by Miss Skelton.
Originally published in Ainsworth's Magazine: A Miscellany of Romance (Chapman and Hall) vol.4 #18 (Jul 1843).
I sit within my convent cell,
And wait to hear the matin bell;
My grated window, straight and high,
Shews me the stars that gem the sky—
Shews me the tops of moonlit trees,
Waving in the passing breeze.
I rise, and to the window go;
Our convent garden lies below,
With narrow walk, and terrace wide,
And shrubs and flow'rs in blooming pride,
And marble founts, whose waters bright
Glitter in the pale moonlight.
Pacing down the terrace wide,
I watch two shadowy figures glide,
Pacing up the narrow walk,
Pausing, as in earnest talk,
Clinging oft in close embrace,
Heart to heart and face to face.
He, by robes and cross I learn,
Vow'd brother of an order stern;
She, by sable veil and hood,
One of a saintly sisterhood;
I, a monk in lonely cell,
Wait to hear the matin bell.
Every night these ghostly shades
Haunt our garden-paths and glades,
(Well I know, no living pair,
Though both so young, and she so fair,)
While I am watching from above
This, all that I may know of love.
Then, as dawns the coming day,
They start—they part—and pass away;
Oh! how fond that last embrace—
Heart to heart, and face to face;
But I, a monk, in lonely cell,
Must wait to hear the matin bell.