FROM off a hill whose concave womb reworded A plaintful story from a sistering vale, My spirits to attend this double voice accorded, And down I laid to list the sad-tuned tale; Ere long espied a fickle maid full pale, Tearing of papers, breaking rings a-twain, Storming her world with sorrow's wind and rain.
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As I sat at the foot of a hill, I heard a tearful story echoing from a nearby valley. I wanted to know what this resounding voice was saying, so I decided to write down the whole sad tale. Before long, a pale, flighty-looking girl came along. She was ripping up pieces of paper and breaking rings in half while screaming and crying a storm's worth of tears.
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Upon her head a platted hive of straw, Which fortified her visage from the sun, Whereon the thought might think sometime it saw The carcass of beauty spent and done: Time had not scythed all that youth begun, Nor youth all quit; but, spite of heaven's fell rage, Some beauty peep'd through lattice of sear'd age.
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Though she wore a straw hat to protect
her face from the sun, you could almost imagine you could see what remained of her former beauty. Her girlish looks weren't completely gone—she still had some youth left. In spite of God's curse, her aging face was still beautiful.
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Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne, Which on it had conceited characters, Laundering the silken figures in the brine That season'd woe had pelleted in tears, And often reading what contents it bears; As often shrieking undistinguish'd woe, In clamours of all size, both high and low.
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She kept wiping her eyes with a handkerchief which had fancy letters embroidered on it. She soaked it with tears that wouldn't stop coming; she'd been crying for a long time. She would read what was embroidered on the handkerchief, then shriek sadly and wordlessly. She cried big cries and small cries, both high-pitched and low-pitched.
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Sometimes her levell'd eyes their carriage ride, As they did battery to the spheres intend; Sometime diverted their poor balls are tied To the orbed earth; sometimes they do extend Their view right on; anon their gazes lend To every place at once, and, nowhere fix'd, The mind and sight distractedly commix'd.
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Sometimes, she looked up as if she were angry at the sun and the moon. At other times, she looked down at the ground; then straight ahead; then everywhere at once without really seeing—as if her mind and her eyes were both distracted.
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Her hair, nor loose nor tied in formal plat, Proclaim'd in her a careless hand of pride For some, untuck'd, descended her sheaved hat, Hanging her pale and pined cheek beside; Some in her threaden fillet still did bide, And true to bondage would not break from thence, Though slackly braided in loose negligence.
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Her hair
was neither down nor braided, indicating she didn’t care how she looked. Some of her hair had fallen out from under her hat, and was hanging next
to her pale, sunken cheek. Some of her
hair stayed faithfully in the braid, even though
it was braided loosely and carelessly.
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A thousand favours from a maund she drew Of amber, crystal, and of beaded jet, Which one by one she in a river threw, Upon whose weeping margent she was set; Like usury, applying wet to wet, Or monarch's hands that let not bounty fall Where want cries some, but where excess begs all.
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As she sat on the bank, she took lots of trinkets out of a basket—all sorts of precious stones—and threw them into the river, one by one. She cried as she sat there, adding water to water like a stockbroker adds money to money, or like a king who gives gifts to the wealthy instead of the poor people who need them.
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Of folded schedules had she many a one, Which she perused, sigh'd, tore, and gave the flood; Crack'd many a ring of posied gold and bone Bidding them find their sepulchres in mud; Found yet moe letters sadly penn'd in blood, With sleided silk feat and affectedly Enswathed, and seal'd to curious secrecy.
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She had several folded notes which she read, sighed over, tore up, and dropped into the river. She tossed a number of rings made of intertwined gold and ivory, burying them in the mud. She pulled out more sad letters written in blood, tied up carefully with strings of silk to keep their secrets safe.
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These often bathed she in her fluxive eyes, And often kiss'd, and often 'gan to tear: Cried 'O false blood, thou register of lies, What unapproved witness dost thou bear! Ink would have seem'd more black and damned here!' This said, in top of rage the lines she rents, Big discontent so breaking their contents.
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She cried over these letters. She kissed them and then began to tear them. She shouted, "This blood betrayed me! It's just a record of lies, despite the fact that it's supposed to seal a promise! Black ink would be more appropriate for this damned stuff!" That said, she angrily tore the letters up, destroying them so they were no longer readable.
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A reverend man that grazed his cattle nigh— Sometime a blusterer, that the ruffle knew Of court, of city, and had let go by The swiftest hours, observed as they flew— Towards this afflicted fancy fastly drew, And, privileged by age, desires to know In brief the grounds and motives of her woe.
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An upstanding man who grazed his cattle nearby happened upon this crazy scene. He was given to bragging—he wanted people to know that he'd been to the court and the city, and that he'd spent plenty of time there. Since he was older, he wanted to know (in brief) why she was so upset.
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So slides he down upon his grained bat, And comely-distant sits he by her side; When he again desires her, being sat, Her grievance with his hearing to divide: If that from him there may be aught applied Which may her suffering ecstasy assuage, 'Tis promised in the charity of age.
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So, using his staff as a support, he lowered himself down to sit next to her, while maintaining an appropriate distance. Once he sat down, he asked her again to tell him the reason she was crying, and if there was anything that he could do to ease her suffering. He promised her as any old man would.
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'Father,' she says, 'though in me you behold The injury of many a blasting hour, Let it not tell your judgment I am old; Not age, but sorrow, over me hath power: I might as yet have been a spreading flower, Fresh to myself, If I had self-applied Love to myself and to no love beside.
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"Sir," she said, "although you can tell that I've been through a lot, don't think that I'm old. Sadness, not age, has ruined me. I would have still been a fresh, blossoming flower if I'd loved myself and no one else.
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