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Translated by H. W. Dulcken
THE SICKLE moon of autumn | |
| Peers white through clouds around; | |
| The parsonage by the churchyard | |
| Lies hushed in rest profound. | |
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| The mother reads in the Bible, | 5 |
| The son at the candle stares, | |
| Sits yawning the elder daughter, | |
| While the younger thus declares:— | |
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| “Alas! for the days we live here! | |
| How creep they so wearily; | 10 |
| Save when one to the grave is carried | |
| What have we here to see?” | |
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| The mother says, mid her reading, | |
| “Thou ’rt wrong; but four have died | |
| Since that thy father was carried | 15 |
| To rest by the church-door side.” | |
| |
| Then yawneth the elder daughter:— | |
| “I ’ll not starve here with ye; | |
| I will to the count to-morrow,— | |
| He ’s rich, and he loveth me.” | 20 |
| |
| The son breaks forth in laughter: | |
| “There drink at the Star below | |
| Three who make gold, and who ’ll teach me | |
| Their secret gladly, I know.” | |
| |
| The mother flings the Bible | 25 |
| Right in his face so wan: | |
| “And wouldst thou, God-accurséd, | |
| Become a highwayman?” | |
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| They hear a knock at the window, | |
| They see a beckoning hand; | 30 |
| Without, in his black-priest garment, | |
| Doth their dead father stand. | |
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