THE SONG OF THE YOUNG PAGE

All that I know of love I see

In eyes that never look at me;

All that I know of love I guess

But from another's happiness.

A beggar at the window I,

Who, famished, looks on revelry;

A slave who lifts his torch to guide

The happy bridegroom to his bride.

My granddam told me once of one

Whom all her village spat upon,

Seeing the church from out its breast

Had cast him cursed and unconfessed.

An outcast he who dared not take

The wafer that God's vicars break,

But dull-eyed watched his neighbours pass

With shining faces from the Mass.

Oh thou, my brother, take my hand,

More than one God hath blessed and banned

And hidden from man's anguished glance

The glory of his countenance.

All that I know of love I see

In eyes that never look at me;

All that I know of love I guess

But from another's happiness.