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The Collected Works of William Morris

With Introductions by his Daughter May Morris

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Now amidst those days that she pondered came a wife of the witch-folk there,
A woman young and lovesome, and shaped exceeding fair,
And she spake with Signy the Queen, and told her of deeds of her craft,
And how the might was with her her soul from her body to waft
And to take the shape of another and give her fashion in turn.
Fierce then in the heart of Signy a sudden flame 'gan burn,
And the eyes of her soul saw all things, like the blind, whom the world's last fire
Hath healed in one passing moment 'twixt his death and his desire.
And she thought: “Alone I will bear it; alone I will take the crime;
On me alone be the shaming, and the cry of the coming time.

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Yea, and he for the life is fated and the help of many a folk,
And I for the death and the rest, and deliverance from the yoke.”