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IN LONELINESS
ISEULT OF BRITTANY
They are at rest.
How still it is—and cold!
The morrow comes; the night is growing old.
They are at rest. Why then, unresting, keep
In vigil lone, a pain that will not sleep—
An anguish, only to itself confessed,
That hushed a moment lies,
Then wakes to sudden eager life, and cries?
At rest?
Ah, me! The wind wails by,
Like to a grief that would but cannot die.
How sore the heart can ache,
Yet beat and beat and beat, and never break!
Hearken!—was that a child's awaking cry?
It was the sea—the ever troubled sea!
My little ones, it was the sea,
That moans unceasingly,
One dear refrain repeating o'er and o'er:—
"Tristram returns no more—
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