University of Virginia Library

Search this document 
The Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti

A variorum edition: Edited, with textual notes and introductions, by R. W. Crump

expand sectionI. 
expand sectionII. 
collapse sectionIII. 
expand sectionI. 
expand sectionII. 
expand sectionIII. 

TEMPUS FUGIT.

Lovely Spring,
A brief sweet thing,
Is swift on the wing;
Gracious Summer,
A slow sweet comer,
Hastens past;
Autumn while sweet
Is all incomplete
With a moaning blast,—
Nothing can last,
Can be cleaved unto,
Can be dwelt upon;
It is hurried thro',
It is come and gone,
Undone it cannot be done,
It is ever to do,

95

Ever old, ever new,
Ever waxing old
And lapsing to Winter cold.