Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE HOUSE OF SORROWS, by FRANCIS THOMPSON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE HOUSE OF SORROWS, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Of the white purity
Last Line: Where any blow were pity, to this it struck before!
Subject(s): Assassination; Elizabeth. Empress Of Austria (1837-98); Grief; Sorrow; Sadness


I

OF the white purity
They wrought my wedding-dress,
Inwoven silverly --
For tears, as I do guess.
Oh, why did they with tears inweave my marriage-dress?

A girl, I did espouse
Destiny, grief, and fears;
The love of Austria's house
And its ancestral years
I learned; and my salt eyes grew erudite in tears.

Devote our tragic line --
One to his rebel's aim,
One to his ignorant brine,
One to the eyeless flame:
Who should be skilled to weep but I, O Christ's dear Dame?

Give one more to the fire,
One more for water keep:
O Death, wilt thou not tire?
Still Austria must thou reap?
Can I have plummetless tears, that still thou bidd'st: 'Weep, weep!'?

No -- thou at length with me
Too far, Dark Fool, hast gone!
One costly cruelty
Voids thy dominion:
I am drained to the uttermost tear: O Rudolph, O my son!

Take this woof of sorrows,
Son of all Women's Tears!
I am not for the morrows,
I am dead with the dead years.
Lo, I vest Thee, Christ, with my woven tears!

My bridal wreath take thou,
Mary! Take Thou, O Christ,
My bridal garment! Now
Is all my fate sufficed,
And, robed and garlanded, the victim sacrificed.

II

The Son of Weeping heard,
The gift benignly saw;
The Women's Pitier heard.
Together, by hid law,
The life-gashed heart, the assassin's healing poniard, draw.

Too long that consummation
The obdurate seasons thwart;
Too long were the sharp consolation
And her breast apart; --
The remedy of steel has gone home to her sick heart.

Her breast, dishabited,
Revealed, her heart above,
A little blot of red, --
Death's reverent sign to approve
He had sealed up that royal tomb of martyred love.

Now, Death, if thou wouldst show
Some ruth still left in store,
Guide thou the armed blow
To strike one bosom more,
Where any blow were pity, to this it struck before!





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