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Ingelow, Jean, 1820-1897

"Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II."


Lifetimes gone by, long, slow, dim, desolate,
I knew even there had been my lost love's cell.
So musing on the man that with his foot
Spurned me, the robed ecclesiastic stern,
'Would he had haled me straight to prison' methought,
'So made an end at once.'
My sufferings rose
Like billows closing over, beating down;
Made heavier far because of a stray, strange,
Sweet hope that mocked me at the last.
'T was thus,
I came from Oxford secretly, the news
Terrible of her danger smiting me,--
She was so young, and ever had been bred
With whom 't was made a peril now to name.
There had been worship in the night; some stole
To a mean chapel deep in woods, and heard
Preaching, and prayed. She, my betrothed, was there.
Father and mother, mother and father kind,
So young, so innocent, had ye no ruth,
No fear, that ye did bring her to her doom?
I know the chiefest Evil One himself
Sanded that floor. Their footsteps marking it
Betrayed them.


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