The Blessed Damozel

Dante Alighieri · en
Produced by Al Haines.

                        FLOWERS OF PARNASSUS—IV.

                         *THE BLESSED DAMOZEL*

[Illustration: "The blessed Damozel leaned out."]

                          *THE BLESSED DAMOZEL
                            BY DANTE GABRIEL
                            ROSSETTI.  WITH
                         ILLUSTRATIONS BY PERCY
                                BULCOCK*

                          JOHN LANE: PUBLISHER
                          LONDON AND NEW YORK
                                  1901

             Wm. Clowes & Sons, Limited, Printers, London.

                            *ILLUSTRATIONS.*

"The blessed Damozel leaned out" . . . Frontispiece

Heading

"Surely she leaned o’er me"

"’We two will stand beside that shrine’"

"’And I myself will teach to him’"

"’Herself shall bring us, hand in hand’"

"And laid her face between her hands"

Tailpiece

    [Illustration: Heading]

    I.

    The blessed Damozel leaned out
      From the gold bar of Heaven:
    Her blue-grey eyes were deeper much
      Than a deep water, even.
    She had three lilies in her hand,
      And the stars in her hair were seven.

    II.

    Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
      No wrought flowers did adorn,
    But a white rose of Mary’s gift
      On the neck meetly worn;
    And her hair, lying down her back,
      Was yellow like ripe corn.

    III.

    Herseemed she scarce had been a day
      One of God’s choristers;
    The wonder was not yet quite gone
      From that still look of hers;
    Albeit to them she left, her day
      Had counted as ten years.

    IV.

    (To _one_ it is ten years of years
      . . . Yet now, here in this place,
    Surely she leaned o’er me,—her hair
      Fell all about my face . . .
    Nothing: the Autumn-fall of leaves.
      The whole year sets apace.)

[Illustration: "Surely she leaned o’er me."]

    V.

    It was the terrace of God’s house
      That she was standing on,—
    By God built over the sheer depth
      In which Space is begun;
    So high, that looking downward thence,
      She could scarce see the sun.

    VI.

    It lies from Heaven across the flood
      Of ether, as a bridge.
    Beneath, the tides of day and night
      With flame and blackness ridge
    The void, as low as where this earth
      Spins like a fretful midge.

    VII.

    But in those tracts, with her, it was
      The peace of utter light
    And silence.  For no breeze may stir
      Along the steady flight
    Of seraphim; no echo there,
      Beyond all depth or height.

    VIII.

    Heard hardly, some of her new friends,
      Playing at holy games,
    Spake, gentle-mouthed, among themselves,
      Their virginal chaste names;
    And the souls, mounting up to God,
      Went by her like thin flames.

    IX.