Poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

The House of Life. Sonnet 83. Barren Spring

Once more the changed year's turning wheel returns:
And as a girl sails balanced in the wind,
And now before and now again behind
Stoops as it swoops, with check that laughs and burns,--
So Spring comes merry towards me here, but earns
No answering smile from me, whose life is twin'd
With the dead boughs that winter still must bind,
And whom to-day the Spring no more concerns.

Behold, this crocus is a withering flame;
This snowdrop, snow; this apple-blossom's part
To breed the fruit that breeds the serpent's art.
Nay, for these Spring-flowers, turn thy face from them,
Nor stay till on the year's last lily-stem
The white cup shrivels round the golden heart.

1. The House of Life. Sonnet 70. The Hill Summit
2. On Certain Elizabethan Revivals
3. At Issue
4. The House of Life. Sonnet 66. The Heart of the Night
5. Penumbra

Print

1447 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version