Christina Rossetti Poetry

REMEMBER
by: Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

REMEMBER me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and besad.

"Remember" is reprinted from Goblin Market and other Poems. Christina Rossetti. Cambridge: Macmillan, 1862.

DREAM LAND
by: Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

WHERE sunless rivers weep
Their waves into the deep,
She sleeps a charmed sleep:
Awake her not.
Led by a single star,
She came from very far
To seek where shadows are Her pleasant lot.

She left the rosy morn,
She left the fields of corn,
For twilight cold and lorn
And water springs.
Through sleep, as through a veil,
She sees the sky look pale, And hears the nightingale
That sadly sings.

Rest, rest, a perfect rest
Shed over brow and breast;
Her face is toward the west,
The purple land.
She cannot see the grain
Ripening on hill and plain; She cannot feel the rain
Upon her hand.

Rest, rest, for evermore
Upon a mossy shore;
Rest, rest at the heart's core
Till time shall cease:
Sleep that no pain shall wake;
Night that no morn shall break Till joy shall overtake
Her perfect peace.


"Dream Land" is reprinted from Poems. Christina Rossetti. London: Macmillan,
1891.

SHE SAT AND SANG
by: Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

HE sat and sang alway
By the green margin of a stream,
Watching the fishes leap and play
Beneath the glad sunbeam.

I sat and wept alway
Beneath the moon's most shadowy beam,
Watching the blossoms of the May
Weep leaves into the stream.

I wept for memory;
She sang for hope that is so fair:
My tears were swallowed by the sea;
Her songs died in the air.



"She Sat and Sang" is reprinted from Goblin Market,
The Prince's Progress and Other Poems. Christina
Rosetti. London: Macmillan 1879.