AN OLD STORY
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t was roses, roses, all the way,With myrtle mixed in my path like mad;The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway,The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,A year ago on this very day. The air broke into a mist with bells,The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries.Had I said, "Good folk, mere noise repels--But give me your sun from yonder skies!"They had answered "And afterward, what else?" 10 Alack, it was I who leaped at the sunTo give it my loving friends to keep!Naught man could do, have I left undone:And you see my harvest, what I reapThis very day, now a year is run. There's nobody on the house-tops now--Just a palsied few at the windows set;For the best of the sight is, all allow,At the Shambles' Gate--or, better yet,By the very scaffold's foot, I trow. 20 I go in the rain, and, more than needs,A rope cuts both my wrists behind;And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds,For they fling, whoever has a mind,Stones at me for my year's misdeeds. Thus I entered, and thus I go!In triumphs, people have dropped down dead,"Paid by the world, what dost thou oweMe? "--God might question; now instead,'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so. 30 * * * * *
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