Page:Poems Rossetti.djvu/243

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"THY BROTHER'S BLOOD CRIETH".
215
"Will it hurt much?"—"No, mine own:
I wish I could bear the pang for both,"
"I wish I could bear the pang alone:
Courage, dear, I am not loth."

Kissandkiss: "Itisnotpain
Thus to kiss and die.
One kiss more."—"And yet one again."—
"Good-bye."—"Good-bye."

I retain this little poem, not as historically accurate, but as written and published before I heard the supposed facts of its- first verse contradicted.


THE GERMAN-FRENCH CAMPAIGN.

1870-1871.

These two pieces, written during the suspense of a great nation's agony, aim at expressing human sympathy, not political bias.

1.

"THY BROTHER'S BLOOD CRIETH."

ALL her corn-fields rippled in the sunshine,
All her lovely vines, sweets-laden, bowed;
Yet some weeks to harvest and to vintage:
When, as one man's hand, a cloud
Rose and spread, and, blackening, burst asunder
   In rain and fire and thunder.