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 | Studies in verse (1865) |  |
But Agnes answered nothing save the old
Womanly answer of a flood of tears.
But Mary judged it kinder to speak out
In time and harshly: for she feared the man
Exceedingly, and fainted in her soul,
Remembering all the trouble she had known.
And Agnes passed in silence to her rest.
But could not sleep and set her casement wide.
The air was very slow, the clouds came not,
One leaned and faltered in the stagnant night.
Her mother's words were cruel and unjust;
She thought unjust to him, unjust to her
She knew them: mothers hardened with their years,
Believed in nothing save in commonplace:
And yet romance was current in the world,
Marring the calculations of the old;
And there were flowers and April, spite of prose
That only saw the winter of the earth.
How could her mother judge of Edward Mayne?
She heard the farmer tattle on the great,
And took it all for gospel: Was there one
As noble or as handsome that escaped
The housewives' gossip? Granting that he meant
The half he said, that little he had said
Was mended easily, no mischief done.
Her life was lonely with her brother gone:
And must she mope in-doors all day, from fear
Of meeting some one in the lanes, who talked
A pleasant twenty minutes at her side?
Womanly answer of a flood of tears.
But Mary judged it kinder to speak out
In time and harshly: for she feared the man
Exceedingly, and fainted in her soul,
Remembering all the trouble she had known.
And Agnes passed in silence to her rest.
43
The air was very slow, the clouds came not,
One leaned and faltered in the stagnant night.
Her mother's words were cruel and unjust;
She thought unjust to him, unjust to her
She knew them: mothers hardened with their years,
Believed in nothing save in commonplace:
And yet romance was current in the world,
Marring the calculations of the old;
And there were flowers and April, spite of prose
That only saw the winter of the earth.
How could her mother judge of Edward Mayne?
She heard the farmer tattle on the great,
And took it all for gospel: Was there one
As noble or as handsome that escaped
The housewives' gossip? Granting that he meant
The half he said, that little he had said
Was mended easily, no mischief done.
Her life was lonely with her brother gone:
And must she mope in-doors all day, from fear
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A pleasant twenty minutes at her side?
| Studies in verse (1865) | |