Wife To Husband

Pardon the faults in me,
    For the love of years ago:
    Good-bye.
I must drift across the sea,
    I must sink into the snow,
    I must die.

You can bask in this sun,
    You can drink wine, and eat:
    Good-bye.
I must gird myself and run,
    Though with unready feet:
    I must die.

Blank sea to sail upon,
    Cold bed to sleep in:
    Good-bye.
While you clasp, I must be gone
    For all your weeping:
    I must die.

A kiss for one friend,
    And a word for two,--
    Good-bye:--
A lock that you must send,
    A kindness you must do:
    I must die.

Not a word for you,
    Not a lock or kiss,
    Good-bye.
We, one, must part in two;
    Verily death is this:
    I must die.

Christina Georgina Rossetti

Christina Georgina Rossetti was an English poet born on December 5, 1830, and passed away on December 29, 1894. She is best known for her romantic, devotional, and children's poems. Rossetti's works include the famous poem 'Goblin Market' and the Christmas carol 'In the Bleak Midwinter'. A major Victorian poet, her writing often featured themes of love, nature, and spirituality. She was associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, as her brother Dante Gabriel Rossetti was one of its founders.

Christina Georgina Rossetti

An October Garden.

Christina Georgina Rossetti, Simple Poetry

One Day

Christina Georgina Rossetti, Simple Poetry

On The Wing. - Sonnet.

Christina Georgina Rossetti, Simple Poetry

Songs In A Cornfield

Christina Georgina Rossetti, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Light Love

'Oh, sad thy lot before I came,
    But sadder when I go;
My presence but a flash of flame,
    A transitory glow
    Between two barren wastes like snow.
What wilt thou do when I am gone,
    Where wilt thou rest, my dear?
For cold thy bed to rest upon,
    And cold the falling year
    Whose withered leaves are lost and sere.'

She hushed the baby at her breast,
    She rocked it on her knee:
'And I will rest my lonely rest,
    Warmed with the thought of thee,
    Rest lulled to rest by memory.'
She hushed the baby with her kiss,
    She hushed it with her breast:
'Is death so sadder much than this -
    Sure death that builds a nest
    For those who elsewhere cannot rest?'

'Oh, sad thy note, my mateless dove,
    With t...

Christina Georgina Rossetti

One Foot On Sea, And One On Shore.

"Oh tell me once and tell me twice
And tell me thrice to make it plain,
When we who part this weary day,
When we who part shall meet again."

"When windflowers blossom on the sea
And fishes skim along the plain,
Then we who part this weary day,
Then you and I shall meet again."

"Yet tell me once before we part,
Why need we part who part in pain?
If flowers must blossom on the sea,
Why, we shall never meet again.

"My cheeks are paler than a rose,
My tears are salter than the main,
My heart is like a lump of ice
If we must never meet again."

"Oh weep or laugh, but let me be,
And live or die, for all's in vain;
For life's in vain since we must part,
And parting must not meet again

"Till windflowers blossom on the s...

Christina Georgina Rossetti

The Poor Ghost

'Oh whence do you come, my dear friend, to me,
With your golden hair all fallen below your knee,
And your face as white as snowdrops on the lea,
And your voice as hollow as the hollow sea?'

'From the other world I come back to you,
My locks are uncurled with dripping drenching dew.
You know the old, whilst I know the new:
But to-morrow you shall know this too.'

'Oh not to-morrow into the dark, I pray;
Oh not to-morrow, too soon to go away:
Here I feel warm and well-content and gay:
Give me another year, another day.'

'Am I so changed in a day and a night
That mine own only love shrinks from me with fright,
Is fain to turn away to left or right
And cover up his eyes from the sight?'

'Indeed I loved you, my chosen friend,
I loved you...

Christina Georgina Rossetti

An End

Love, strong as Death, is dead.
Come, let us make his bed
Among the dying flowers:
A green turf at his head;
And a stone at his feet,
Whereon we may sit
In the quiet evening hours.

He was born in the Spring,
And died before the harvesting:
On the last warm summer day
He left us; he would not stay
For Autumn twilight cold and grey.
Sit we by his grave, and sing
He is gone away.

To few chords and sad and low
Sing we so:
Be our eyes fixed on the grass
Shadow-veiled as the years pass
While we think of all that was
In the long ago.

Christina Georgina Rossetti

Death's Chill Between

(Athenaeum, October 14, 1848)


Chide not; let me breathe a little,
    For I shall not mourn him long;
Though the life-cord was so brittle,
    The love-cord was very strong.
I would wake a little space
Till I find a sleeping-place.

You can go, - I shall not weep;
    You can go unto your rest.
My heart-ache is all too deep,
    And too sore my throbbing breast.
Can sobs be, or angry tears,
Where are neither hopes nor fears?

Though with you I am alone
    And must be so everywhere,
I will make no useless moan, -
    None shall say 'She could not bear:'
While life lasts I will be strong, -
But I shall not struggle long.

Listen, listen! Everywhere
    A low voice is calling me,
And a step is on the sta...

Christina Georgina Rossetti

Heart's Chill Between

(Athenaeum, October 21, 1848)


I did not chide him, though I knew
    That he was false to me.
Chide the exhaling of the dew,
    The ebbing of the sea,
The fading of a rosy hue, -
    But not inconstancy.

Why strive for love when love is o'er?
    Why bind a restive heart? -
He never knew the pain I bore
    In saying: 'We must part;
Let us be friends and nothing more.'
    - Oh, woman's shallow art!

But it is over, it is done, -
    I hardly heed it now;
So many weary years have run
    Since then, I think not how
Things might have been, - but greet each one
    With an unruffled brow.

What time I am where others be,
    My heart seems very calm -
Stone calm; but if all go from me,
    There c...

Christina Georgina Rossetti