Christina Georgina Rossetti Poems

Boats sail on the rivers,
And ships sail on the seas;
But clouds that sail across the sky
...

I cannot tell you how it was,
But this I know: it came to pass
Upon a bright and sunny day
When May was young; ah, pleasant May!
...

A frisky lamb
And a frisky child
Playing their pranks
In a cowslip meadow:
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Why were you born when the snow was falling?
You should have come to the cuckoo's calling
Or when grapes are green in the cluster,
...

I looked for that which is not, nor can be,
And hope deferred made my heart sick in truth:
But years must pass before a hope of youth
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Sonnets are full of love, and this my tome
Has many sonnets: so here now shall be
One sonnet more, a love sonnet, from me
...

VI
We lack, yet cannot fix upon the lack:
Not this, nor that; yet somewhat, certainly.
We see the things we do not yearn to see
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What is pink? a rose is pink
By a fountain's brink.
What is red? a poppy's red
In its barley bed.
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Ten years ago it seemed impossible
That she should ever grow so calm as this,
With self-remembrance in her warmest kiss
And dim dried eyes like an exhausted well.
...

It's a weary life, it is, she said:
Doubly blank in a woman's lot:
I wish and I wish I were a man:
Or, better then any being, were not:
...