Poems (Scudder)/Ursule's Missal
URSULE'S MISSAL
Ursule a dainty missal hath; Its pages smooth and bland Are white as lily-petals Or as our Lady's hand.
But Ursule while she scans it peers Aside and tries to see If Colin's kneeling near the aisle Where he was wont to be.
The letters scarlet, golden, blue Most quaintly shapen are, And in the margin of each leaf Are painted clear and fair
Saint Michael in his gilded mail, Saint John in tunic green, Saint Helen robed in miniver, And rose-crowned Magdalene.
But Ursule while she studies them Knows that her Colin wears A fine new cloak of velvet blue As fruit the plum-tree bears.
Around the little pictures runs A charming fantasy Of flower, leaf and budding vine— Oh, marvellous to see
How finely wrought the hawthorn leaves, And ivy; finer yet The silver-berried mistletoe, Clove-pink and violet.
But Ursule thinks of how her lad And she one blithe spring day Through field and meadow singing went To gather in the May.
Of how they never reached her home Till dews began to fall, And how they found the year's first rose Beside the garden wall.
The missal hath a golden clasp Set with a comely stone, But Ursule while she fingers it Hopes that when Mass is done
Colin will wait beside the door To greet her—pretty fool—Perchance will try to kiss her hand— Oh, shame on thee, Ursule.