THE LONGEST DEATH-WATCH.[1]
The woman is a picture now.
The Spanish suns have touched her face;
The coil of gold upon her brow
Shines back on an Imperial race
With most forlorn and bitter grace.
The Spanish suns have touched her face;
The coil of gold upon her brow
Shines back on an Imperial race
With most forlorn and bitter grace.
Old palace-lamps behind her burn,
The ermine moulders on her train.
Her ever-constant eyes still yearn
For one who came not back to Spain;
And dim and hollow is her brain.
The ermine moulders on her train.
Her ever-constant eyes still yearn
For one who came not back to Spain;
And dim and hollow is her brain.
One only thing she knew in life,
Four hundred ghostly years ago—
That she was Flemish Philip's wife.
Nor much beyond she cared to know;
Without a voice she tells me so.
Four hundred ghostly years ago—
That she was Flemish Philip's wife.
Nor much beyond she cared to know;
Without a voice she tells me so.
- ↑ Joanna, the wife of Philip the Handsome, was the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, sister of Catherine of Aragon, and mother of the Emperor Charles v.
