CATHERINE TALBOT TO HER CHILD.
(1510.)
A face keeps peeping at me through the pane;
I know thee; thou art Madness. Where are they,
The men with masks, who stole my child away?
All day, all night, I hunt for it in vain.
I hear all round me, ever and again,
A pattering of little feet at play.
But can see nought. Come child, come child, it's May;
We'll dance the Dance of Death o'er hill and plain.
The painted Virgin in the chapel shrine
Has seven daggers sticking in her breast;
I think there must be seventy in mine.
Oh for an earthquake! Crimson clouds to west.
The sun's face stoops to drink; it drinks the brine.
I too drink brine.—Those little feet can't rest.
