Dante Gabriel Rossetti (Данте Габриэль Россетти)

The Honeysuckle

I PLUCKED a honeysuckle where
The hedge on high is quick with thorn,
And climbing for the prize, was torn,
And fouled my feet in quag-water;
And by the thorns and by the wind
The blossom that I took was thinn'd,
And yet I found it sweet and fair.
Thence to a richer growth I came,
Where, nursed in mellow intercourse,
The honeysuckles sprang by scores,
Not harried like my single stem,
All virgin lamps of scent and dew.
So from my hand that first I threw,
Yet plucked not any more of them. 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s other poems:

  1. The House of Life. Sonnet 17. Beauty’s Pageant
  2. The House of Life. Sonnet 35. The Lamp’s Shrine
  3. The House of Life. Sonnet 92. The Sun’s Shame – 1
  4. The House of Life. Sonnet 21. Love-Sweetness
  5. The House of Life. Sonnet 50. Willowwood – 2




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