Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. IV. The Nineteenth Century: Wordsworth to Rossetti

William Wordsworth (1770–1850)

Sonnets: [The Throne of Death]

METHOUGHT I saw the footsteps of a throne

Which mists and vapours from mine eyes did shroud—

Nor view of who might sit thereon allowed;

But all the steps and ground about were strown

With sights the ruefullest that flesh and bone

Ever put on; a miserable crowd,

Sick, hale, old, young, who cried before that cloud,

‘Thou art our king, O Death! to thee we groan.’

Those steps I clomb; the mists before me gave

Smooth way: and I beheld the face of one

Sleeping alone within a mossy cave,

With her face up to heaven; that seemed to have

Pleasing remembrance of a thought foregone;

A lovely Beauty in a summer grave!