The wild-flower waves, in lonely bloom,
On Godstow’s desolated wall:
There thin shades flit through twilight gloom,
And murmured accents feebly fall.
The aged hazel nurtures there
Its hollow fruit, so seeming fair,
And lightly throws its humble shade,
Where Rosamonda’s form is laid,
The rose of earth, the sweetest flower
That ever graced a monarch’s breast,
In vernal beauty’s loveliest hour,
Beneath that sod was laid to rest.
In vain the bower of love around
The Dædalëan path was wound:
Alas! that jealous hate should find
The clue for love alone designed!
The venomed bowl,--the mandate dire,--
The menaced steel’s uplifted glare,--
The tear, that quenched the blue eye’s fire,--
The humble, ineffectual prayer:--
All these shall live, recorded long
In tragic and romantic song,
And long a moral charm impart,
To melt and purify the heart.
A nation’s gem, a monarch’s pride.
In youth, in loveliness, she died:
The morning sun’s ascending ray
Saw none so fair, so blest, so gay:
Ere evening came, her funeral knell
Was tolled by Godstow’s convent bell.
The marble tomb, the illumined shrine,
Their ineffectual splendour gave:
Where slept in earth the maid divine.
The votive silk was seen to wave.
To her, as to a martyred saint.
His vows the weeping pilgrim poured
The drooping traveller, sad and faint,
Knelt there, and found his strength restored:
To that fair shrine, in solemn hour,
Fond youths and blushing maidens came.
And gathered from its mystic power
A brighter, purer, holier flame:
The lightest heart with awe could feel
The charm her hovering spirit shed
But superstition’s impious zeal
Distilled its venom on the dead!
The illumined shrine has passed away;
The sculptured stone in dust is laid:
But when the midnight breezes play
Amid the barren hazel’s shade,
The lone enthusiast, lingering near,
The youth, whom slighted passion grieves,
Through fancy’s magic spell may hear
A spirit in the whispering leaves;
And dimly see, while mortals sleep,
Sad forms of cloistered maidens move,
The transient dreams of life to weep,
The fading flowers of youth and love!