W. Garrett Horder, comp. The Poets’ Bible: New Testament. 1895.

The Passover in the Holy Family

Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882)

(For a Drawing)

HERE meet together the prefiguring day

And day prefigured. ‘Eating, thou shalt stand,

Feet shod, loins girt, thy road-staff in thine hand,

With blood-stained door and lintel,’—did God say

By Moses’ mouth in ages passed away.

And now where this poor household doth comprise

At Paschal feast two kindred families,—

Lo! the slain lamb confronts the Lamb to slay.

The pyre is piled. What agony’s crown attained,

What shadow of death the Boy’s fair brow subdues

Who holds that blood wherewith the porch is stain’d,

By Zachary the priest? John binds the shoes

He deemed himself not worthy to unloose;

And Mary culls the bitter herbs ordained.