She cannot feel the rain

Down in Stoke-on-Trent today. Good to be back here after so many years; but under such unbearably sad circumstances ... 

... here's some Christina Rossetti:


Dream-Land

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.

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Christina Rossetti (1830 - 1894)

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