaker 1: up in a passionate yearning and gnashed her teeth for
- 11:18Speaker 1: balked desire, and wept as if her heart would break.
- 11:22Speaker 1: Day after day, night after night, Lora kept watch in vain,
- 11:28Speaker 1: in sullen silence of exceeding pain. She never caught again
- 11:32Speaker 1: the goblin cry, come by, come by. She never spied
- 11:38Speaker 1: the goblin men hawking their fruits along the glen. But
- 11:41Speaker 1: when the moon waxed bright, her hair grew thin and gray.
- 11:46Speaker 1: She dwindled as the fair full moon doth turn to
- 11:49Speaker 1: swift decay and burn her fire away. One day, remembering
- 11:55Speaker 1: her Colonel Stone, she set it by a wall that
- 11:58Speaker 1: faced the south, dewed it with tears, hoped for a root,
- 12:03Speaker 1: watched for a waxing shoot, but there came none. It
- 12:07Speaker 1: never saw the sun, It never felt the trickling moisture run,
- 12:11Speaker 1: while with sunk eyes and faded mouths, she dreamed of melons,
- 12:16Speaker 1: as a traveler sees false waves in desert drought with
- 12:20Speaker 1: shade of leaf crowned trees and burns the thirstier and
- 12:24Speaker 1: the sandful breeze. She no more swept the house, tended
- 12:29Speaker 1: the fowls or cows, fetched honey, kneaded cakes of wheat,
- 12:33Speaker 1: brought water from the brook, but sat down listless in
- 12:37Speaker 1: the chimney nook and would not eat. Tender Lizzie could
- 12:42Speaker 1: not bear to watch her sister's cankerous care, yet not
- 12:45Speaker 1: to share. She night and morning caught the goblin's cry,
- 12:50Speaker 1: come by our orchard, fruits, come by, come by beside
- 12:54Speaker 1: the brook. Along the glen, she heard the tramp of
- 12:57Speaker 1: goblin men, the voice and stir where poor Laura could
- 13:01Speaker 1: not hear. Longed to buy fruit to comfort her, but
- 13:05Speaker 1: feared to pay too dear. She thought of Genie in
- 13:09Speaker 1: her grave, who should have been a bride, but who
- 13:11Speaker 1: for Joy's brides hoped to have fell sick and died
- 13:15Speaker 1: in her gay prime in earliest winter time, with the
- 13:18Speaker 1: first glaring rhyme, with the first snowfall of crisp winter time,
- 13:24Speaker 1: till Laura dwindling seemed knocking at death's door. Then Lizzie
- 13:30Speaker 1: weighed no more better and worse, but put a silver
- 13:33Speaker 1: penny in her purse. Kissed, Laura crossed the heath with
- 13:37Speaker 1: clumps of furs at twilight, halted by the brook, and
- 13:41Speaker 1: for the first time in her life began to listen
- 13:45Speaker 1: and look laughed. Every goblin when they spied her, peeping
- 13:51Speaker 1: came towards her, hobbling, flying, running, leaping, puffing and blowing, chuckling, clapping, crowing,
- 13:58Speaker 1: clucking and gobbling, mopping and mowing, full of airs and graces, pulling,
- 14:04Speaker 1: wry faces, demure, grimaces, catlike and ratlike, rattle and wombat
- 14:10Speaker 1: like snail, paced in a hurry, parrot voiced and whistler,
- 14:14Speaker 1: helter skelter, hurry, scurry, chattering like magpies, fluttering like pigeons,
- 14:20Speaker 1: gliding like fishes. Hugged her and kissed her, squeezed and
- 14:25Speaker 1: caressed her, stretched up their dishes, panniers and plates. Look
- 14:30Speaker 1: at our apples russet and done. Bob at our cherries,
- 14:35Speaker 1: Bite at our peaches, citrons and dates, grapes for the asking,
- 14:40Speaker 1: pears red with basking out in the sun, Plums on
- 14:44Speaker 1: their twigs, Pluck them and suck them, pomegranates, figs. Good folk,
- 14:52Speaker 1: said Lizzie, mindful of Genie, give me much, and many
- 14:57Speaker 1: held out her apron tossed them her penny. Nay, take
- 15:02Speaker 1: a seat with us, honor, and eat with us, they answered, grinning,
- 15:07Speaker 1: our feast is yet beginning night, Yet is early, warm
- 15:12Speaker 1: and dew pearly, wakeful and starry. Such fruits as these
- 15:17Speaker 1: no man can carry. Half their bloom would fly, half
- 15:21Speaker 1: their dew would dry, half their flavor would pass by.
- 15:26Speaker 1: Sit down and feast with us, Be welcome, guest with us,
- 15:29Speaker 1: Cheer you, and rest with us. Thank you, said Lizzie.
- 15:35Speaker 1: But one waits at home alone for me, So, without
- 15:38Speaker 1: further parleying, if you will not sell me any of
- 15:41Speaker 1: your fruits, though much and many, give me back my
- 15:45Speaker 1: silver penny I tossed you for a fee. They began
- 15:48Speaker 1: to scratch their pates, no longer wagging, purring, but visibly demurring, grunting,
- 15:55Speaker 1: and snarling. One called her proud cross, grain and uncivil.
- 16:01Speaker 1: Their tones waxed loud, their looks were evil. Lashing their tails,
- 16:07Speaker 1: they trod and hustled her, elbowed and jostled her, clawed
- 16:11Speaker 1: with their nails, barking, mewing, hissing, mocking, tore her gown
- 16:16Speaker 1: and soiled her stocking, twitched her hair out by the roots,
- 16:20Speaker 1: stamped upon her tender feet, held her hands, and squeezed
- 16:24Speaker 1: their fruits against her mouth to make her eat white
- 16:28Speaker 1: and golden. Lizzie stood like a lily in a flood,
- 16:32Speaker 1: like a rock of blue veined stone, lashed by tides, obstreperously,
- 16:37Speaker 1: like a beacon left alone in a hoary, roaring sea,
- 16:41Speaker 1: sending up a golden fire, like a fruit crowned orange tree,
- 16:45Speaker 1: white with blossoms, honey, sweet soar, beset by wasp and bee,
- 16:51Speaker 1: like a royal virgin town, topped with gilded dome and spire, close,
- 16:56Speaker 1: beleaguered by a fleet mad to tug her stone down.
- 17:01Speaker 1: One may lead a horse to water, twenty cannot make
- 17:05Speaker 1: him drink. Though the goblins cuffed and caught her, coaxed
- 17:09Speaker 1: and fought her, bullied and besought her, scratched her, pinched
- 17:13Speaker 1: her black as ink, kicked and knocked her, mauled and
- 17:16Speaker 1: mocked her. Lizzie uttered not a word, would not open
- 17:21Speaker 1: lip from lip, lest they should cram a mouthful inn,
- 17:24Speaker 1: but laughed in heart to feel the drip of juice
- 17:27Speaker 1: that syruped all her face and lodged in dimples of
- 17:31Speaker 1: her chin, and streaked her neck, which quaked like curd.
- 17:36Speaker 1: At last, the evil people, worn out by her resistance,
- 17:40Speaker 1: flung back her penny, kicked their fruit along whichever road
- 17:44Speaker 1: they took, not leaving root or stone or shoot. Some
- 17:48Speaker 1: writhed into the ground, some dived into the brook with
- 17:52Speaker 1: ring and ripple. Some scudded on the gale without a sound.
- 17:56Speaker 1: Some vanished in the distance in a smart ache tingle.
- 18:02Speaker 1: Lizzie went her way. She knew not was it night
- 18:05Speaker 1: or day, sprang up the bank, tore through the furs,
- 18:09Speaker 1: threaded copse and dingle, and heard her penny jingle bouncing
- 18:13Speaker 1: in her purse. Its bounce was music to her ear.
- 18:17Speaker 1: She ran and ran, as if she feared some goblin
- 18:21Speaker 1: man dogged her with gibe or curse or something worse.
- 18:25Speaker 1: But not one goblin scurried after, nor was she pricked
- 18:29Speaker 1: by fear. The kind heart made her windy paste that
- 18:33Speaker 1: urged her home, quite out of breath. With haste and
- 18:36Speaker 1: inward laughter, she cried, Laura, up the garden, did you
- 18:42Speaker 1: miss me? Come and kiss me. Never mind my bruises,
- 18:47Speaker 1: Hug me, kiss me, suck my juices squeezed from goblin
- 18:51Speaker 1: fruits for you, Goblin pulp and goblin do eat me,
- 18:56Speaker 1: drink me, love me, Laura, make much of me for
- 18:59Speaker 1: your your sake. I have braved the glen and had
- 19:02Speaker 1: to do with goblin merchantmen. Laura started from her chair,
- 19:07Speaker 1: flung her arms up in the air, clutched her hair. Lizzy, Lizzie,
- 19:12Speaker 1: have you tasted for my sake the fruit forbidden? Must
- 19:16Speaker 1: your light like mine be hidden? Your young life like
- 19:20Speaker 1: mine be wasted, undone in mine, undoing and ruined in
- 19:24Speaker 1: my ruin? Thirsty, cankered, goblin ridden, she clung about her sister,
- 19:30Speaker 1: kissed and kissed and kissed her tears once again refreshed
- 19:34Speaker 1: her shrunken eyes, dropping like rain after long sultry drought.
- 19:39Speaker 1: Shaking with anguish, fear and pain, she kissed and kissed
- 19:43Speaker 1: her with a hungry mouth. Her lips began to scorch.
- 19:48Speaker 1: That juice was wormwood to her tongue. She loathed the feast,
- 19:53Speaker 1: writhing as one possessed. She leaped and sung, rent all
- 19:56Speaker 1: her robe and wrung her hands in lamentable haste, and
- 20:00Speaker 1: beat her breast. Her locks streamed like the torch borne
- 20:04Speaker 1: by a racer at full speed, or like the mane
- 20:07Speaker 1: of horses in their flight, or like an eagle when
- 20:10Speaker 1: she stems the light straight toward the sun, or like
- 20:14Speaker 1: a caged thing freed, or like a flying flag when
- 20:17Speaker 1: armies run swift, fire spread through her veins, knocked at
- 20:22Speaker 1: her heart, met the fire smoldering there, and overbore its
- 20:26Speaker 1: lesser flame. She gorged on bitterness without a naim ah.
- 20:32Speaker 1: Fool to choose such part of soul consuming care sense
- 20:37Speaker 1: failed in the mortal strife, like the watch tower of
- 20:40Speaker 1: a town which an earthquake shatters down like a lightning
- 20:44Speaker 1: stricken mast, like a wind uprooted tree spun about, like
- 20:48Speaker 1: a foam topped water spout cast down headlong in the sea.
- 20:52Speaker 1: She fell at last, Pleasure passed and anguish passed. Is
- 20:58Speaker 1: it death? Or is it life? Life out of death?
- 21:04Speaker 1: That night long Lizzy watched by her, counting her pulses flagging,
- 21:09Speaker 1: stir felt for her breath, held water to her lips,
- 21:13Speaker 1: and cooled her face with tears and fanning leaves. But
- 21:17Speaker 1: when the first birds chirped about their eaves, and early
- 21:21Speaker 1: reapers plodded to the place of golden sheaves and dew
- 21:25Speaker 1: wet grass bowed in the morning, wind so brisk to pass,
- 21:29Speaker 1: and new buds with new day opened of cup like
- 21:32Speaker 1: lilies on the stream, Laura awoke as from a dream,
- 21:37Speaker 1: laughed in the innocent old way hugged Lizzie, but not
- 21:41Speaker 1: twice or thrice. Her gleaming locks showed not one thread
- 21:45Speaker 1: of gray. Her breath was sweet as may, and light
- 21:49Speaker 1: danced in her eyes days, weeks, months, years afterwards, when
- 21:55Speaker 1: both were wives, with children of their own, their mother
- 21:58Speaker 1: hearts beset with feets, their lives bound up in tender lives,
- 22:04Speaker 1: Laura would call the little ones and tell them of
- 22:07Speaker 1: her early prime, those pleasant days long gone, of not
- 22:11Speaker 1: returning time. Would talk about the haunted glen, the wicked,
- 22:16Speaker 1: quaint fruit merchant men, their fruits like honey to the throat,
- 22:21Speaker 1: but poison in the blood men sell not such in
- 22:24Speaker 1: any town. Would tell them how her sister stood in
- 22:28Speaker 1: deadly peril to do her good and win the fiery antidote. Then,
- 22:33Speaker 1: joining hands to little hands, would bid them cling together,
- 22:38Speaker 1: for there is no friend like a sister in calm
- 22:42Speaker 1: or stormy weather. To cheer one on the tedious way,
- 22:46Speaker 1: to fetch one if one goes astray, to lift one,
- 22:50Speaker 1: if one totters down, to strengthen whilst one stands. End
- 22:56Speaker 1: of Section one, Section two of Goblin Market and Other
- 23:06Speaker 1: Poems by Christina Rossetti. This LibriVox recording is in the
- 23:11Speaker 1: public domain. In the round Tower at Johnsy June eighth,
- 23:17Speaker 1: eighteen fifty seven, A hundred a thousand to one. Even so,
- 23:25Speaker 1: not a hope in the world remained. The swarming, howling
- 23:30Speaker 1: wretches below gained and gained and gained. Skeene looked at
- 23:36Speaker 1: his pale young wife. Is the time come? The time
- 23:41Speaker 1: is come, young, strong, and so full of life. The
- 23:46Speaker 1: agony struck them dumb. Close his arm about her, Now
- 23:51Speaker 1: close her cheek to his, close the pistol to her brow.
- 23:56Speaker 1: God forgive them. This will it much no mine own.
- 24:03Speaker 1: I wish I could bear the pang for both. I
- 24:06Speaker 1: wish I could bear the pang alone. Courage dear, I
- 24:10Speaker 1: am not loath. Kiss and kiss. It is not pain.
- 24:17Speaker 1: Thus to kiss and die. One kiss more, and yet
- 24:22Speaker 1: one again, good bye, good bye. End of section two
- 24:35Speaker 1: Section three of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 24:41Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Dreamland, where
- 24:49Speaker 1: sunless rivers weep their waves into the deep. She sleeps
- 24:53Speaker 1: a charmed sleep, awake her not led by a single star.
- 25:00Speaker 1: She came from very far to seek where shadows are
- 25:03Speaker 1: her pleasant lot. She left the rosy morn. She left
- 25:08Speaker 1: the fields of corn for twilight, cold and lorn, and
- 25:13Speaker 1: water springs through sleep As through a veil. She sees
- 25:19Speaker 1: the sky look pale, and hears the nightingale that sadly sings.
- 25:25Speaker 1: Rest Rest, a perfect rest shed over brow and breast.
- 25:32Speaker 1: Her face is toward the west, the purple land. She
- 25:37Speaker 1: cannot see the grain ripening on hill and plain. She
- 25:42Speaker 1: cannot feel the rain upon her hand. Rest Rest for
- 25:48Speaker 1: evermore upon a mossy shore. Rest Rest at the heart's core,
- 25:56Speaker 1: till time shall cease. Sleep, that no pain shall wake night,
- 26:02Speaker 1: that no morn shall break, till joy shall overtake her
- 26:08Speaker 1: perfect peace. End of section three, Section four of Goblin
- 26:20Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 26:26Speaker 1: is in the public domain. At home, when I was dead,
- 26:33Speaker 1: my spirit turned to seek the much frequented house. I
- 26:37Speaker 1: passed the door and saw my friends feasting beneath green
- 26:41Speaker 1: orange boughs. From hand to hand, they pushed the wine,
- 26:46Speaker 1: they sucked the pulp of plum and peach. They sang,
- 26:51Speaker 1: they jested, and they laughed, for each was loved of each.
- 26:56Speaker 1: I listened to their honest chat. To morrow we shall
- 27:02Speaker 1: be plowed, plowd along the featureless sands, and coasting miles
- 27:07Speaker 1: and miles of sea, said one, before the turn of tide,
- 27:13Speaker 1: we will achieve the iriy seat, said one. Tomorrow shall
- 27:18Speaker 1: be like to day, but much more sweet to morrow,
- 27:24Speaker 1: said they strong with hope, and dwelt upon the pleasant way.
- 27:28Speaker 1: To morrow, cried they one and all, while no one
- 27:32Speaker 1: spoke of yesterday. Their life stood full at blessed noon.
- 27:37Speaker 1: I only I had passed away to morrow and to day,
- 27:43Speaker 1: they cried, I was of yesterday. I shivered comfortless, but
- 27:50Speaker 1: cast no chill across the tablecloth. I all forgotten, shivered,
- 27:57Speaker 1: sad to stay, and yet to part, how loath I
- 28:02Speaker 1: passed from the familiar room, I who from love had
- 28:06Speaker 1: passed away, like the remembrance of a guest that tarrieth
- 28:11Speaker 1: but a day. End of section four, Section five of
- 28:22Speaker 1: Goblin Market and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox
- 28:27Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. From sunset to starrise,
- 28:35Speaker 1: go from me summer friends and tarry not I am
- 28:39Speaker 1: no summer friend, but wintry cold. A silly sheep benighted
- 28:45Speaker 1: from the fold, A sluggard with a thorn choked garden plot.
- 28:50Speaker 1: Take counsel sever from my lot, your lot. Dwell in
- 28:55Speaker 1: your pleasant places, hoard your gold, Lest you with me
- 29:00Speaker 1: should shiver on the wold, athirst and hungering on a
- 29:04Speaker 1: barren spot. For I have hedged me with a thorny hedge.
- 29:10Speaker 1: I live alone, I look to die alone. Yet sometimes
- 29:15Speaker 1: when a wind sighs through the sedge, ghosts of my
- 29:19Speaker 1: buried years and friends come back. My heart goes sighing
- 29:24Speaker 1: after swallows flown on sometimes summer's unreturning track. End of
- 29:32Speaker 1: section five, Section six of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 29:42Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 29:49Speaker 1: Love from the North I had a love in soft Southland,
- 29:56Speaker 1: beloved through April, far in May. He waited on my
- 30:00Speaker 1: lightest breath and never dared to say me nay. He
- 30:05Speaker 1: saddened if my cheer was sad, but gay he grew
- 30:09Speaker 1: if I was gay. We never differed on a hair,
- 30:13Speaker 1: my yes, his yes, my nay, his nay. The wedding
- 30:18Speaker 1: hour was come, The isles were flushed with sun and flowers.
- 30:23Speaker 1: That day, I pacing balanced in my thoughts. It's quite
- 30:28Speaker 1: too late to think of nay, my bridegroom answered in
- 30:33Speaker 1: his turn. Myself had almost answered yea, when through the
- 30:38Speaker 1: flashing knave I heard a struggle and resounding nay. Bridemaids
- 30:46Speaker 1: and bridegroom shrank in fear. But I stood high, who
- 30:50Speaker 1: stood at bay? And if I answer yea, fair sir,
- 30:54Speaker 1: what man art thou to bar with? Nay? He was
- 30:59Speaker 1: a strong man from the north light, locked with eyes
- 31:02Speaker 1: of dangerous gray. Put YEA by for another time, in
- 31:07Speaker 1: which I will not say thee nay. He took me
- 31:11Speaker 1: in his strong white arms. He bore me on his
- 31:14Speaker 1: horse away or crag morass and hair breadth pass, but
- 31:19Speaker 1: never asked me yea or nay. He made me fast
- 31:24Speaker 1: with book and bell, with links of love. He makes
- 31:27Speaker 1: me stay till now I've neither heart nor power, nor
- 31:32Speaker 1: will nor wish to say him nay. End of section
- 31:39Speaker 1: six Section seven of Goblin Market and Other Poems by
- 31:49Speaker 1: Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 31:55Speaker 1: Winter rain every valley, drinks every dell and hollow, where
- 32:03Speaker 1: the kind rain sinks and sinks. Green of spring will follow,
- 32:09Speaker 1: yet a lapse of weeks, buds will burst their edges,
- 32:13Speaker 1: strip their wool coats, glue coats, streaks in the woods
- 32:18Speaker 1: and hedges. Weave a bower of love for birds to
- 32:22Speaker 1: meet each other. Weave a canopy above nest and egg
- 32:27Speaker 1: and mother. But for fattening rain, we should have no flowers,
- 32:32Speaker 1: never a bud or leaf again but for soaking showers.
- 32:37Speaker 1: Never a matd bird in the rocking tree tops, Never
- 32:41Speaker 1: indeed a flock or herd to graze upon the lee
- 32:44Speaker 1: crops lambs so wooly white sheep the sun bright LEAs
- 32:50Speaker 1: on they could have no grass to bite, but for
- 32:54Speaker 1: rain in season, we should find no moss in the
- 32:58Speaker 1: shadiest places, find no waving meadow grass pied with broad
- 33:03Speaker 1: eyed daisies, but miles of barren sand, with never a
- 33:08Speaker 1: sun or daughter. Not a lily on the land or
- 33:13Speaker 1: lily on the water. End of section seven, Section eight
- 33:24Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and other poems by Christina Rossetti. This
- 33:29Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. A dirge, why
- 33:37Speaker 1: were you born when the snow was falling? You should
- 33:40Speaker 1: have come to the cuckoo's calling, Or when grapes are
- 33:44Speaker 1: green in the cluster, or at least when lithe swallows
- 33:49Speaker 1: muster for they are far off, flying from summer dying.
- 33:54Speaker 1: Why did you die when the lambs were cropping? You
- 33:58Speaker 1: should have died at the apples drop, when the grasshopper
- 34:01Speaker 1: comes to trouble, and the wheat fields are sodden stubble,
- 34:06Speaker 1: and all winds go sighing for sweet things dying. End
- 34:14Speaker 1: of section eight Section nine of Goblin Market and Other
- 34:24Speaker 1: Poems by Christina Risetti. This LibriVox recording is in the
- 34:28Speaker 1: public domain. Confluence. As rivers seek the sea much more
- 34:37Speaker 1: deep than they, so my soul seeks thee far away.
- 34:44Speaker 1: As running rivers moan on their course alone, so I
- 34:49Speaker 1: moan left alone. As the delicate rose to the sun's
- 34:54Speaker 1: sweet strength doth herself unclose, breadth and length, So spreads
- 35:01Speaker 1: my heart to thee, unveiled utterly, I to thee utterly.
- 35:10Speaker 1: As morning dew exhales sunwards, pure and free. So my
- 35:15Speaker 1: spirit fails after thee. As dew leaves not a trace
- 35:21Speaker 1: on the green Earth's face, I no trace on thy face.
- 35:29Speaker 1: Its goal. The river knows, dewdrops find a way, Sunlight
- 35:34Speaker 1: cheers the rose in her day. Shall I lone sorrow
- 35:41Speaker 1: past find thee At the last sorrow past thee at
- 35:48Speaker 1: last end of section nine Section ten of Goblin Market
- 35:59Speaker 1: and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 36:04Speaker 1: in the public domain. Noble sisters, Now, did you mark
- 36:11Speaker 1: a falcon sister, dear, sister, dear, flying toward my window
- 36:16Speaker 1: in the morning, cool and clear, with jingling bells about
- 36:20Speaker 1: her neck? But what beneath her wing? It may have
- 36:24Speaker 1: been a ribbon, or it may have been a ring.
- 36:28Speaker 1: I marked a falcon swooping at the break of day,
- 36:31Speaker 1: and for your love, my sister dove, I frayed the
- 36:35Speaker 1: thief away. Or did you spy a ruddy hound, sister,
- 36:40Speaker 1: fair and tall, went snuffing round my garden, bound, or
- 36:44Speaker 1: crouched by my bower wall, with a silken leash about
- 36:47Speaker 1: his neck, But in his mouth may be a chain
- 36:51Speaker 1: of gold and silver lynx, or a letter writ to
- 36:54Speaker 1: me I heard a hound high born sister stood baying
- 36:59Speaker 1: at the I rose and drove him from your wall,
- 37:03Speaker 1: lest you should wake too soon. Or did you meet
- 37:08Speaker 1: a pretty page sat swinging on the gate, sat whistling,
- 37:11Speaker 1: whistling like a bird, Or maybe slept too late, with
- 37:15Speaker 1: eaglets broidered on his cap and eaglets on his glove.
- 37:19Speaker 1: If you had turned his pockets out, you had found
- 37:22Speaker 1: some pledge of love. I met him at this daybreak,
- 37:26Speaker 1: scarce the east was red, lest the creaking gate should
- 37:30Speaker 1: anger you. I packed him home to bed. Oh, patient, sister,
- 37:36Speaker 1: did you see a young man, tall and strong, swift footed,
- 37:39Speaker 1: to uphold the right and to uproot the wrong, come
- 37:42Speaker 1: home across the desolate sea to woo me for his wife?
- 37:46Speaker 1: And in his heart my heart is locked, and in
- 37:49Speaker 1: his life my life. I met a nameless man, sister,
- 37:54Speaker 1: who loitered round our door. I said, her husband loves
- 37:59Speaker 1: her much, and yet she loves him more. Fie, sister, Fi,
- 38:04Speaker 1: a wicked lie, A lie, a wicked lie. I have
- 38:08Speaker 1: none other love but him, nor will have till I die.
- 38:12Speaker 1: And you have turned him from our door and stabbed
- 38:15Speaker 1: him with a lie. I will go seek him through
- 38:17Speaker 1: the world in sorrow till I die. Go seek in sorrow, sister,
- 38:24Speaker 1: and find in sorrow too. If thus you shame our
- 38:27Speaker 1: father's name, my curse, go forth with you. End of
- 38:34Speaker 1: section ten, section eleven of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 38:44Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 38:51Speaker 1: Spring frost locked all the winter, seeds and roots and
- 38:57Speaker 1: stones of fruits. What sha shall make their sap ascend,
- 39:01Speaker 1: that they may put forth shoots, tips of tender green
- 39:06Speaker 1: leaf or blade or sheath, telling of the hidden life
- 39:10Speaker 1: that breaks forth underneath, life nursed in its grave by
- 39:15Speaker 1: death blows the thaw. Wind pleasantly drips the soaking rain.
- 39:22Speaker 1: By fits looks down the waking sun. Young grass springs
- 39:27Speaker 1: on the plain. Young leaves clothe early hedgerow trees, Seeds
- 39:32Speaker 1: and roots and stones of fruits, swollen with sap, put
- 39:37Speaker 1: forth their shoots. Curled headed ferns sprout in the lane.
- 39:42Speaker 1: Birds sing and pear again. There is no time like spring,
- 39:48Speaker 1: when life's alive in everything. Before new nestlings sing, before
- 39:53Speaker 1: cleft swallows speed their journey back along the trackless track.
- 39:59Speaker 1: God God guides their wing. He spreads their table that
- 40:03Speaker 1: they nothing lack. Before the daisy grows a common flower,
- 40:08Speaker 1: before the sun has power to scorch the world up
- 40:11Speaker 1: in his noontide hour. There is no time like spring,
- 40:16Speaker 1: like spring that passes by. There is no life like spring.
- 40:20Speaker 1: Life born to die, piercing the sod clothing the uncouth
- 40:25Speaker 1: clod hatched in the nest, fledged on the windy bough,
- 40:30Speaker 1: strong on the wing. There is no time like spring
- 40:34Speaker 1: that passes by, now newly born and now hastening to die.
- 40:42Speaker 1: End of section eleven, Section twelve of Goblin Market and
- 40:51Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rossetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 40:56Speaker 1: the public domain. The Lambs of Grass eighteen sixty The
- 41:04Speaker 1: upland flocks grew starved and thinned. Their shepherds scarce could
- 41:08Speaker 1: feed the lambs whose milkless mothers butted them, or who
- 41:12Speaker 1: were orphaned of their dams. The lambs, athirst for mother's milk,
- 41:17Speaker 1: filled all the place with piteous sounds. Their mother's bones
- 41:21Speaker 1: made white for miles the pastureless, wet pasture grounds, day
- 41:27Speaker 1: after day, night after night, from lamb to lamb. The
- 41:31Speaker 1: shepherds went with teapots for the bleating mouths instead of
- 41:35Speaker 1: nature's nourishment. The little shivering, gaping things soon knew the
- 41:40Speaker 1: step that brought them aid, and fondled the protecting hand
- 41:45Speaker 1: and rubbed it with a wooly head. Then, as the
- 41:48Speaker 1: days waxed on to weeks, it was a pretty sight
- 41:51Speaker 1: to see these lambs with frisky heads and tails, skipping
- 41:55Speaker 1: and leaping on the lee, bleating in tender, trustful tones,
- 42:00Speaker 1: resting on rocky crag or mound, and following the beloved
- 42:04Speaker 1: feet that once had sought for them and found these
- 42:09Speaker 1: very shepherds of their flocks, These loving lambs, so meek
- 42:12Speaker 1: to please, are worthy of recording words and honor in
- 42:16Speaker 1: their due degrees. So I might live a hundred years
- 42:21Speaker 1: and roam from strand to foreign strand, yet not forget
- 42:25Speaker 1: this flooded spring and scarce saved lambs of Westmorland, and
- 42:32Speaker 1: of Section twelve, Section thirteen of Goblin Market and other
- 42:42Speaker 1: poems by Christina Rossetti. This LibriVox recording is in the
- 42:47Speaker 1: public domain. A birthday. My heart is like a singing
- 42:54Speaker 1: bird whose nest is in a watered shoot. My heart
- 42:58Speaker 1: is like an apple tree whose are bent with thickset fruit.
- 43:02Speaker 1: My heart is like a rainbow shell that paddles in
- 43:06Speaker 1: a halcyon sea. My heart is gladder than all these,
- 43:11Speaker 1: because my love is come to me. Raise me a
- 43:15Speaker 1: dais of silk and down, hang it with verre and
- 43:18Speaker 1: purple dyes, Carve it in doves and pomegranates and peacocks
- 43:23Speaker 1: with a hundred eyes, work it in gold and silver
- 43:27Speaker 1: grapes in leaves and silver fleur de lis. Because the
- 43:31Speaker 1: birthday of my life is come, my love is come
- 43:36Speaker 1: to me. End of section thirteen, Section fourteen of Goblin
- 43:47Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti. This LibriVox recording
- 43:52Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Remember a sonnet. Remember me
- 43:59Speaker 1: when I gone away, gone far away into the silent land,
- 44:04Speaker 1: when you can no more hold me by the hand,
- 44:07Speaker 1: nor I half turn to go, yet turnings stay. Remember
- 44:13Speaker 1: me when no more day by day you tell me
- 44:17Speaker 1: of our future that you planned. Only remember me. You
- 44:22Speaker 1: understand it will be late to counsel then or pray.
- 44:26Speaker 1: Yet if you should forget me for a while and afterwards,
- 44:30Speaker 1: remember do not grieve. For if the darkness and corruption
- 44:35Speaker 1: leave a vestige of the thought that once I had
- 44:39Speaker 1: better by far, you should forget and smile. Than that
- 44:43Speaker 1: you should remember and be sad. And of section fourteen,
- 44:55Speaker 1: section fifteen of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 45:00Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. After death
- 45:06Speaker 1: a sonnet. The curtains were half drawn, the floor was
- 45:11Speaker 1: swept and strewn with rushes. Rosemary and may lay thick
- 45:16Speaker 1: upon the bed, on which I lay, where through the
- 45:20Speaker 1: lattice ivy shadows crept. He leaned above me, thinking that
- 45:25Speaker 1: I slept and could not hear him. But I heard
- 45:29Speaker 1: him say, poor child, poor child. And as he turned
- 45:35Speaker 1: away came a deep silence, and I knew he wept.
- 45:40Speaker 1: He did not touch the shroud, or raise the fold
- 45:43Speaker 1: that hid my face, or take my hand in his,
- 45:48Speaker 1: or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head. He did
- 45:52Speaker 1: not love me living, but once dead he pitied me.
- 45:57Speaker 1: And very sweet it is to know he still is warm,
- 46:02Speaker 1: though I am cold. End of Section fifteen Section sixteen
- 46:13Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 46:18Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. An end love
- 46:27Speaker 1: strong as death is dead. Come let us make his
- 46:31Speaker 1: bed among the dying flowers, a green turf at his head,
- 46:36Speaker 1: and a stone at his feet, whereon we may sit
- 46:40Speaker 1: in the quiet evening hours. He was born in the
- 46:44Speaker 1: spring and died before the harvesting. On the last warm
- 46:49Speaker 1: summer day he left us. He would not stay for
- 46:53Speaker 1: autumn twilight, cold and gray. Sit we by his grave
- 46:59Speaker 1: and sing he is gone away to few chords, and
- 47:05Speaker 1: sad and low, sing we sow be our eyes fixed
- 47:10Speaker 1: on the grass, shadow veiled as the years pass, while
- 47:15Speaker 1: we think of all that was in the long ago.
- 47:20Speaker 1: End of Section sixteen, Section seventeen of Goblin Market and
- 47:30Speaker 1: other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 47:34Speaker 1: the public domain. My dream here now, a curious dream
- 47:42Speaker 1: I dreamed last night, each word whereof is weighed and
- 47:46Speaker 1: sifted truth. I stood beside Euphrates while it swelled like
- 47:52Speaker 1: overflowing Jordan in its youth. It waxed and colored sensibly
- 47:57Speaker 1: to sight, till out of me periad pregnant waves. There
- 48:01Speaker 1: welled young crocodiles, a gaunt, blunt featured crew, fresh hatched
- 48:08Speaker 1: perhaps and daubed with birthday dew. The rest, if I
- 48:13Speaker 1: should tell, I fear my friend, my closest friend, would
- 48:18Speaker 1: deem the facts untrue, and therefore it were wisely left untold.
- 48:24Speaker 1: Yet if he will, why hear it to the end.
- 48:29Speaker 1: Each crocodile was girt with massive gold and polished stones that,
- 48:35Speaker 1: with their wearers grew. But one there was, who waxed
- 48:39Speaker 1: beyond the rest, wore kinglier girdle and a kingly crown,
- 48:44Speaker 1: whilst crowns and orbs and scepters starred, his breast all gleamed,
- 48:50Speaker 1: compact and green, with scale on scale, but special burnishment
- 48:55Speaker 1: adorned his male, and special terror weighed upon his frown.
- 49:00Speaker 1: His punier brethren quaked before his tail, broad as a rafter,
- 49:05Speaker 1: potent as a flail. So he grew lord and master
- 49:10Speaker 1: of his kin. But who shall tell the tale of
- 49:13Speaker 1: all their woes? An execrable appetite arose. He battened on them,
- 49:20Speaker 1: crunched and sucked them in. He knew no law, he
- 49:25Speaker 1: feared no binding law, but ground them with inexorable jaw.
- 49:30Speaker 1: The luscious fat distilled upon his chin, exuded from his
- 49:35Speaker 1: nostrils and his eyes. While still like hungry death, he
- 49:39Speaker 1: fed his maw till every minor crocodile being dead, and
- 49:45Speaker 1: buried too, himself gorged to the full, he slept with
- 49:50Speaker 1: breath oppressed and unstrung claw O marvel passing strange, which
- 49:57Speaker 1: next I saw in sleep he dwindled to the common size,
- 50:02Speaker 1: and all the empire faded from his coat. Then from
- 50:06Speaker 1: far off a winged vessel came, swift as a swallow,
- 50:10Speaker 1: subtle as a flame. I know not what it bore,
- 50:14Speaker 1: A freight or host, but white it was as an
- 50:18Speaker 1: avenging ghost, it leveled strong euphrates in its course, supreme
- 50:25Speaker 1: yet weightless. As an idle mote, it seemed to tame
- 50:28Speaker 1: the waters without force, till not a murmur swelled or
- 50:32Speaker 1: billow beat lo. As the purple shadow swept the sands,
- 50:37Speaker 1: the prudent crocodile rose on his feet and shed appropriate
- 50:42Speaker 1: tears and wrung his hands. What can it mean, you ask?
- 50:49Speaker 1: I answer not for meaning, but myself must echo what
- 50:55Speaker 1: and tell it as I saw it on the spot.
- 51:01Speaker 1: End of section seventeen, Section eighteen of Goblin Market and
- 51:11Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 51:17Speaker 1: the public domain. Song O Roses for the flush of youth,
- 51:25Speaker 1: and Laurel for the perfect prime. But pluck an ivy
- 51:30Speaker 1: branch for me grown old before my time, Oh violets
- 51:35Speaker 1: for the grave of youth, and bay for those dead
- 51:39Speaker 1: in their prime. Give me the withered leaves I chose
- 51:44Speaker 1: before in the old time. End of section eighteen, Section
- 51:57Speaker 1: nineteen of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 52:03Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The Hour
- 52:08Speaker 1: and the Ghost Bride O love love, Hold me fast.
- 52:16Speaker 1: He draws me away from thee. I cannot stem the
- 52:20Speaker 1: blast nor the cold strong sea. Far away, A light
- 52:24Speaker 1: shines beyond the hills and pines. It is lit for me, Bridegroom.
- 52:33Speaker 1: I have thee close, my dear. No terror can come near.
- 52:38Speaker 1: Only far off the northern light shines clear. Ghost, Come
- 52:45Speaker 1: with me, fair and false, to our home. Come home.
- 52:52Speaker 1: It is my voice that calls. Once, thou wast not
- 52:56Speaker 1: afraid when I wooed and said, come. Our nest is
- 53:02Speaker 1: newly made. Now cross the tossing foam. Bride, Hold me
- 53:11Speaker 1: one moment longer. He taunts me with the past. His
- 53:15Speaker 1: clutch is waxing stronger. Hold me fast, Hold me fast.
- 53:21Speaker 1: He draws me from thy heart, and I cannot withhold.
- 53:26Speaker 1: He bids my spirit to part with him unto the cold,
- 53:30Speaker 1: O bitter vows of old. Bridegroom, Lean on me, hide
- 53:38Speaker 1: thine eyes. Only ourselves, earth and skies are present here.
- 53:44Speaker 1: Be wise ghost, Lean on me. Come away, I will
- 53:52Speaker 1: guide and steady. Come for I will not stay. Come
- 53:58Speaker 1: for house and bed are ready, Ah, sure, bed and
- 54:03Speaker 1: house for better and worse, for life and death. Goal
- 54:07Speaker 1: one with shortened breath come crown our vows, bride one moment,
- 54:17Speaker 1: one more word, while my heart beats still, while my
- 54:22Speaker 1: breath is stirred by my fainting will, O friend, forsake me,
- 54:27Speaker 1: not forget nought as I forgot, But keep thy heart
- 54:32Speaker 1: for me, Keep thy faith true and bright through the
- 54:36Speaker 1: lone cold winter night. Perhaps I may come to thee bridegroom. Nay, peace,
- 54:45Speaker 1: my darling, Peace. Let these dreams and terrors cease. Who
- 54:50Speaker 1: spoke of death or change or aught, but ease ghost,
- 54:57Speaker 1: O fair frail sin, O poor harvest gathered in Thou
- 55:04Speaker 1: shalt visit him again, to watch his heart grow cold,
- 55:08Speaker 1: to know the gnawing pain I knew of old, to
- 55:13Speaker 1: see one much more fair, Fill up the vacant chair,
- 55:17Speaker 1: fill his heart, his children bear, while thou and I
- 55:22Speaker 1: together in the outcast weather toss and howl and spin.
- 55:33Speaker 1: End of Section nineteen, Section twenty of Goblin Market and
- 55:42Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 55:47Speaker 1: the public domain. A summer wish, live all thy sweet
- 55:54Speaker 1: life through sweet rose, dew sprent, drop down thine evening,
- 55:59Speaker 1: dear to gather it anew when day is bright. I
- 56:04Speaker 1: fancy thou wast meant chiefly to give delight, sing in
- 56:09Speaker 1: the silent sky, glad soaring bird, sing out thy notes
- 56:15Speaker 1: on high to sunbeam, straying by or passing cloud heedless.
- 56:21Speaker 1: If thou art heard sing thy full song aloud, Oh
- 56:26Speaker 1: that it were with me, as with the flower blooming
- 56:30Speaker 1: on its own tree, for butterfly and bee its summer morns.
- 56:36Speaker 1: That I might bloom mine hour arose in spite of thorns.
- 56:42Speaker 1: Oh that my work were done as birds that soar,
- 56:46Speaker 1: rejoicing in the sun. That when my time is run
- 56:51Speaker 1: and daylight too, I so might rest once more, cool
- 56:57Speaker 1: with refreshing dew and of Section twenty Section twenty one
- 57:09Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 57:14Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. An apple gathering.
- 57:21Speaker 1: I plucked pink blossoms from mine apple tree and wore
- 57:25Speaker 1: them all that evening in my hair. Then in due season,
- 57:30Speaker 1: when I went to sea, I found no apples there,
- 57:34Speaker 1: with dangling basket all along the grass as I had come,
- 57:38Speaker 1: I went the self same track. My neighbors mocked me
- 57:42Speaker 1: while they saw me pass so empty handed back Lilian
- 57:47Speaker 1: and Lilias smiled and trudging by their heaped up basket
- 57:52Speaker 1: teased me like a jeer. Sweet voiced they sang beneath
- 57:56Speaker 1: the sunset sky. Their mother's home was near. Plump Gertrude
- 58:02Speaker 1: passed me with her basket full. A stronger hand than
- 58:05Speaker 1: hers helped it along. A voice talked with her through
- 58:09Speaker 1: the shadows. Cool, more sweet to me than song. Ah, Willie,
- 58:15Speaker 1: Willie was my love less worth than apples. With their
- 58:19Speaker 1: green leaves piled above, I counted rosiest apples on the earth,
- 58:24Speaker 1: of far less worth than love. So once it was
- 58:28Speaker 1: with me, you stooped to talk, laughing and listening in
- 58:32Speaker 1: this very lane, to think that by this way we
- 58:35Speaker 1: used to walk, we shall not walk again. I let
- 58:40Speaker 1: my neighbors pass me ones and twos and groups, the
- 58:44Speaker 1: latest said. The night grew chill and hastened, but I
- 58:49Speaker 1: loitered while the dews fell fast. I loitered still. End
- 58:56Speaker 1: of section twenty one Section twenty two of Goblin Market
- 59:05Speaker 1: and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 59:10Speaker 1: in the public domain. Song two doves upon the self
- 59:17Speaker 1: same branch, two lilies on a single stem, two butterflies
- 59:23Speaker 1: upon one flower, O happy they who look on them,
- 59:28Speaker 1: who look upon them hand in hand, flushed in the
- 59:31Speaker 1: rosy summer light, who look upon them hand in hand,
- 59:36Speaker 1: and never give a thought to night. End of section
- 59:42Speaker 1: twenty two Section twenty three of Goblin Market and Other
- 59:51Speaker 1: Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the
- 59:55Speaker 1: public domain. Maude Claire out of the church. She followed
- 1:00:03Speaker 1: them with a lofty step and mien. His bride was
- 1:00:07Speaker 1: like a village made. Maude Clare was like a queen.
- 1:00:11Speaker 1: Son Thomas, his lady mother said, with smiles, almost with tears,
- 1:00:17Speaker 1: May Knell and you, but live as true as we
- 1:00:20Speaker 1: have done for years. Your father, thirty years ago, had
- 1:00:24Speaker 1: just your tale to tell. But he was not so
- 1:00:28Speaker 1: pale as you, nor I so pale as Nell. My
- 1:00:33Speaker 1: Lord was pale with inward strife, and Nell was pale
- 1:00:37Speaker 1: with pride. My Lord gazed long on pale Maud Claire,
- 1:00:42Speaker 1: or ever he kissed the bride. Lo I have brought
- 1:00:47Speaker 1: my gift, My Lord, have brought my gift, she said,
- 1:00:52Speaker 1: to bless the hearth, to bless the board, to bless
- 1:00:56Speaker 1: the marriage bed. Here's my half of the golden chain
- 1:01:00Speaker 1: you wore about your neck. That day we waded ankle
- 1:01:05Speaker 1: deep for lilies in the back. Here's my half of
- 1:01:09Speaker 1: the faded leaves we plucked from budding bough with feet
- 1:01:13Speaker 1: amongst the lily leaves. The lilies are budding. Now he
- 1:01:17Speaker 1: stirved to match her scorn with scorn. He faltered in
- 1:01:21Speaker 1: his place. Lady, he said, Maud Claire. He said, Maud Claire,
- 1:01:29Speaker 1: and hid his face. She turned to Nell, my lady, nell,
- 1:01:35Speaker 1: I have a gift for you. Though were it fruit
- 1:01:39Speaker 1: the bloom were gone? Or were it flowers the dew?
- 1:01:43Speaker 1: Take my share of a fickle heart, mine of a
- 1:01:47Speaker 1: paltry love. Take it or leave it as you will.
- 1:01:51Speaker 1: I wash my hands thereof. And what you leave, said Nell,
- 1:01:59Speaker 1: I'll take, And what you spurn i'll wear, for he's
- 1:02:04Speaker 1: my lord, for better and worse, and him I love,
- 1:02:08Speaker 1: Maude Claire. Yea, though you're taller by the head, more
- 1:02:14Speaker 1: wise and much more fair. I'll love him till he
- 1:02:19Speaker 1: loves me best me, best of all, Maude Claire. End
- 1:02:25Speaker 1: of section twenty three, Section twenty four of Goblin Market
- 1:02:35Speaker 1: and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 1:02:40Speaker 1: in the public domain. Echo come to Me in the
- 1:02:47Speaker 1: silence of the night. Come in the speaking silence of
- 1:02:51Speaker 1: a dream. Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as
- 1:02:56Speaker 1: bright as sunlight on a stream. Come back in tears,
- 1:03:01Speaker 1: Oh memory, hope, love of finished years, Oh dream, how sweet,
- 1:03:10Speaker 1: too sweet, too bitter? Sweet? Whose wakening should have been
- 1:03:14Speaker 1: in paradise, where souls brim full of love, abide and meet,
- 1:03:20Speaker 1: Where thirsting, longing eyes watch the slow door, that opening
- 1:03:25Speaker 1: letting in, let's out no more yet. Come to me
- 1:03:31Speaker 1: in dreams that I may live my very life again,
- 1:03:35Speaker 1: though cold in death. Come back to me in dreams
- 1:03:39Speaker 1: that I may give pulse for pulse, breath for breath,
- 1:03:45Speaker 1: Speak low, lean, low, as long ago, my love, How
- 1:03:52Speaker 1: long ago? End of Section twenty four, Section twenty five
- 1:04:04Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 1:04:08Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Winter my secret,
- 1:04:17Speaker 1: I tell my secret. No, indeed not I Perhaps some
- 1:04:23Speaker 1: day who knows, But not to day. It froze and
- 1:04:28Speaker 1: blows and snows, and you are too curious. Fine you
- 1:04:35Speaker 1: want to hear it. Well, only my secret's mine, and
- 1:04:41Speaker 1: I won't tell. Or after all, perhaps there's none. Suppose
- 1:04:48Speaker 1: there is no secret after all, but only just my
- 1:04:52Speaker 1: fun to day's a nipping day, a biting day in
- 1:04:58Speaker 1: which one wants a shawl, a veil, a cloak, and
- 1:05:02Speaker 1: other wraps. I cannot ope to every one who taps
- 1:05:07Speaker 1: and let the drafts come whistling through my hall, come
- 1:05:11Speaker 1: bounding and surrounding me, come buffeting, astounding me, nipping and
- 1:05:17Speaker 1: clipping through my wraps, and all I wear my mask
- 1:05:22Speaker 1: for warmth. Whoever shows his nose to rush and snows,
- 1:05:27Speaker 1: to be pecked at by every wind that blows you
- 1:05:32Speaker 1: would not peck. I thank you for good will, believe,
- 1:05:38Speaker 1: but leave that truth untested. Still springs an expansive time.
- 1:05:46Speaker 1: Yet I don't trust March with its peck of dust,
- 1:05:50Speaker 1: nor April, with its rainbow crowned brief showers, nor even May,
- 1:05:55Speaker 1: whose flowers one frost may wither through the sunless hours.
- 1:06:01Speaker 1: Perhaps some languid summer day, when drowsy birds sing less
- 1:06:07Speaker 1: and less, and golden fruit is ripening to excess, If
- 1:06:13Speaker 1: there's not too much sun nor too much cloud, and
- 1:06:18Speaker 1: the warm wind is neither still nor loud, perhaps my
- 1:06:22Speaker 1: secret I may say, or you may guess. End of
- 1:06:29Speaker 1: Section twenty five Section twenty six of Goblin Market and
- 1:06:38Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:06:43Speaker 1: the public domain. Another Spring. If I might see another spring,
- 1:06:52Speaker 1: I'd not plant summer flowers and wait. I'd have my
- 1:06:56Speaker 1: crocuses at once, my leafless pink miserian, my chill veined snowdrops,
- 1:07:03Speaker 1: choicer yet my white or asure violet leaf nested primrose.
- 1:07:08Speaker 1: Anything to blow at once, not late. If I might
- 1:07:13Speaker 1: see another spring, I'd listen to the daylight birds that
- 1:07:18Speaker 1: build their nests and pair and sing, nor wait for
- 1:07:22Speaker 1: mateless nightingale. I'd listen to the lusty herds, the ewes
- 1:07:27Speaker 1: with lambs as white as snow. I'd find out music
- 1:07:31Speaker 1: in the hail and all the winds that blow. If
- 1:07:36Speaker 1: I might see another spring, o stinging comment on my
- 1:07:41Speaker 1: past that all my past results in. If if I
- 1:07:47Speaker 1: might see another spring, I'd laugh to day to day
- 1:07:52Speaker 1: is brief. I would not wait for anything. I'd use
- 1:07:57Speaker 1: to day that cannot last. Be glad to day and sing.
- 1:08:04Speaker 1: End of section twenty six Section twenty seven of Goblin
- 1:08:13Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:08:18Speaker 1: is in the public domain. A peal of bells. Strike
- 1:08:25Speaker 1: the bells, wantonly tinkle, tinkle well, Bring me wine, bring
- 1:08:30Speaker 1: me flowers, ring the silver bell. All my lamps burned,
- 1:08:35Speaker 1: scented oil, hung on laden orange trees, whose shadowed foliage
- 1:08:41Speaker 1: is the foil to golden lamps and oranges. Heap my
- 1:08:45Speaker 1: golden plates with fruit, golden fruit, fresh plucked and ripe.
- 1:08:50Speaker 1: Strike the bells and breathe the pipe. Shut out showers
- 1:08:54Speaker 1: from summer hours, silence that complaining lute, shut out thinking,
- 1:09:00Speaker 1: shut out pain from hours that cannot come again. Strike
- 1:09:05Speaker 1: the bells, solemnly, ding dong deep. My friend is passing
- 1:09:10Speaker 1: to his bed, fast asleep. There's plaited linen round his head,
- 1:09:16Speaker 1: while foremost go his feet, his feet that cannot carry him.
- 1:09:21Speaker 1: My feasts a show. My lights are dim, be still,
- 1:09:25Speaker 1: Your music is not sweet. There is no music more
- 1:09:29Speaker 1: for him. His lights are out, his feast is done.
- 1:09:34Speaker 1: His bowl that sparkled to the brim, is drained, is broken,
- 1:09:38Speaker 1: cannot hold. My blood is chill, His blood is cold.
- 1:09:44Speaker 1: His death is full, and mine begun. End of section
- 1:09:51Speaker 1: twenty seven Section twenty eight of Goblin Market and Other
- 1:09:59Speaker 1: p Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:10:04Speaker 1: the public domain. Fotta morgana a blue eyed phantom far
- 1:10:12Speaker 1: before is laughing, leaping toward the sun like lead. I
- 1:10:17Speaker 1: chase it evermore, I pant and run. It breaks the sunlight,
- 1:10:22Speaker 1: bound on bound, goes singing as it leaps along two
- 1:10:26Speaker 1: sheep bells with a dreamy sound, a dreamy song. I laugh.
- 1:10:33Speaker 1: It is so brisk and gay, it is so far before.
- 1:10:36Speaker 1: I weep. I hope I shall lie down some day,
- 1:10:41Speaker 1: lie down and sleep. End of Section twenty eight, Section
- 1:10:52Speaker 1: twenty nine of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 1:10:57Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public dome. No thank you, John,
- 1:11:06Speaker 1: I never said I loved you, John. Why will you
- 1:11:09Speaker 1: tease me day by day and wax a weariness to
- 1:11:12Speaker 1: think upon with? Always do and pray? You know I
- 1:11:18Speaker 1: never loved you, John. No fault of mine made me
- 1:11:21Speaker 1: your toast. Why will you haunt me with a face
- 1:11:24Speaker 1: as wan As shows an hour old ghost. I dare say,
- 1:11:29Speaker 1: Meg or Maul would take pity upon you if you'd
- 1:11:32Speaker 1: ask and pray. Don't remain single for my sake? Who
- 1:11:36Speaker 1: can't perform that task? I have no heart. Perhaps I
- 1:11:42Speaker 1: have not but then you're mad to take offense that
- 1:11:46Speaker 1: I don't give you what I have not got. Use
- 1:11:49Speaker 1: your own common sense. Let bygones be bygones. Don't call
- 1:11:55Speaker 1: me false who owed not to be true? I'd rather
- 1:11:59Speaker 1: answer no to fifty Johns, then answer yes to you.
- 1:12:03Speaker 1: Let's mar our pleasant days, no more song, birds of passage,
- 1:12:08Speaker 1: days of youth, catch at to day, forget the days before.
- 1:12:13Speaker 1: I'll wink at your untruth. Let us strike hands as
- 1:12:18Speaker 1: hearty friends, no more, no less, And friendship's good only.
- 1:12:23Speaker 1: Don't keep in view ulterior ends and points not understood
- 1:12:28Speaker 1: in open treaty. Rise above quibbles and shuffling off and on.
- 1:12:34Speaker 1: Here's friendship for you if you like, but love no
- 1:12:39Speaker 1: thank you John. End of section twenty nine, Section thirty
- 1:12:50Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 1:12:54Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. May I cannot
- 1:13:02Speaker 1: tell you how it was, but this I know. It
- 1:13:06Speaker 1: came to pass upon a bright and breezy day when
- 1:13:09Speaker 1: May was young, Ah, pleasant May. And yet the poppies
- 1:13:14Speaker 1: were not born between the blades of tender corn. The
- 1:13:17Speaker 1: last eggs had not hatched as yet, nor any bird
- 1:13:21Speaker 1: foregone its mate. I cannot tell you what it was,
- 1:13:26Speaker 1: but this I know it did, but pass it passed
- 1:13:31Speaker 1: away with sunny may, with all sweet things. It passed
- 1:13:35Speaker 1: away and left me old and cold and gray. End
- 1:13:44Speaker 1: of Section thirty Section thirty one of Goblin Market and
- 1:13:52Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:13:57Speaker 1: the public domain. A pause of thought. I looked for
- 1:14:04Speaker 1: that which is not nor can be, and hope deferred
- 1:14:08Speaker 1: made my heart sick in truth. But years must pass
- 1:14:12Speaker 1: before a hope of youth is resigned. Utterly, I watched
- 1:14:17Speaker 1: and waited with a steadfast will, And though the object
- 1:14:21Speaker 1: seemed to flee away that I so longed for, ever
- 1:14:25Speaker 1: day by day I watched and waited still. Sometimes I said,
- 1:14:32Speaker 1: this thing shall be no more. My expectation wearies and
- 1:14:37Speaker 1: shall cease. I will resign it now and be at peace.
- 1:14:42Speaker 1: Yet never gave it o'er. Sometimes I said, it is
- 1:14:47Speaker 1: an empty name I long for to a name. Why
- 1:14:50Speaker 1: should I give the peace of all the days I
- 1:14:52Speaker 1: have to live? Yet gave it all the same. Alas
- 1:14:58Speaker 1: thou foolish one like, unfit for healthy joy and salutary pain,
- 1:15:03Speaker 1: thou knowest the chase useless, and again turnest to follow it.
- 1:15:11Speaker 1: End of section thirty one Section thirty two of Goblin
- 1:15:19Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:15:24Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Twilight calm, oh pleasant even tide.
- 1:15:31Speaker 1: Clouds on the western side grow gray and grayer, hiding
- 1:15:36Speaker 1: the warm sun. The bees and birds, their happy labors done,
- 1:15:41Speaker 1: seek their close nests and bide screened in the leafy wood.
- 1:15:46Speaker 1: The stalk doves sit and brood. The very squirrel leaps
- 1:15:50Speaker 1: from bow to bow, but lazily pauses and settles now
- 1:15:55Speaker 1: where once he stored his food. One by one, the
- 1:15:59Speaker 1: flowers close, lily and dewy rose, shutting their tender petals
- 1:16:05Speaker 1: from the moon. The grasshoppers are still, but not so
- 1:16:09Speaker 1: soon are still the noisy crows. The dormouse squats and
- 1:16:14Speaker 1: eats choice little dainty bits. Beneath the spreading roots of
- 1:16:17Speaker 1: a broad lime, nibbling his fill. He stops from time
- 1:16:21Speaker 1: to time and listens where he sits. From far the
- 1:16:26Speaker 1: lowings come of cattle driven home from farther. Still, the
- 1:16:30Speaker 1: wind brings fitfully the vast continual murmur of the sea,
- 1:16:35Speaker 1: now loud, now almost dumb. The gnats whirl in the air,
- 1:16:41Speaker 1: the evening gnats. And there the owl opens, broad his
- 1:16:45Speaker 1: eyes and wings to sail for prey. The bat wakes,
- 1:16:50Speaker 1: and the shellless snail comes forth, clammy and bare hark.
- 1:16:57Speaker 1: That's the nightingale, telling the self same tale her song
- 1:17:01Speaker 1: told when this ancient earth was young, So Echoes answered,
- 1:17:06Speaker 1: when her song was sung in the first wooded veil,
- 1:17:10Speaker 1: we call it love and pain, the passion of her strain.
- 1:17:14Speaker 1: And yet we little understand or know. Why should it
- 1:17:18Speaker 1: not be rather joy that so throbs in each throbbing
- 1:17:22Speaker 1: vein in separate herds. The deer lie hear the bucks,
- 1:17:26Speaker 1: and hear the does, And by its mother sleeps the
- 1:17:29Speaker 1: fawn through all the hours of night until the dawn.
- 1:17:33Speaker 1: They sleep forgetting fear. The hare sleeps where it lies,
- 1:17:39Speaker 1: with wary, half closed eyes. The cock has ceased to crow,
- 1:17:43Speaker 1: the hen to cluck. Only the fox is out some
- 1:17:48Speaker 1: heedless duck or chicken. To surprise remote, each single star
- 1:17:53Speaker 1: comes out, till there are all shining brightly. How the
- 1:17:58Speaker 1: dews fall down, while close at hand the glow worm
- 1:18:02Speaker 1: lights her lamp or twinkles from afar. But evening now
- 1:18:07Speaker 1: is done as much as if the sun day giving
- 1:18:11Speaker 1: had arisen in the east. For night has come, and
- 1:18:15Speaker 1: the great calm has ceased, the quiet sands have run.
- 1:18:22Speaker 1: And of section thirty two, section thirty three of Goblin
- 1:18:30Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:18:35Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Wife to husband, pardon the
- 1:18:41Speaker 1: faults in me for the love of years ago. Good Bye.
- 1:18:47Speaker 1: I must drift across the sea. I must sink into
- 1:18:51Speaker 1: the snow. I must die. You can bask in this sun.
- 1:18:58Speaker 1: You can drink wine and eat good Bye. I must
- 1:19:02Speaker 1: gird myself and run, though with unready feet. I must
- 1:19:07Speaker 1: die blank sea, to sail upon cold bed, to sleep
- 1:19:13Speaker 1: in good bye while you clasp. I must be gone
- 1:19:18Speaker 1: for all your weeping. I must die. A kiss for
- 1:19:23Speaker 1: one friend, and a word for two good bye, a
- 1:19:28Speaker 1: lock that you must send, a kindness you must do.
- 1:19:32Speaker 1: I must die, not a word for you, not a
- 1:19:37Speaker 1: lock or kiss. Good bye. We one must part in
- 1:19:42Speaker 1: two verily. Death is this I must die. And of
- 1:19:50Speaker 1: section thirty three, section thirty four of Goblin Market and
- 1:19:59Speaker 1: Other po by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:20:03Speaker 1: the public domain. Three seasons. A cup for hope, she said,
- 1:20:13Speaker 1: in springtime ere the bloom was old, the crimson wine
- 1:20:16Speaker 1: was poor and cold by her mouth's richer red. A
- 1:20:21Speaker 1: cup for love, how low, how soft the words, and
- 1:20:26Speaker 1: all the while her blush was rippling with a smile,
- 1:20:29Speaker 1: like summer after snow. A cup for memory, cold cup
- 1:20:35Speaker 1: that one must drain alone while autumn winds are up
- 1:20:39Speaker 1: and moan across the barren sea. Hope, memory, love, hope
- 1:20:48Speaker 1: for fair morn, and love for day, and memory for
- 1:20:52Speaker 1: the evening gray and solitary dove. End of section thirty
- 1:20:59Speaker 1: four Section thirty five of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 1:21:08Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Mirage.
- 1:21:17Speaker 1: The hope I dreamed of was a dream, was but
- 1:21:21Speaker 1: a dream, And now I wake exceeding, comfortless and worn
- 1:21:28Speaker 1: and old. For a dream's sake, I hang my harp
- 1:21:34Speaker 1: upon a tree, a weeping willow in a lake. I
- 1:21:38Speaker 1: hang my silenced harp there, wrung and snapped, for a
- 1:21:43Speaker 1: dream's sake. Lie still, lie still, my breaking heart, My
- 1:21:52Speaker 1: silent heart lies still and break. Life and the world
- 1:21:57Speaker 1: and mine own self are changed for a dream's sake.
- 1:22:04Speaker 1: End of section thirty five Section thirty six of Goblin
- 1:22:13Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:22:18Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Shut Out. The door was shut.
- 1:22:26Speaker 1: I looked between its iron bars and saw it lie
- 1:22:31Speaker 1: my garden, mine beneath the sky, pied with all flowers
- 1:22:37Speaker 1: bedewed and green. From bow to bow, the song birds
- 1:22:41Speaker 1: crossed from flower to flower, the moths and bees, with
- 1:22:46Speaker 1: all its nests and stately trees. It had been mine,
- 1:22:51Speaker 1: and it was lost. A shadowless spirit kept the gate
- 1:22:56Speaker 1: blank and unchanging, like the grave. I peering through, said,
- 1:23:02Speaker 1: let me have some buds to cheer my outcast state.
- 1:23:07Speaker 1: He answered not, or give me then, but one small
- 1:23:11Speaker 1: twig from shrub or tree, and bid my home remember
- 1:23:15Speaker 1: me until I come to it again. The spirit was silent,
- 1:23:21Speaker 1: but he took mortar and stone to build a wall.
- 1:23:25Speaker 1: He left no loophole great or small through which my
- 1:23:28Speaker 1: straining eyes might look. So now I sit here quite alone,
- 1:23:34Speaker 1: blinded with tears, nor grieve for that, for naught is
- 1:23:39Speaker 1: left worth looking at, since my delightful land is gone.
- 1:23:44Speaker 1: A violet bed is budding near wherein a lark has
- 1:23:48Speaker 1: made her nest and good they are, but not the best.
- 1:23:53Speaker 1: And dear they are, but not so dear. End of
- 1:23:58Speaker 1: section thirty six, Section thirty seven of Goblin Market and
- 1:24:07Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:24:12Speaker 1: the public domain. Sound sleep, Some are laughing, some are weeping.
- 1:24:21Speaker 1: She is sleeping, only sleeping round her rest. Wild flowers
- 1:24:27Speaker 1: are creeping. There the wind is heaping, heaping sweetest sweets
- 1:24:33Speaker 1: of summer's keeping, by the cornfields ripe for reaping. There
- 1:24:39Speaker 1: are lilies, and there blushes the deep rose. And there
- 1:24:43Speaker 1: the thrushes sing till latest sunlight flushes. In the west,
- 1:24:48Speaker 1: a fresh wind brushes through the leaves, while evening hushes.
- 1:24:53Speaker 1: There By day the lark is singing, and the grass
- 1:24:57Speaker 1: and weeds are springing. There By night the bat is winging.
- 1:25:02Speaker 1: There forever winds are bringing far off chimes of church
- 1:25:07Speaker 1: bells ringing night and morning noon, and even their sound
- 1:25:13Speaker 1: fills her dreams with heaven. The long strife at length
- 1:25:17Speaker 1: is striven, till her grave bands shall be riven. Such
- 1:25:22Speaker 1: is the good portion given to her soul at rest
- 1:25:26Speaker 1: and shriven. End of section thirty seven, Section thirty eight
- 1:25:36Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 1:25:41Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Song she sat
- 1:25:49Speaker 1: and sang all way by the green margin of a stream,
- 1:25:53Speaker 1: watching the fishes leap and play beneath the glad sunbeam.
- 1:25:59Speaker 1: I say, and wept all way beneath the moon's most
- 1:26:03Speaker 1: shadowy beam, watching the blossoms of the may weep leaves
- 1:26:08Speaker 1: into the stream. I wept for memory, she sang for hope.
- 1:26:13Speaker 1: That is so fair. My tears were swallowed by the sea.
- 1:26:18Speaker 1: Her songs died on the air end of section thirty
- 1:26:25Speaker 1: eight section thirty nine of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 1:26:34Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 1:26:40Speaker 1: Song when I am dead, my dearest, sing no sad
- 1:26:46Speaker 1: songs for me. Plant thou no roses at my head,
- 1:26:51Speaker 1: nor shady cypress tree. Be the green grass above me,
- 1:26:56Speaker 1: with showers and dewdrops wet. And if thou will remember,
- 1:27:01Speaker 1: and if thou wilt forget, I shall not see the shadows,
- 1:27:07Speaker 1: I shall not feel the rain. I shall not hear
- 1:27:11Speaker 1: the nightingale sing on as if in pain and dreaming
- 1:27:15Speaker 1: through the twilight that doth not rise nor set haply
- 1:27:19Speaker 1: I may remember, and haply may forget. End of section
- 1:27:27Speaker 1: thirty nine, Section forty of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 1:27:36Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 1:27:42Speaker 1: Dead before death a sonnet ah changed and cold, how
- 1:27:49Speaker 1: changed and very cold, with stiffened smiling lips and cold
- 1:27:54Speaker 1: calm eyes changed, yet the same, much knowing, little wise.
- 1:28:01Speaker 1: This was the promise of the days of old, grown
- 1:28:04Speaker 1: hard and stubborn, in the ancient mold, grown rigid, in
- 1:28:08Speaker 1: the sham of life long lies. We hoped for better
- 1:28:12Speaker 1: things as years would rise. But it is over, as
- 1:28:16Speaker 1: a tale once told, all fallen, the blossom that no
- 1:28:21Speaker 1: fruitage bore, all lost, the present and the future time
- 1:28:26Speaker 1: all lost, all lost, the lapse that went before, so
- 1:28:31Speaker 1: lost till death, shut to the opened door, so lost,
- 1:28:36Speaker 1: from chime to everlasting chime, so cold and lost forever
- 1:28:41Speaker 1: ever more. End of section forty, Section forty one of
- 1:28:52Speaker 1: Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox
- 1:28:57Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Bitter, for sweet summer
- 1:29:05Speaker 1: is gone, with all its roses, its sun and perfumes
- 1:29:09Speaker 1: and sweet flowers, its warm air and refreshing showers, and
- 1:29:14Speaker 1: even autumn closes. Yea autumn's chilly self is going, and
- 1:29:21Speaker 1: winter comes, which is yet colder. Each day the hoar
- 1:29:26Speaker 1: frost waxes bolder, and the last buds cease blowing. End
- 1:29:34Speaker 1: of Section forty one, Section forty two of Goblin Market
- 1:29:42Speaker 1: and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 1:29:47Speaker 1: in the public domain. The Master is come, and calleth
- 1:29:52Speaker 1: for thee who calleth Thy Father, calleth run odor to
- 1:30:00Speaker 1: wait on him. He who chasteth, but for a season
- 1:30:04Speaker 1: trims thy lamp that it burn not dim who calleth
- 1:30:10Speaker 1: thy Master. Calleth sit disciple, and learn of him. He
- 1:30:15Speaker 1: who teacheth wisdom of angels makes thee wise as the
- 1:30:18Speaker 1: cheribim who calleth thy Monarch, calleth rise o subject and
- 1:30:26Speaker 1: follow him. He is stronger than death or devil. Fear
- 1:30:31Speaker 1: not thou. If the foe be grim who calleth Thy
- 1:30:36Speaker 1: Lord God calleth fall o creature adoring him, he is
- 1:30:42Speaker 1: jealous Thy God, Almighty, count not dear to thee. Life
- 1:30:46Speaker 1: or limb. Who calleth thy bridegroom, calleth soar o bride
- 1:30:53Speaker 1: with the Seraphim, He who loves thee as no man
- 1:30:56Speaker 1: loveth bids thee give up thy heart to him. End
- 1:31:02Speaker 1: of section forty two, section forty three of Goblin Market
- 1:31:11Speaker 1: and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 1:31:16Speaker 1: in the public domain. Rest a sonnet O Earth lie
- 1:31:24Speaker 1: heavily upon her eyes seal her sweet eyes, weary of
- 1:31:28Speaker 1: watching Earth lie close around her, leave no room for
- 1:31:33Speaker 1: mirth with its harsh laughter, nor for sound of sighs.
- 1:31:38Speaker 1: She hath no questions, she hath no replies, hushed in
- 1:31:43Speaker 1: and curtained with the blessed dearth of all that irked
- 1:31:46Speaker 1: her from the hour of birth. With stillness that is
- 1:31:49Speaker 1: almost paradise, darkness more clear than noonday, holdeth her silence,
- 1:31:57Speaker 1: more musical than any song, even and her very heart
- 1:32:01Speaker 1: has ceased to stir until the morning of eternity. Her
- 1:32:04Speaker 1: rest shall not begin nor end, but be, And when
- 1:32:09Speaker 1: she wakes, she will not think it long. End of
- 1:32:16Speaker 1: section forty three, section forty four of Goblin Market and
- 1:32:25Speaker 1: Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 1:32:29Speaker 1: the public domain. The first spring day, I wonder if
- 1:32:35Speaker 1: the sap is stirring, yet, if wintry birds are dreaming
- 1:32:39Speaker 1: of a mate, if frozen snowdrops feel as yet the
- 1:32:43Speaker 1: sun and crocus fires are kindling one by one, sing
- 1:32:49Speaker 1: Robin sing. I still am sore in doubt concerning spring.
- 1:32:56Speaker 1: I wonder if the spring tide of this year will
- 1:32:59Speaker 1: bring another spring, ring both lost and dear. If heart
- 1:33:03Speaker 1: and spirit will find out their spring, or if the
- 1:33:07Speaker 1: world alone will bud and sing sing hope to me,
- 1:33:12Speaker 1: sweet notes, my hope, soft notes for memory. The sap
- 1:33:18Speaker 1: will surely quicken soon or late, the tardiest bird will
- 1:33:22Speaker 1: twitter to a mate. So spring must dawn again with
- 1:33:25Speaker 1: warmth and bloom, or in this world or in the
- 1:33:29Speaker 1: world to come, sing voice of spring, till I too
- 1:33:35Speaker 1: blossom and rejoice and sing. End of Section forty four
- 1:33:48Speaker 1: Section forty five of Goblin Market and Other Poems by
- 1:33:52Speaker 1: Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 1:33:57Speaker 1: The convent threshold. There's blood between us love my love.
- 1:34:05Speaker 1: There's father's blood, there's brother's blood. And blood's a bar
- 1:34:10Speaker 1: I cannot pass. I choose the stairs that mount above,
- 1:34:15Speaker 1: stare after golden skyward stair to city and to sea
- 1:34:19Speaker 1: of glass. My lily feet are soiled with mud, with
- 1:34:23Speaker 1: scarlet mud, which tells a tale of hope that was
- 1:34:27Speaker 1: of guilt, that was of love that shall not yet
- 1:34:30Speaker 1: avail alas my heart. If I could bear my heart
- 1:34:37Speaker 1: this self, same stain is there. I seek the sea
- 1:34:41Speaker 1: of glass and fire to wash the spot, to burn
- 1:34:44Speaker 1: the snare. Lo stairs are meant to lift us higher.
- 1:34:50Speaker 1: Mount with me, mount the kindled stair. Your eyes look earthward, mine,
- 1:34:57Speaker 1: look up. I see the far off city, grand beyond
- 1:35:01Speaker 1: the hills, a watered land, beyond the gulf, a gleaming
- 1:35:05Speaker 1: strand of mansions, where the righteous sup who sleep at
- 1:35:09Speaker 1: ease among their trees, or wake to sing a cadenced
- 1:35:13Speaker 1: hymn with Cherubim and Seraphim. They bore the cross, They drained,
- 1:35:18Speaker 1: the cup, racked, roasted, crushed, wrenched, limb from limb, They
- 1:35:24Speaker 1: the offscouring of the world, the heaven of starry heavens, unfurled.
- 1:35:29Speaker 1: The sun before their face is dim. You looking earthward,
- 1:35:34Speaker 1: what see you? Milk white wine flushed among the vines,
- 1:35:40Speaker 1: up and down, leaping to and fro, most glad, most full,
- 1:35:45Speaker 1: made strong, with wines blooming as peaches, purled with dew,
- 1:35:49Speaker 1: their golden, windy hair, afloat love, music warbling in their throat.
- 1:35:54Speaker 1: Young men and women come and go. You linger, Yet
- 1:35:59Speaker 1: the time is short. Flee for your life. Gird up
- 1:36:03Speaker 1: your strength to flee. The shadows stretched at length, show
- 1:36:07Speaker 1: that day wanes, that night draws nigh. Flee to the
- 1:36:11Speaker 1: mountain tarry. Not is this a time for smile and sigh,
- 1:36:17Speaker 1: for songs among the secret trees where sudden blue birds
- 1:36:20Speaker 1: nest and sport. The time is short, and yet you
- 1:36:24Speaker 1: stay to day while it is called to day niel, wrestle, knock,
- 1:36:30Speaker 1: do violence, pray? To day is short, to morrow nigh?
- 1:36:34Speaker 1: Why will you die? Why will you die? You sinned
- 1:36:39Speaker 1: with me, a pleasant sin. Repent with me? For I
- 1:36:44Speaker 1: repent woes me. The lore I must unlearn woes me.
- 1:36:50Speaker 1: That easy way we went, so rugged when I would return?
- 1:36:54Speaker 1: How long until my sleep begin? How long shall stretch
- 1:36:58Speaker 1: these nights and days? Surely clean angels cry? She prays,
- 1:37:04Speaker 1: She laves her soul with tedious tears. How long must
- 1:37:08Speaker 1: stretch these years and years? I turn from you my
- 1:37:13Speaker 1: cheeks and eyes, my hair, which you shall see no more,
- 1:37:18Speaker 1: alas for joy that went before, for joy that dies.
- 1:37:22Speaker 1: For love that dies, only my lips still turn to you,
- 1:37:27Speaker 1: my livid lips that cry repent. O weary life, O
- 1:37:31Speaker 1: weary lent, O weary time whose starts are few? How
- 1:37:36Speaker 1: should I rest in paradise or sit on steps of
- 1:37:40Speaker 1: heaven alone? If saints and angels spoke of love? Should
- 1:37:45Speaker 1: I not answer from my throne? Have pity upon me? Ye,
- 1:37:50Speaker 1: my friends, for I have heard the sound thereof Should
- 1:37:54Speaker 1: I not turn with yearning eyes? Turn earthwards with a
- 1:37:57Speaker 1: pitiful pang? Oh? Say, gave me from a pang in heaven,
- 1:38:02Speaker 1: by all the gifts we took and gave. Repent, repent
- 1:38:06Speaker 1: and be forgiven. This life is long, but yet it ends.
- 1:38:10Speaker 1: Repent and perjure soul, and save no gladder. Song. The
- 1:38:14Speaker 1: morning stars upon their birthday morning sang, than angels sang
- 1:38:18Speaker 1: when one repents. I tell you what I dreamed last night.
- 1:38:24Speaker 1: A spirit with transfigured face, fire footed, clom in infinite space.
- 1:38:30Speaker 1: I heard his hundred pinions clang, heaven bells rejoicing, rang
- 1:38:35Speaker 1: and rang. Heaven air was thrilled with subtle scents. Worlds
- 1:38:39Speaker 1: spun upon their rushing cars. He mounted, shrieking, Give me light.
- 1:38:46Speaker 1: Still light was poured on him more light, angels, arch angels.
- 1:38:50Speaker 1: He outstripped, exultant in exceeding might, and trod the skirts
- 1:38:55Speaker 1: of Cherubim. Still give me light. He shrieked and dipped
- 1:39:00Speaker 1: his thirsty face, and drank a sea athirst with thirst
- 1:39:04Speaker 1: it could not slake. I saw him, drunk with knowledge,
- 1:39:09Speaker 1: take from aching brows the oriel crown, his locks writhed
- 1:39:13Speaker 1: like a cloven snake. He left his throne to grovel
- 1:39:16Speaker 1: down and lick the dust of Seraph's feet. For what
- 1:39:20Speaker 1: is knowledge? Duly weighed? Knowledge is strong, but love is sweet? YEA,
- 1:39:27Speaker 1: All the progress he had made was but to learn
- 1:39:30Speaker 1: that all is small save love, for love is all
- 1:39:34Speaker 1: in all. I tell you what I dreamed last night.
- 1:39:39Speaker 1: It was not dark, It was not light. Cold dews
- 1:39:44Speaker 1: had drenched my plenteous hair through clay. You came to
- 1:39:48Speaker 1: seek me there, and do you dream of me? You
- 1:39:53Speaker 1: said my heart was dust that used to leap to you.
- 1:39:58Speaker 1: I answered, half asleep. My pillow is damp, my sheets
- 1:40:03Speaker 1: are red. There's a leaden tester to my bed. Find
- 1:40:08Speaker 1: you a warmer playfellow, a warmer pillow for your head,
- 1:40:12Speaker 1: A kinder love to love than mine. You wrung your hands,
- 1:40:18Speaker 1: while I, like lead, crushed downwards through the sodden earth.
- 1:40:22Speaker 1: You smote your hands, but not in mirth, and reeled,
- 1:40:26Speaker 1: but were not drunk with wine. For all night long
- 1:40:30Speaker 1: I dreamed of you. I woke and prayed against my will,
- 1:40:35Speaker 1: then slept to dream of you again. At length I
- 1:40:39Speaker 1: rose and knelt and prayed. I cannot write the words
- 1:40:44Speaker 1: I said. My words were slow, my tears were few,
- 1:40:49Speaker 1: But through the dark my silence spoke like thunder. When
- 1:40:54Speaker 1: this morning broke, my face was pinched, my hair was
- 1:40:57Speaker 1: gray and frozen, blood was on the sill. Were stifling
- 1:41:01Speaker 1: in my struggle, I lay. If now you saw me,
- 1:41:04Speaker 1: you would say where is the face I used to love?
- 1:41:09Speaker 1: And I would answer, gone before it. Terry's veiled in paradise.
- 1:41:16Speaker 1: When once the morning star shall rise, when earth with
- 1:41:20Speaker 1: shadow flees away, and we stand safe within the door,
- 1:41:25Speaker 1: then you shall lift the veil thereof Look up, Rise up,
- 1:41:31Speaker 1: for far above our palms are grown, our place is set.
- 1:41:36Speaker 1: There we shall meet as once we met, and love
- 1:41:39Speaker 1: with old familiar love. And of section forty five, Section
- 1:41:52Speaker 1: forty six of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 1:41:58Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is the public domain. Up hill? Does
- 1:42:06Speaker 1: the road wind up hill? All the way? Yes, to
- 1:42:10Speaker 1: the very end? Will the day's journey take the whole
- 1:42:14Speaker 1: long day, from morn to night? My friend? But is
- 1:42:19Speaker 1: there for the night a resting place, a roof for
- 1:42:23Speaker 1: when the slow dark hours begin? May not the darkness
- 1:42:27Speaker 1: hide it from my face? You cannot miss that inn.
- 1:42:32Speaker 1: Shall I meet other wayfarers at night, those who have
- 1:42:36Speaker 1: gone before? Then? Must I knock or call? When just
- 1:42:41Speaker 1: in sight? They will not keep you? Standing at that door?
- 1:42:46Speaker 1: Shall I find comfort? Travel sore and weak of labor,
- 1:42:51Speaker 1: you shall find the sum Will there be beds for
- 1:42:55Speaker 1: me and all who seek? Yes, bed for all who come?
- 1:43:04Speaker 1: And of section forty six Section forty seven of Goblin
- 1:43:13Speaker 1: Market and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:43:18Speaker 1: is in the public domain. The Love of Christ, which
- 1:43:23Speaker 1: passeth knowledge, I bore with THEE long weary days and nights,
- 1:43:30Speaker 1: through many pangs of heart, through many tears, I bore
- 1:43:34Speaker 1: with THEE thy hardness, coldness, slights for three and thirty years.
- 1:43:41Speaker 1: Who else had dared for THEE what I have dared?
- 1:43:45Speaker 1: I plunged the depth, most deep from bliss above. I
- 1:43:50Speaker 1: not my flesh, I not my spirit spared. Give thou
- 1:43:56Speaker 1: me love for love for THEE. I thirsted in the
- 1:44:01Speaker 1: daily draft, for THEE. I trembled in the nightly frost,
- 1:44:05Speaker 1: much sweeter than thou. Honey to my mouth. Why wilt
- 1:44:10Speaker 1: thou still be lost? I bore THEE on my shoulders
- 1:44:14Speaker 1: and rejoiced. Men only marked upon my shoulders, borne the
- 1:44:19Speaker 1: branding cross, and shouted, hungry voiced, were wagged their heads
- 1:44:25Speaker 1: in scorn. THEE did nails grave upon my hands. Thy
- 1:44:31Speaker 1: name did thorns for frontlet stamp between mine eyes. I
- 1:44:36Speaker 1: Holy One, put on thy guilt and shame I God Priest,
- 1:44:42Speaker 1: sacrifice a thief upon my right hand, and my left
- 1:44:47Speaker 1: six hours alone athirst in misery, at length in death
- 1:44:52Speaker 1: one smote my heart and cleft a hiding place for
- 1:44:56Speaker 1: thee nailed to the racking cross, then bed of down
- 1:45:01Speaker 1: more dear, whereon to stretch myself and sleep? So did
- 1:45:06Speaker 1: I win a kingdom, share my crown, a harvest, come
- 1:45:12Speaker 1: and reap end of Section forty seven, Section forty eight
- 1:45:23Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This
- 1:45:28Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. A bruised reed,
- 1:45:33Speaker 1: shall he not break. I will accept thy will to
- 1:45:38Speaker 1: do and be thy hatred and intolerance of sin. Thy
- 1:45:43Speaker 1: will at least to love that burns within and thirsteth
- 1:45:46Speaker 1: after me. So will I render fruitful blessing still the
- 1:45:51Speaker 1: germs and small beginnings in thy heart, because thy will
- 1:45:56Speaker 1: cleaves to the better part alas I cannot, will dost
- 1:46:03Speaker 1: not thou will poor soul. Yet I receive the inner
- 1:46:07Speaker 1: unseen longings of the soul. I guide them turning towards me.
- 1:46:12Speaker 1: I control and charm hearts till they grieve, if thou
- 1:46:17Speaker 1: desire it, yet shall come to pass. Though thou but
- 1:46:20Speaker 1: wish indeed to choose my love, For I have power
- 1:46:25Speaker 1: in earth and heaven above. I cannot wish alas what
- 1:46:32Speaker 1: neither choose nor wish to choose. And yet I still
- 1:46:35Speaker 1: must strive to win thee, and constrain for thee I
- 1:46:39Speaker 1: hung upon the cross in pain. How then can I forget?
- 1:46:45Speaker 1: If thou, as yet dost neither love nor hate, nor choose,
- 1:46:49Speaker 1: nor wish resign thyself, be still till I infuse love, hatred, longing,
- 1:46:56Speaker 1: will I do not deprecate. End of Section forty eight
- 1:47:10Speaker 1: Section forty nine of Goblin Market and Other Poems by
- 1:47:14Speaker 1: Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain,
- 1:47:20Speaker 1: a better resurrection. I have no wit, no words, no tears.
- 1:47:28Speaker 1: My heart within me, like a stone, is numbed too
- 1:47:31Speaker 1: much for hopes or fears. Look right, look left. I
- 1:47:37Speaker 1: dwell alone. I lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief,
- 1:47:42Speaker 1: no everlasting hills I see. My life is in the
- 1:47:46Speaker 1: falling leaf. Oh Jesus, quicken me. My life is like
- 1:47:53Speaker 1: a faded leaf, my harvest dwindled to a husk. Truly,
- 1:47:58Speaker 1: my life is void and brief and tedious in the
- 1:48:02Speaker 1: barren dusk. My life is like a frozen thing, no
- 1:48:07Speaker 1: bud nor greenness. Can I see yet? Rise it shall
- 1:48:12Speaker 1: the sap of spring, Oh Jesus, rise in me. My
- 1:48:18Speaker 1: life is like a broken bowl, a broken bowl that
- 1:48:22Speaker 1: cannot hold one drop of water for my soul or
- 1:48:25Speaker 1: cordial In the searching cold, cast in the fire, the
- 1:48:29Speaker 1: perished thing melt and remold it till it be a
- 1:48:33Speaker 1: royal cup for him, my King, Oh Jesus, drink of me.
- 1:48:41Speaker 1: End of Section forty nine, Section fifty of Goblin Market
- 1:48:50Speaker 1: and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 1:48:55Speaker 1: in the public domain. Advent, This advent moon shines cold
- 1:49:03Speaker 1: and clear. These advent nights are long. Our lamps have
- 1:49:07Speaker 1: burned year after year, and still their flame is strong. Watchman,
- 1:49:14Speaker 1: what of the night? We cry? Heartsick with hope deferred.
- 1:49:18Speaker 1: No speaking signs are in the sky. Is still the
- 1:49:22Speaker 1: watchman's word. The porter watches at the gate, the servants
- 1:49:27Speaker 1: watch within. The watch is long, betimes and late. The
- 1:49:32Speaker 1: prize is slow to win. Watchman, what of the night?
- 1:49:38Speaker 1: But still his answer sounds the same. No daybreak tops
- 1:49:42Speaker 1: the utmost hill, nor pale. Our lamps aflame one to another.
- 1:49:48Speaker 1: Hear them speak the patient virgins wise, surely he is
- 1:49:53Speaker 1: not far to seek. All night we watch and rise.
- 1:49:58Speaker 1: The days are evil looking back, the coming days are dim.
- 1:50:03Speaker 1: Yet count we not his promise, slack, but watch and
- 1:50:07Speaker 1: wait for him. One with another, soul with soul, they
- 1:50:12Speaker 1: kindle fire from fire. Friends watch us who have touched
- 1:50:16Speaker 1: the goal. They urge us come up higher with them,
- 1:50:21Speaker 1: shall rest our waists or feet? With them? Is built
- 1:50:24Speaker 1: our home with Christ? They sweet, But he most sweet,
- 1:50:29Speaker 1: sweeter than honeycomb. There no more parting, no more pain,
- 1:50:35Speaker 1: the distant ones brought near the lost, so long are
- 1:50:39Speaker 1: found again, long lost, but longer dear eye hath not seen,
- 1:50:45Speaker 1: ear hath not heard, nor heart conceived that rest with
- 1:50:50Speaker 1: them our good things, long deferred. With Jesus Christ, our best.
- 1:50:56Speaker 1: We weep because the night is long. We laugh, for
- 1:50:59Speaker 1: day shall rise. We sing a slow contented song, and
- 1:51:04Speaker 1: knock at paradise weeping. We hold him fast, who wept
- 1:51:09Speaker 1: for us. We hold him fast and will not let
- 1:51:12Speaker 1: him go except he bless us first or last. Weeping,
- 1:51:17Speaker 1: we hold him fast to night. We will not let
- 1:51:20Speaker 1: him go till daybreak. Smite our wearied sight, and summer
- 1:51:24Speaker 1: smite the snow. Then figs shall bud and dove with
- 1:51:30Speaker 1: dove shall coo the livelong day. Then he shall say, arise,
- 1:51:35Speaker 1: my love, my fair one, come away. End of section
- 1:51:42Speaker 1: fifty Section fifty one of Goblin Market and Other Poems
- 1:51:51Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 1:51:57Speaker 1: The Three Enemies the flesh, Sweet thou art pale, more pale,
- 1:52:06Speaker 1: to see Christ hung upon the cruel tree and bore
- 1:52:10Speaker 1: his father's wrath for me. Sweet thou art sad beneath
- 1:52:17Speaker 1: a rod, more heavy. Christ, for my sake trod the
- 1:52:20Speaker 1: wine press of the wrath of God. Sweet thou art weary,
- 1:52:27Speaker 1: Not so Christ, whose mighty love of me sufficed for
- 1:52:31Speaker 1: strength salvation Eucharist. Sweet thou art footsore. If I bleed
- 1:52:39Speaker 1: his feet of blood, yea, in my need, his heart
- 1:52:43Speaker 1: once bled for mine. Indeed the world. Sweet Thou art young.
- 1:52:52Speaker 1: So he was young, who, for my sake, in silence,
- 1:52:55Speaker 1: hung upon the cross with passion wrung. Look, thou art fair.
- 1:53:02Speaker 1: He was more fair than men who deigned for me
- 1:53:05Speaker 1: to wear a visage marred beyond compare. And thou hast
- 1:53:10Speaker 1: riches daily bread. All else is his, who, living dead
- 1:53:16Speaker 1: for me, lacked where to lay his head, and life
- 1:53:20Speaker 1: is sweet. It was not so to him whose cup
- 1:53:24Speaker 1: did overflow with mine unutterable woe the devil. Thou drinkest
- 1:53:33Speaker 1: deep when Christ would sup He drained the dregs from
- 1:53:37Speaker 1: out my cup. So how should I be lifted up?
- 1:53:41Speaker 1: Thou shalt win glory in the skies. Lord Jesus, cover
- 1:53:46Speaker 1: up mine eyes lest they should look on vanities. Thou
- 1:53:51Speaker 1: shalt have knowledge helpless dust in thee O, Lord, I
- 1:53:56Speaker 1: put my trust answer thou for me wise and just,
- 1:54:01Speaker 1: and might get thee behind me. Lord who hast redeemed
- 1:54:07Speaker 1: and not abhorred my soul, Oh keep it by thy word.
- 1:54:13Speaker 1: End of section fifty one, section fifty two of Goblin
- 1:54:22Speaker 1: Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 1:54:27Speaker 1: is in the public domain. One certainty a sonnet vanity
- 1:54:35Speaker 1: of vanities, the preacher saith, all things are vanity. The
- 1:54:41Speaker 1: eye and ear cannot be filled with what they see
- 1:54:43Speaker 1: and hear, like early dew, or like the sudden breath
- 1:54:48Speaker 1: of wind, or like the grass that withereth is man
- 1:54:53Speaker 1: tossed to and fro by hope and fear, so little joy,
- 1:54:57Speaker 1: hath he so little cheer till all things end in
- 1:55:01Speaker 1: the long dust of death. To day is still the
- 1:55:05Speaker 1: same as yesterday, to morrow, also even as one of them.
- 1:55:10Speaker 1: And there is nothing new under the sun until the
- 1:55:14Speaker 1: ancient race of time be run. The old thorns shall
- 1:55:18Speaker 1: grow out of the old stem, and morning shall be
- 1:55:22Speaker 1: cold and twilight gray. End of section fifty two, section
- 1:55:34Speaker 1: fifty three of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 1:55:39Speaker 1: This LIBRIVOCXT recording is in the public domain. Christian and
- 1:55:44Speaker 1: jew a dialog, Oh, happy, happy land. Angels like rushes,
- 1:55:51Speaker 1: stand about the wells of light. Alas I have not
- 1:55:57Speaker 1: eyes for this fair sight, hold facts my hand, as
- 1:56:03Speaker 1: in a soft wind, they bend, all one blessed way,
- 1:56:06Speaker 1: each bowed in his own glory, star with star I
- 1:56:12Speaker 1: cannot see so far here shadows are white winged, the
- 1:56:18Speaker 1: Cherubim yet whiter. Seraphim glow white with intense fire of love.
- 1:56:25Speaker 1: Mine eyes are dim. I look in vain above and
- 1:56:30Speaker 1: miss their hymn. Angels arch angels cry one to other ceaselessly.
- 1:56:36Speaker 1: I hear them sing one, holy, holy, Holy to their king.
- 1:56:42Speaker 1: I do not hear them. I joy to thee paradise
- 1:56:48Speaker 1: garden and gold and nest made green for wearied eyes,
- 1:56:52Speaker 1: much softer than the breast of mother dove. Clad in
- 1:56:55Speaker 1: a rainbow's dyes, All precious souls are there, most safe
- 1:57:00Speaker 1: elect by grace, All tears are wiped forever from their face.
- 1:57:04Speaker 1: Untired in prayer, they wait and praise. Hidden for a
- 1:57:08Speaker 1: little space. Boughs of the living vine they spread in
- 1:57:12Speaker 1: summer shine, green leaf with leaf sap of the royal vine.
- 1:57:16Speaker 1: It stirs like wine in all both less and chief
- 1:57:21Speaker 1: sing to the Lord all spirits of all flesh sing,
- 1:57:25Speaker 1: For he hath not abhorred our low estate, nor scorned
- 1:57:28Speaker 1: our offering. Shout to our king. But Zion said, my Lord,
- 1:57:35Speaker 1: forgetteth me. Lo. She hath made her bed in dust,
- 1:57:40Speaker 1: forsaken weepeth she where alien rivers swell the sea. She
- 1:57:45Speaker 1: laid her body as the ground, her tender body as
- 1:57:49Speaker 1: the ground. To those who passed her harp strings cannot
- 1:57:52Speaker 1: sound in a strange land, tiscrowned. She sits and drunk
- 1:57:57Speaker 1: with woes, Oh, drunken not with wine, whose sins and
- 1:58:02Speaker 1: sorrows have fulfilled the sum Be not afraid. A rise
- 1:58:06Speaker 1: be no more dumb, a rise shine, for thy light
- 1:58:11Speaker 1: is come. Can these bones live? God knows. The prophet
- 1:58:19Speaker 1: saw such clothed with flesh and skin. A wind blew
- 1:58:22Speaker 1: on them, and life entered in. They shook and rose
- 1:58:26Speaker 1: hasten the time O Lord blot out their sin. Let
- 1:58:30Speaker 1: life begin end of section fifty three Section fifty four
- 1:58:42Speaker 1: of Goblin Market and other poems. This LibriVox recording is
- 1:58:46Speaker 1: in the public domain. Sweet death, the sweetest blossoms die.
- 1:58:54Speaker 1: And so it was that, going day by day unto
- 1:58:58Speaker 1: the church to praise and prayer and crossing the green churchyard,
- 1:59:02Speaker 1: thoughtfully I saw how on the graves the flowers shed
- 1:59:06Speaker 1: their fresh leaves and showers, and how their perfume rose
- 1:59:10Speaker 1: up to the sky before it passed away. The youngest
- 1:59:15Speaker 1: blossoms die, They die and fall and nourish the rich
- 1:59:19Speaker 1: earth from which they lately had their birth. Sweet life,
- 1:59:24Speaker 1: but sweeter death that passeth by, and is as though
- 1:59:28Speaker 1: it had not been. All colors turned to green, the
- 1:59:32Speaker 1: bright hues vanish, and the odors fly. The grass hath
- 1:59:37Speaker 1: lasting worth, and youth and beauty die. So be it,
- 1:59:43Speaker 1: o my God, Thou God of truth, better than beauty
- 1:59:48Speaker 1: and than youth. Are saints and angels a glad company.
- 1:59:53Speaker 1: And Thou, o Lord, our rest and ease art better
- 1:59:58Speaker 1: far than these. Why should we shrink from our full harvest?
- 2:00:03Speaker 1: Why prefer to glean with ruth? End of section fifty
- 2:00:09Speaker 1: four Section fifty five of Goblin Market and Other poems
- 2:00:19Speaker 1: by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Cymbals.
- 2:00:28Speaker 1: I watched a rose bud very long, brought on by
- 2:00:31Speaker 1: dew and sun and shower, waiting to see the perfect flower. Then,
- 2:00:37Speaker 1: when I thought it should be strong. It opened at
- 2:00:40Speaker 1: the matin hour and fell at evensong. I watched a
- 2:00:45Speaker 1: nest from day to day, a green nest full of
- 2:00:48Speaker 1: pleasant shade, wherein three speckled eggs were laid. But when
- 2:00:53Speaker 1: they should have hatched in May, the two old birds
- 2:00:56Speaker 1: had grown afraid or tired, and flew away. Then, in
- 2:01:01Speaker 1: my wrath I broke the bough that I had tended
- 2:01:03Speaker 1: so with care, hoping its scent should fill the air.
- 2:01:07Speaker 1: I crushed the eggs, not heeding how their ancient promise
- 2:01:11Speaker 1: had been fair. I would have vengeance now, But the
- 2:01:15Speaker 1: dead branch spoke from the sod, and the eggs answered
- 2:01:19Speaker 1: me again, because we failed. Dost thou complain? Is thy
- 2:01:25Speaker 1: wrath just? And what if God, who waiteth for thy
- 2:01:29Speaker 1: fruits in vain should also take the rod end of
- 2:01:35Speaker 1: section fifty five section fifty six of Goblin Market and
- 2:01:44Speaker 1: other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 2:01:49Speaker 1: the public domain. Consider the lilies of the field flowers
- 2:01:56Speaker 1: preach to us, if we will hear the rose saith
- 2:01:59Speaker 1: in the dewy morn. I am most fair, Yet all
- 2:02:03Speaker 1: my loveliness is borne upon a thorn. The poppy saith
- 2:02:08Speaker 1: amid the corn let, But my scarlet head appear, and
- 2:02:12Speaker 1: I am held in scorn. Yet juice of subtle virtue
- 2:02:16Speaker 1: lies within my cup of curious dyes. The lilies say, behold,
- 2:02:22Speaker 1: how we preach without words of purity. The violets whisper
- 2:02:26Speaker 1: from the shade which their own leaves have made. Men
- 2:02:30Speaker 1: scent our fragrance on the air. Yet take no heed
- 2:02:33Speaker 1: of humble lessons we would read, but not alone. The
- 2:02:37Speaker 1: fairest flowers, the merest grass along the roadside where we pass,
- 2:02:42Speaker 1: lichen and moss and sturdy weed tell of his love
- 2:02:46Speaker 1: who sends the dew, the rain, and sunshine too, to
- 2:02:50Speaker 1: nourish one small seed. End of section fifty six Section
- 2:03:03Speaker 1: fifty seven of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 2:03:09Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The world
- 2:03:15Speaker 1: a sonnet. By day she woos me soft, exceeding fair,
- 2:03:22Speaker 1: But all night, as the moon so changeth, she loathsome
- 2:03:26Speaker 1: and foul, with hideous leprosy and subtle serpents gliding in
- 2:03:31Speaker 1: her hair. By day she woos me to the outer air,
- 2:03:36Speaker 1: ripe fruits, sweet flowers, and full satiety. But through the night,
- 2:03:41Speaker 1: a beast, she grins at me, a very monster, void
- 2:03:45Speaker 1: of love and prayer. By day she stands alie. By
- 2:03:51Speaker 1: night she stands in all the naked horror of the truth,
- 2:03:55Speaker 1: with pushing horns and clawed and clutching hands. Is this
- 2:04:00Speaker 1: a friend? Indeed? That I should sell my soul to her,
- 2:04:04Speaker 1: give her my life and youth, till my feet cloven too?
- 2:04:10Speaker 1: Take hold on hell. End of section fifty seven Section
- 2:04:22Speaker 1: fifty eight of Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rosetti.
- 2:04:27Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain a testimony.
- 2:04:34Speaker 1: I said, of laughter, it is vain of mirth, I said,
- 2:04:38Speaker 1: what profits it? Therefore I found a book and writ
- 2:04:43Speaker 1: therein how ease and also pain, how health and sickness.
- 2:04:48Speaker 1: Every one is vanity. Beneath the sun man walks in
- 2:04:52Speaker 1: a vain shadow. He disquieteth himself in vain. The things
- 2:04:57Speaker 1: that were shall be again. The river do not fill
- 2:05:00Speaker 1: the sea, but turn back to their secret source. The winds, too,
- 2:05:06Speaker 1: turn upon their course Our treasures moth and rust, corrupt
- 2:05:11Speaker 1: or thieves, break through and steal, or they make themselves
- 2:05:15Speaker 1: wings and fly away. One man made merry as he
- 2:05:19Speaker 1: supped nor guessed how when that night grew dim, his
- 2:05:24Speaker 1: soul would be required of him. We build our houses
- 2:05:28Speaker 1: on the sand, calmly, with outside and within. But when
- 2:05:33Speaker 1: the winds and rains begin to beat on them, they
- 2:05:36Speaker 1: cannot stand. They perish quickly, overthrown loose from the very
- 2:05:42Speaker 1: basement stone. All things are vanity, I said, yea vanity
- 2:05:48Speaker 1: of vanities. The rich man dies and the poor dyes.
- 2:05:53Speaker 1: The worm feeds sweetly on the dead. Whate'er thou lackest
- 2:05:57Speaker 1: keep this trust, all in the end shall have but dust.
- 2:06:02Speaker 1: The one inheritance, which best and worst alike, shall find
- 2:06:06Speaker 1: and share. The wicked cease from troubling. There, and there
- 2:06:11Speaker 1: the weary be at rest. There all the wisdom of
- 2:06:14Speaker 1: the wise is vanity of vanities. Man flourishes as a
- 2:06:20Speaker 1: green leaf, and as a leaf doth pass away, or
- 2:06:24Speaker 1: as a shade that cannot stay and leaves no track.
- 2:06:28Speaker 1: His course is brief. Yet man doth hope and fear
- 2:06:32Speaker 1: and plan till he is dead, O foolish man. Our
- 2:06:37Speaker 1: eyes cannot be satisfied with seeing, nor our ears be
- 2:06:41Speaker 1: filled with hearing. Yet we plant and build, and buy,
- 2:06:45Speaker 1: and make our borders wide. We gather wealth we gather care,
- 2:06:50Speaker 1: but know not who shall be our heir. Why should
- 2:06:54Speaker 1: we hasten to arise so early and so late? Take rest?
- 2:06:59Speaker 1: Our labor is not good, Our best hopes fade, Our
- 2:07:03Speaker 1: heart is stayed on lies. Verily we sow wind, and
- 2:07:08Speaker 1: we shall reap the whirlwind. Verily, he who hath little
- 2:07:12Speaker 1: shall not lack. He who hath plenty shall decay. Our
- 2:07:17Speaker 1: fathers went, we pass away, our children follow on our track.
- 2:07:23Speaker 1: So generations fail, and so they are renewed, and come
- 2:07:26Speaker 1: and go. The earth is fattened with our dead. She
- 2:07:31Speaker 1: swallows more and doth not cease. Therefore her wine and
- 2:07:35Speaker 1: oil increase, and her sheaves are not numbered. Therefore her
- 2:07:39Speaker 1: plants are green, and all her pleasant trees lusty and tall.
- 2:07:44Speaker 1: Therefore the maidens cease to sing, and the young men
- 2:07:47Speaker 1: are very sad. Therefore the sowing is not glad and
- 2:07:51Speaker 1: mournful is the harvesting of high and low, of great
- 2:07:56Speaker 1: and small. Vanity is the lot of all. A king
- 2:08:01Speaker 1: dwelt in Jerusalem. He was the wisest man on earth.
- 2:08:05Speaker 1: He had all riches from his birth, and pleasures till
- 2:08:09Speaker 1: he tired of them. Then, having tested all things, he
- 2:08:14Speaker 1: witnessed that all are vanity. End of section fifty eight
- 2:08:26Speaker 1: Section fifty nine of Goblin Market and Other Poems by
- 2:08:30Speaker 1: Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
- 2:08:36Speaker 1: Sleep at sea, sound the deep waters? Who shall sound
- 2:08:43Speaker 1: that deep? Too short? The plummet and the watchman sleep.
- 2:08:49Speaker 1: Some dream of effort up a toilsome steep. Some dream
- 2:08:54Speaker 1: of pasture grounds for harmless sheep. White shapes flit to
- 2:08:59Speaker 1: and fro from mast to mast. They feel the distant
- 2:09:03Speaker 1: tempest that nears them fast. Great rocks are straight ahead,
- 2:09:08Speaker 1: great shoals, not past. They shout to one another upon
- 2:09:12Speaker 1: the blast, Oh soft. The streams drop music between the hills,
- 2:09:18Speaker 1: and musical the bird's nest beside those rills. The nests
- 2:09:23Speaker 1: are types of home love hidden from ills. The nests
- 2:09:26Speaker 1: are types of spirits. Love. Music fills so dream the sleepers,
- 2:09:32Speaker 1: each man in his place. The lightning shows the smile
- 2:09:36Speaker 1: upon each face. The ship is driving, driving, It drives apace,
- 2:09:42Speaker 1: and sleepers smile, and spirits bewail their case. The lightning
- 2:09:48Speaker 1: glares and reddens across the skies. It seems but sunset
- 2:09:52Speaker 1: to those sleeping eyes. When did the sun go down
- 2:09:55Speaker 1: on such a wise, from such a sunset, When shall
- 2:09:59Speaker 1: day arise? Wake call the spirits, but to heedless ears.
- 2:10:06Speaker 1: They have forgotten sorrows and hopes and fears. They have
- 2:10:09Speaker 1: forgotten perils and smiles and tears. Their dream has held
- 2:10:14Speaker 1: them long, long years and years. Wake call the spirits again,
- 2:10:22Speaker 1: But it would take a louder summons to bid them awake.
- 2:10:25Speaker 1: Some dream of pleasure for another's sake, some dream forgetful
- 2:10:30Speaker 1: of a life long ache. One by one, slowly ah
- 2:10:36Speaker 1: how sad and slow, wailing and praying, The spirits rise
- 2:10:40Speaker 1: and go clear, stainless spirits, white as white as snow,
- 2:10:47Speaker 1: Pale spirits wailing for an overthrow, one by one, flitting
- 2:10:53Speaker 1: like a mournful bird whose song is tired at last,
- 2:10:56Speaker 1: for no mate heard. The loving voice is so violent,
- 2:11:00Speaker 1: the useless word, One by one, flitting, sick with hope deferred.
- 2:11:07Speaker 1: Driving and driving, the ship drives a main while swift
- 2:11:12Speaker 1: from mast to mast, shapes flit again, flit, silent as
- 2:11:17Speaker 1: the silence where men lie slain. Their shadow cast upon
- 2:11:21Speaker 1: the sails is like a stain. No voice to call
- 2:11:25Speaker 1: the sleepers, no hand to raise. They sleep to death
- 2:11:29Speaker 1: in dreaming of length of days. Vanity of vanities, the
- 2:11:34Speaker 1: preacher says, vanity is the end of all their ways.
- 2:11:41Speaker 1: And of section fifty nine, section sixty of Goblin Market
- 2:11:51Speaker 1: and other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is
- 2:11:56Speaker 1: in the public domain. From house to the first was
- 2:12:03Speaker 1: like a dream through summer heat, the second like a tedious,
- 2:12:06Speaker 1: numbing swoon, while the half frozen pulses lagged to beat
- 2:12:11Speaker 1: beneath a winter moon. But says my friend, what was
- 2:12:16Speaker 1: this thing and where it? Was? A pleasure place within
- 2:12:19Speaker 1: my soul, an earthly paradise, supremely fair, that lured me
- 2:12:24Speaker 1: from the goal. The first part was a tissue of
- 2:12:28Speaker 1: hugged lies, the second was its ruin, fraught with pain.
- 2:12:32Speaker 1: Why raise the fair delusion to the skies, but to
- 2:12:36Speaker 1: be dashed again. My castle stood of white, transparent glass,
- 2:12:41Speaker 1: glittering and frail, with many a fretted spire. But when
- 2:12:45Speaker 1: the summer sunset came to pass, it kindled into fire.
- 2:12:50Speaker 1: My pleasance was an undulating green, stately with trees whose
- 2:12:54Speaker 1: shadows slept below, with glimpses of smooth garden beds between,
- 2:13:00Speaker 1: like flame or sky or snow swift squirrels on the
- 2:13:05Speaker 1: pastures took their ease with leaping lambs, safe from the
- 2:13:08Speaker 1: unfeared knife. All singing birds rejoicing in those trees, fulfilled
- 2:13:13Speaker 1: their careless life. Wood pigeons cooed there. Stock doves nestled there.
- 2:13:20Speaker 1: My trees were full of songs and flowers and fruit.
- 2:13:23Speaker 1: Their branches spread a city to the air, and mice
- 2:13:27Speaker 1: lodged in their root. My heath lay farther off, where
- 2:13:31Speaker 1: lizards lived in strange metallic mail just spied and gone
- 2:13:37Speaker 1: like darted lightnings here and there perceived, but nowhere dwelt upon.
- 2:13:42Speaker 1: Frogs and fat toads were there to hop or plod
- 2:13:46Speaker 1: and propagate in peace and uncouth crew where velvet headed
- 2:13:51Speaker 1: rushes rustling gnawed and spill the morning dew All caterpillars
- 2:13:56Speaker 1: throve beneath my rule with snails and slugs and corners
- 2:14:00Speaker 1: out of sight. I never marred the curious sudden stool
- 2:14:04Speaker 1: that perfects in a night, safe in his excavated gallery.
- 2:14:09Speaker 1: The burrowing mole groped on from year to year. No
- 2:14:13Speaker 1: harmless hedgehog curled because of me, his prickly back for
- 2:14:17Speaker 1: fear ofttimes one like an angel walked with me with
- 2:14:22Speaker 1: spirit discerning eyes like flames of fire, but deep as
- 2:14:26Speaker 1: the unfathomed endless sea, fulfilling my desire, and sometimes like
- 2:14:32Speaker 1: a snow drift. He was fair, and sometimes like a
- 2:14:35Speaker 1: sunset glorious red, and sometimes he had wings to scale
- 2:14:39Speaker 1: the air, with aureole around his head. We sang our
- 2:14:43Speaker 1: songs together by the way, calls and recarls and echoes
- 2:14:47Speaker 1: of delight, So communed we together all the day, and
- 2:14:52Speaker 1: so in dreams by night. I have no words to
- 2:14:56Speaker 1: tell what way we walked, what unforgotten path now close
- 2:15:00Speaker 1: and sealed. I have no words to tell all things
- 2:15:03Speaker 1: we talked, all things that he revealed. This only can
- 2:15:08Speaker 1: I tell that hour by hour I waxed more feastful,
- 2:15:12Speaker 1: lifted up and glad. I felt no thorn prick when
- 2:15:16Speaker 1: I plucked a flower, felt not. My friend was sad tomorrow.
- 2:15:22Speaker 1: Once I said to him, with smiles, to night. He
- 2:15:26Speaker 1: answered gravely and was dumb, but pointed out the stones
- 2:15:30Speaker 1: that numbered miles and miles and miles to come. Not
- 2:15:35Speaker 1: so I said, to morrow shall be sweet. To night
- 2:15:39Speaker 1: is not so sweet as coming days. Then first I
- 2:15:42Speaker 1: saw that he had turned, his feet had turned from me,
- 2:15:45Speaker 1: his face, running and flying miles and miles he went,
- 2:15:50Speaker 1: but once looked back to Beckon with his hand and cry,
- 2:15:54Speaker 1: come home, O love, from banishment, Come to the distant land.
- 2:16:00Speaker 1: That night destroyed me like an avalanche. One night turned
- 2:16:04Speaker 1: all my summer back to snow. Next morning, not a
- 2:16:07Speaker 1: bird upon my branch. Not a lamb woke below. No bird,
- 2:16:12Speaker 1: no lamb, no living breathing thing. No squirrels scampered on
- 2:16:16Speaker 1: my breezy lawn. No mouse lodged by his hoard. All
- 2:16:20Speaker 1: joys took wing and fled. Before that dawn, azure and
- 2:16:25Speaker 1: sun were starved from heaven above. No dew had fallen,
- 2:16:29Speaker 1: but biting frost lay hoar, O love. I knew that
- 2:16:33Speaker 1: I should meet my love, should find my love. No more,
- 2:16:37Speaker 1: my love, no more, I muttered, stunned with pain, I
- 2:16:42Speaker 1: shed no tear. I wrung no passionate hand till something whispered,
- 2:16:47Speaker 1: you shall meet again, meet in a distant land. Then
- 2:16:52Speaker 1: with a cry like famine, I arose. I lit my candle,
- 2:16:55Speaker 1: searched from room to room, searched up and down. A
- 2:16:59Speaker 1: war of winds, froze swept through the blank of gloom.
- 2:17:03Speaker 1: I searched day after day, night after night, scant change
- 2:17:07Speaker 1: there came to me of night or day no more.
- 2:17:11Speaker 1: I wailed no more, and trimmed my light and gnashed,
- 2:17:15Speaker 1: but did not pray until my heart broke and my
- 2:17:19Speaker 1: spirit broke. Upon the frost bound floor, I stumbled, fell,
- 2:17:24Speaker 1: and moaned, it is enough. Withhold the stroke. Farewell, O love, farewell.
- 2:17:32Speaker 1: Then life swooned from me, and I heard the song
- 2:17:35Speaker 1: of spheres and spirits rejoicing over me. One cried, our sister,
- 2:17:41Speaker 1: she hath suffered long. One answered, make her see. One cried, Oh,
- 2:17:48Speaker 1: blessed she who no more pain, who no more disappointment,
- 2:17:52Speaker 1: shall receive. One answered, not, so, she must live again.
- 2:17:58Speaker 1: Strengthen thou her to live. So, while I lay entranced,
- 2:18:03Speaker 1: a curtain seemed to shrivel with crackling from before my face.
- 2:18:07Speaker 1: Across mine eyes, a certain waxing radiance beamed and showed
- 2:18:11Speaker 1: a certain place. I saw a vision of a woman
- 2:18:16Speaker 1: where night and new mornings strive for domination. Incomparably pale
- 2:18:21Speaker 1: and almost fair and sad beyond expression. Her eyes were
- 2:18:26Speaker 1: like some fire and shrining gem were stately like the stars,
- 2:18:31Speaker 1: and yet were tender. Her figure charmed me like a
- 2:18:34Speaker 1: windy stem, quivering and drooped and slender. I stood upon
- 2:18:39Speaker 1: the outer barren ground. She stood on inner ground that
- 2:18:43Speaker 1: budded flowers, while circling in their never slackening round, danced
- 2:18:47Speaker 1: by the mystic hours. But every flower was lifted on
- 2:18:52Speaker 1: a thorn, and every thorn shot upright from its sand
- 2:18:55Speaker 1: to gall her feet. Hoarse laughter pealed in scorn with
- 2:18:59Speaker 1: cruel clapping hands. She bled and wept, yet did not shrink.
- 2:19:05Speaker 1: Her strength was strung up until daybreak of delight. She
- 2:19:09Speaker 1: measured measureless sorrow toward its length and breadth, and depth
- 2:19:14Speaker 1: and height. Then marked I how a chain sustained her
- 2:19:18Speaker 1: form a chain of living lynx, not made nor riven.
- 2:19:22Speaker 1: It stretched. Sheer up through lightning, wind and storm, and
- 2:19:26Speaker 1: anchored fast in heaven. One cried, how long, yet founded
- 2:19:33Speaker 1: on the rock, she shall do battle, suffer, and attain.
- 2:19:37Speaker 1: One answered faith. Quakes in the tempest shock strengthen her soul. Again.
- 2:19:44Speaker 1: I saw a cup sent down and come to her
- 2:19:47Speaker 1: brimful of loathing and of bitterness. She drank with livid
- 2:19:51Speaker 1: lips that seemed to stir the depth, not make it less.
- 2:19:55Speaker 1: But as she drank, I spied a hand distill new
- 2:19:58Speaker 1: wine and virgin honey, making it first bitter sweet, then
- 2:20:02Speaker 1: sweet indeed, until she tasted only sweet. Her lips and
- 2:20:07Speaker 1: cheeks waxed, rosy, fresh and young. Drinking, she sang, my
- 2:20:12Speaker 1: soul shall nothing want, and drank anew while soft. A
- 2:20:16Speaker 1: song was sung, a mystical slow chant. One cried, the
- 2:20:22Speaker 1: wounds are faithful of a friend. The wilderness shall blossom
- 2:20:26Speaker 1: as a rose. One answered, rend the veil, declare the end,
- 2:20:32Speaker 1: strengthen her ere she goes. Then Earth and heaven were
- 2:20:36Speaker 1: rolled up like a scroll. Time and space, change and
- 2:20:40Speaker 1: death had passed away, weight, number, measure, each had reached
- 2:20:44Speaker 1: its whole. The day had come. That day multitudes, multitude
- 2:20:51Speaker 1: stood up in bliss, made equal to the angels, glorious fair,
- 2:20:57Speaker 1: with harps, palms, wedding garments, kiss of peace, and crowned
- 2:21:01Speaker 1: and haloed hair. They sang a song, a new song,
- 2:21:05Speaker 1: in the height, harping with harps to him who was
- 2:21:08Speaker 1: strong and true. They drank new wine. Their eyes saw
- 2:21:12Speaker 1: with new light lo all things were made new tear
- 2:21:17Speaker 1: beyond tear. They rose and rose, and rose so high
- 2:21:21Speaker 1: that it was dreadful. Flames with flames, no man could
- 2:21:25Speaker 1: number them, no tongue disclose their secret sacred names. As
- 2:21:30Speaker 1: though one pulse stirred all, one rush of blood fed all,
- 2:21:34Speaker 1: one breath, swept through their myriad voiced. They struck their harps,
- 2:21:38Speaker 1: cast down their crowns. They stood and worshiped and rejoiced.
- 2:21:43Speaker 1: Each face looked one way, like a moon new lit.
- 2:21:46Speaker 1: Each face looked one way towards its sun of love,
- 2:21:50Speaker 1: drank love, and bathed in love, and mirrored it, and
- 2:21:53Speaker 1: knew no end thereof glory touched glory on each blessed head,
- 2:21:58Speaker 1: hands locked, dear hands, never to sunder more. These were
- 2:22:02Speaker 1: the new begotten from the dead, whom the great birthday bore.
- 2:22:06Speaker 1: Heart answered, heart, soul answered soul at rest, double against
- 2:22:11Speaker 1: each other, filled, sufficed, all, loving, loved of all, but loving,
- 2:22:16Speaker 1: best and best beloved of Christ. I saw that one
- 2:22:21Speaker 1: who lost her love and pain, who trod on thorns,
- 2:22:24Speaker 1: who drank the loathsome cup, the lost in night in
- 2:22:28Speaker 1: day was found again, the fallen was lifted up. They
- 2:22:32Speaker 1: stood together in the blessed noon. They sang together through
- 2:22:35Speaker 1: the length of days, each loving face bent sunwards like
- 2:22:39Speaker 1: a moon new lit with love and praise. Therefore, O
- 2:22:44Speaker 1: friend I would not if I might rebuild my house
- 2:22:47Speaker 1: of lies, wherein I joyed one time to dwell. My
- 2:22:51Speaker 1: soul shall walk in white, cast down but not destroyed. Therefore,
- 2:22:56Speaker 1: in patience I possess my soul. Yea, there as a flint.
- 2:23:00Speaker 1: I set my face to pluck down, to build up
- 2:23:04Speaker 1: again the whole. But in a distant place. These thorns
- 2:23:09Speaker 1: are sharp, yet I can tread on them. This cup
- 2:23:13Speaker 1: is loathsome, yet he makes it sweet. My face is
- 2:23:16Speaker 1: steadfast toward Jerusalem. My heart remembers it. I lift the
- 2:23:22Speaker 1: hanging hands, the feeble knees. I precious more than seven
- 2:23:27Speaker 1: times molten gold, until the day when from his storehouses
- 2:23:31Speaker 1: God shall bring new and old beauty for ashes, oil
- 2:23:35Speaker 1: of joy for grief, garment of praise for spirit of heaviness.
- 2:23:40Speaker 1: Although to day I fade as doth a leaf. I
- 2:23:43Speaker 1: languish and grow less. Although to day he prunes my
- 2:23:47Speaker 1: twigs with pain, Yet doth his blood nourish and warm
- 2:23:51Speaker 1: my root? Tomorrow I shall put forth buds again and
- 2:23:55Speaker 1: clothe myself with fruit. Although to day I walk in
- 2:23:59Speaker 1: tedious ways, to day his staff is turned to a rod.
- 2:24:03Speaker 1: Yet will I wait for him the appointed days and
- 2:24:07Speaker 1: stay upon my God. End of section sixty Section sixty
- 2:24:17Speaker 1: one of Goblin Market and other poems by Christina Rossetti.
- 2:24:22Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Old and
- 2:24:27Speaker 1: New Year ditties. One New Year met me somewhat sad.
- 2:24:34Speaker 1: Old Year leaves me tired, stripped of favorite things I
- 2:24:38Speaker 1: had balked of much desired. Yet farther on my road
- 2:24:43Speaker 1: to day God, willing farther on my way, New Year,
- 2:24:49Speaker 1: coming on apace. What have you to give me? Bring
- 2:24:52Speaker 1: you scathe or bring you grace. Face me with an
- 2:24:55Speaker 1: honest face. You shall not deceive me. Be it good,
- 2:25:00Speaker 1: good or ill. Be it what you will it need
- 2:25:03Speaker 1: shall help me on my road, my rugged way to heaven.
- 2:25:07Speaker 1: Please God, two watch with me. Men, women and children,
- 2:25:15Speaker 1: Dear you, whom I love, for whom I hope and fear,
- 2:25:19Speaker 1: watch with me this last vigil of the year. Some
- 2:25:23Speaker 1: hug their business, some their pleasure scheme. Some seize the
- 2:25:27Speaker 1: vacant hour to sleep or dream heart locked in heart.
- 2:25:32Speaker 1: Some kneel and watch apart. Watch with me, blessed spirits
- 2:25:37Speaker 1: who delight all through the holy night to walk in white,
- 2:25:41Speaker 1: or take your ease after the long drawn fight I
- 2:25:45Speaker 1: know not if they watch with me. I know they
- 2:25:48Speaker 1: count this eve of resurrection slow and cry how long
- 2:25:53Speaker 1: with urgent utterance? Strong watch with me Jesus in my loneliness.
- 2:25:59Speaker 1: Though others say me nay, yet say thou yes. Though
- 2:26:04Speaker 1: others pass me by, stop thou to bless yea thou
- 2:26:09Speaker 1: dost stop with me this vigil night to night of
- 2:26:13Speaker 1: pain to morrow of delight. I love am thine, Thou Lord,
- 2:26:18Speaker 1: my God. Art mine three passing away saith the world
- 2:26:26Speaker 1: passing away, chances, beauty and youth sapt day by day.
- 2:26:32Speaker 1: Thy life never continueth in one's stay is the eye
- 2:26:37Speaker 1: waxen dim, is the dark hair changing to gray. That
- 2:26:40Speaker 1: hath one neither laurel nor bay. I shall clothe myself
- 2:26:45Speaker 1: in spring and bud in may Thou root stricken, shalt
- 2:26:50Speaker 1: not rebuild thy decay on my bosom. For aye? Then
- 2:26:54Speaker 1: I answered, YEA passing away saith my soul, passing away,
- 2:27:01Speaker 1: with its burden of fear and hope of labor and play.
- 2:27:06Speaker 1: Hearken what the past doth witness, and say, rust in
- 2:27:10Speaker 1: thy gold, A moth is in thine array, a canker
- 2:27:13Speaker 1: is in thy bud. Thy leaf must decay at midnight
- 2:27:18Speaker 1: at cock crow at morning one certain day, Lo, the
- 2:27:23Speaker 1: bridegroom shall come and shall not delay. Watch thou and pray.
- 2:27:28Speaker 1: Then I answered, yea passing away, saith my God, passing away.
- 2:27:36Speaker 1: Winter passeth after the long delay, new grapes on the vine,
- 2:27:41Speaker 1: new figs on the tender spray, turtle, calleth turtle in
- 2:27:46Speaker 1: Heaven's may. Though I tarry, wait for me, trust me,
- 2:27:51Speaker 1: watch and pray, arise, come away. Nights past, and Lo
- 2:27:58Speaker 1: it is day, my love, my sister, my spouse. Thou
- 2:28:03Speaker 1: shalt hear me say? Then I answered yea end of
- 2:28:10Speaker 1: section sixty one section sixty two of Goblin Market and
- 2:28:19Speaker 1: other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording is in
- 2:28:24Speaker 1: the public domain. Amen, it is over. What is over? Nay,
- 2:28:34Speaker 1: how much is over? Truly? Harvest days we toiled to
- 2:28:38Speaker 1: sow for now the sheaves are gathered newly. Now the
- 2:28:42Speaker 1: wheat is garnered duly. It is finished. What is finished.
- 2:28:49Speaker 1: Much is finished, known or unknown lives are finished. Time diminished?
- 2:28:55Speaker 1: Was the fallow field left unsown? Will these buds be
- 2:28:59Speaker 1: always unblown? It suffices? What suffices, All suffices reckoned rightly
- 2:29:09Speaker 1: spring shall bloom. Where now the ice is roses make
- 2:29:13Speaker 1: the bramble slightly, and the quickening sun shine brightly, and
- 2:29:18Speaker 1: the latter wind blow lightly, and my garden team with spices.
- 2:29:25Speaker 1: End of section sixty two Section sixty three of Goblin
- 2:29:34Speaker 1: Market and Other poems by Christina Rosetti. This LibriVox recording
- 2:29:39Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Mother Country, Oh, what is
- 2:29:46Speaker 1: that country? And where can it be? Not mine own country?
- 2:29:52Speaker 1: But dear far to me, yet mine own country? If
- 2:29:57Speaker 1: I one day may see its spices and cedars, its
- 2:30:01Speaker 1: gold and ivory. As I lie dreaming it rises that
- 2:30:07Speaker 1: land there rises before me, its green, golden strand, with
- 2:30:12Speaker 1: the bowing cedars and the shining sand. It sparkles and
- 2:30:16Speaker 1: flashes like a shaken brand. Do angels lean nearer while
- 2:30:22Speaker 1: I lie and long? I see their soft plumage and
- 2:30:26Speaker 1: catch their windy song, like the rise of a high tide,
- 2:30:31Speaker 1: sweeping full and strong. I mark the outskirts of their
- 2:30:35Speaker 1: reverend throng. Oh, what is a king here? Or what
- 2:30:40Speaker 1: is a bore here? All starve together, all dwarfed and poor.
- 2:30:46Speaker 1: Here Death's hand knocketh that door after door he thins
- 2:30:50Speaker 1: the dancers from the festal floor, or what is a
- 2:30:53Speaker 1: handmaid or what is a queen? All must lie down together,
- 2:30:58Speaker 1: where the turf is green, the foulest face hidden, the
- 2:31:02Speaker 1: fairest not seen, gone as if never they had breathed
- 2:31:07Speaker 1: or been gone from sweet sunshine underneath the sod turned
- 2:31:13Speaker 1: from warm flesh and blood to senseless clod, gone, as
- 2:31:18Speaker 1: if never they had toiled or trod, Gone out of
- 2:31:21Speaker 1: sight of all except our God, shut into silence, from
- 2:31:27Speaker 1: the accustomed song, Shut into solitude from all Earth's throng,
- 2:31:32Speaker 1: run down though swift of foot, thrust down thoe strong.
- 2:31:37Speaker 1: Life made an end of seemed it short or long?
- 2:31:41Speaker 1: Life made an end of life, but just begun, life
- 2:31:46Speaker 1: finished yesterday, its last sand run life new born with
- 2:31:52Speaker 1: the morrow, fresh as the sun. While done is done
- 2:31:56Speaker 1: for ever, undone, undone. And if that life is life,
- 2:32:03Speaker 1: this is but a breath, the passage of a dream,
- 2:32:07Speaker 1: and the shadow of death, but a vain shadow, if
- 2:32:11Speaker 1: one considereth vanity of vanities, as the preacher saith. End
- 2:32:19Speaker 1: of section sixty three. End of Goblin Market and other
- 2:32:24Speaker 1: poems by Christina Rosetti, read by Elisabeth Klett in January
- 2:32:30Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen