Page:Poems Rossetti.djvu/75

Fair Margaret stayed alone at home.
 Awhile she sang her song,
Awhile sat silent, then she thought:
 "My sisters loiter long."
That sultry noon had waned away,
 Shadows had waxen great:
"Surely," she thought within herself,
 "My sisters loiter late."
She rose, and peered out at the door,
 With patient heart to wait,
And heard a distant nightingale
 Complaining of its mate;
Then down the garden slope she walked,
 Down to the garden gate,
Leaned on the rail and waited so.

The slope was lightened by her eyes
 Like summer lightning fair,
Like rising of the haloed moon
 Lightened her glimmering hair,
While her face lightened like the sun
 Whose dawn is rosy white.
Thus crowned with maiden majesty
 She peered into the night,
Looked up the hill and down the hill,
 To left hand and to right,
Flashing like fire-flies to and fro.

Waiting thus in weariness
 She marked the nightingale