Poem by Louise Imogen Guiney

On First Entering Westminster Abbey

Holy of England! since my light is short
And faint, O rather by the sun anew
Of timeless passion set my dial true,
That with thy saints and thee I may consort;
And wafted in the cool enshadowed port
Of poets, seem a little sail long due,
And be as one the call of memory drew
Unto the saddle void since Agincourt!
Not now for secular love’s unquiet lease,
Receive my soul, who, rapt in thee erewhile,
Hath broken tryst with transitory things;
But seal with her a marriage and a peace
Eternal, on thine Edward’s altar-isle,
Above the stormless sea of ended kings.

1. The Old Dial of Corpus
2. Winter Boughs
3. A Friend’s Song for Simoisius
4. Friendship Broken
5. Heathenesse

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