Louise Imogen Guiney

On the Pre-Reformation Churches about Oxford

Imperial Iffley, Cumnor bowered in green,
And Templar Sandford in the boatman’s call,
And sweet-belled Appleton, and Marcham wall
That dost upon adoring ivies lean;
Meek Binsey; Dorchester, where streams convene
Bidding on graves thy solemn shadow fall;
Clear Cassington that soars perpetual;
Holton and Hampton Poyle, and towers between:
If one of all in your sad courts that come,
Belovèd and disparted! be your own,
Kin to the souls ye had, while yet endures
Some memory of a great communion known
At home in quarries of old Christendom,—
Ah, mark him: he will lay his cheek to yours.