EVELYN G. OF CHRISTMINSTER

I can see the towers

In mind quite clear

Not many hours’

Faring from here;

But how up and go,

And briskly bear

Thither, and know

That are not there?

Though the birds sing small,

And apple and pear

On your trees by the wall

Are ripe and rare,

Though none excel them,

I have no care

To taste them or smell them

And you not there.

Though the College stones

Are smit with the sun,

And the graduates and Dons

Who held you as one

Of brightest brow

Still think as they did,

Why haunt with them now

Your candle is hid?

Towards the river

A pealing swells:

They cost me a quiver -

Those prayerful bells!

How go to God,

Who can reprove

With so heavy a rod

As your swift remove!

The chorded keys

Wait all in a row,

And the bellows wheeze

As long ago.

And the psalter lingers,

And organist's chair;

But where are your fingers

That once wagged there?

Shall I then seek

That desert place

This or next week,

And those tracks trace

That fill me with cark

And cloy; nowhere

Being movement or mark

Of you now there!