The Poetry of Dante Rossetti

"That in our embersIs something that doth live."

"Could it be so now?Not if all beneath heaven's pallLay dead but I and thou,Could it be so now!"

"Jenny, you know the city now,A child can tell the tale there, howSome things which are not yet enroll'dIn market lists are bought and sold.••••••Our learned London children know,Poor Jenny, all your pride and woe;••••••Have seen your coach-wheels splash rebukeOn virtue; and have learned your lookWhen, wealth and health slipped past, you stareAlong the streets alone, and there,Round the long park, across the bridge,The cold lamps at the pavements edgeWind on together and apart,A fiery serpent for your heart."

"Father, yon heard my speech and not her laugh;"But God heard that. Will God remember all?

"Some tribe of the Australian ploughBear him afar,—a relic nowOf London, not of Nineveh."

"A little while a little loveThe scattering Autumn hoards for usWhose bower is not yet ruinousNor quite unleaved our songless grove.Only across the shaken boughsWe hear the flood-tides seek the sea,And deep in both our hearts they rouseOne wail for thee and me."

"Say, is it day, is it dusk in thy bower,Thou whom I long for, who longest for me!Oh! be it light, be it night, 'tis Love's hour,Love's that is fettered as Love's that is free."

"What wore my prize, could I enter thy bower,This day, to-morrow, at eve or at morn?Large lovely arms and a neck like a tower,Bosom then heaving that now lies forlorn.Kindled with love-breath, (the sun's kiss is colder!)Thy sweetness all near me, so distant to-day;My hand round thy neck and thy hand on my shoulder,My mouth to thy mouth as the world melts away."

"A soul that's lost as mine is lost,Little brother!"(O Mother, Mary Mother,Lost, lost, all lost, between Hell and Heaven!)

"But he and I are sadder stillLittle brother."

"Less than her shadow on the grassOr than her image in the stream."