Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Wilfrid Scawen Blunt. b. 1840823. The Two Highwaymen
I LONG have had a quarrel set with Time | |
Because he robb’d me. Every day of life | |
Was wrested from me after bitter strife: | |
I never yet could see the sun go down | |
But I was angry in my heart, nor hear | 5 |
The leaves fall in the wind without a tear | |
Over the dying summer. I have known | |
No truce with Time nor Time’s accomplice, Death. | |
The fair world is the witness of a crime | |
Repeated every hour. For life and breath | 10 |
Are sweet to all who live; and bitterly | |
The voices of these robbers of the heath | |
Sound in each ear and chill the passer-by. | |
—What have we done to thee, thou monstrous Time? | |
What have we done to Death that we must die? | 15 |