The Collected Works of William Morris With Introductions by his Daughter May Morris |
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 | III, IV, V, VI. |
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| II. |
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| IV. |
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| XVII. |
| XXI. |
| XXIV. |
 | The Collected Works of William Morris |  |
“Get to the tower-top, look ye through the night,
And ye shall see the cleared sky made all red
And murky 'neath the moon with signs of dread;
Come forth and meet them! What! the Gods ye fear,
And what they threaten? Life to you is dear?
Ah, fools, that think not how to all on earth
The very death is born along with birth;
That some men are but dying twenty years,
That some men on this sick-bed of all tears
Must lie for forty years, for eighty some,
Or ever they may reach their peaceful home!
Ah, give to birth the name of death, and wait
With brave hearts rather for the stroke of fate,
And hope, since ye gained death when ye were born,
That ye from death by dying may be torn—
—Unless ye deem that if this day ye live,
The next a deathless life to you shall give.
And ye shall see the cleared sky made all red
And murky 'neath the moon with signs of dread;
Come forth and meet them! What! the Gods ye fear,
And what they threaten? Life to you is dear?
Ah, fools, that think not how to all on earth
The very death is born along with birth;
That some men are but dying twenty years,
That some men on this sick-bed of all tears
Must lie for forty years, for eighty some,
Or ever they may reach their peaceful home!
Ah, give to birth the name of death, and wait
With brave hearts rather for the stroke of fate,
And hope, since ye gained death when ye were born,
That ye from death by dying may be torn—
—Unless ye deem that if this day ye live,
The next a deathless life to you shall give.
| The Collected Works of William Morris | |