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Francis Thompson - July Fugitive
Work rating: Low

Can you tell me where has hid her
   Pretty Maid July?
I would swear one day ago
   She passed by,
I would swear that I do know
   The blue bliss of her eye:
`Tarry, maid, maid,` I bid her;
   But she hastened by.
Do you know where she has hid her,
   Maid July?

Yet in truth it needs must be
   The flight of her is old;
Yet in truth it needs must be,
   For her nest, the earth, is cold.
No more in the pool-ed Even
   Wade her rosy feet,
Dawn-flakes no more plash from them
   To poppies `mid the wheat.
She has muddied the day`s oozes
   With her petulant feet;
Scared the clouds that floated,
   As sea-birds they were,
Slow on the coerule
   Lulls of the air,
Lulled on the luminous
   Levels of air:
She has chidden in a pet
   All her stars from her;
Now they wander loose and sigh
   Through the turbid blue,
Now they wander, weep, and cry--
   Yea, and I too--
`Where are you, sweet July,
   Where are you?`

Who hath beheld her footprints,
   Or the pathway she goes?
Tell me, wind, tell me, wheat,
   Which of you knows?
Sleeps she swathed in the flushed Arctic
   Night of the rose?
Or lie her limbs like Alp-glow
   On the lily`s snows?
Gales, that are all-visitant,
   Find the runaway;
And for him who findeth her
   (I do charge you say)
I will throw largesse of broom
   Of this summer`s mintage,
I will broach a honey-bag
   Of the bee`s best vintage.
Breezes, wheat, flowers sweet,
   None of them knows!
How then shall we lure her back
   From the way she goes?
For it were a shameful thing,
   Saw we not this comer
Ere Autumn camp upon the fields
   Red with rout of Summer.

When the bird quits the cage,
   We set the cage outside,
With seed and with water,
   And the door wide,
Haply we may win it so
   Back to abide.
Hang her cage of earth out
   O`er Heaven`s sunward wall,
Its four gates open, winds in watch
   By rein-ed cars at all;
Relume in hanging hedgerows
   The rain-quenched blossom,
And roses sob their tears out
   On the gale`s warm heaving bosom;
Shake the lilies till their scent
   Over-drip their rims;
That our runaway may see
   We do know her whims:
Sleek the tumbled waters out
   For her travelled limbs;
Strew and smoothe blue night thereon,
   There will--O not doubt her!--
The lovely sleepy lady lie,
   With all her stars about her!
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