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The Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti

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

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236

Listening.

She listened like a cushat dove
That listens to its mate alone;
She listened like a cushat dove
That loves but only one.
Not fair as men would reckon fair,
Nor noble as they count the line;
Only as graceful as a bough
And tendrils of the vine;
Only as noble as sweet Eve
Your ancestress and mine.
And downcast were her dovelike eyes,
And downcast was her tender cheek,
Her pulses fluttered like a dove
To hear him speak.