THE BLESSED DAMOZEL.

The blessed damozel leaned out
	From the gold bar of heaven;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth
	Of waters stilled at even;
She had three lilies in her hand,
	And the stars in her hair were seven.

Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
	No wrought flowers did adorn,
But a white rose of Mary’s gift,
	For service meetly worn;
Her hair that lay along her back
	Was yellow like ripe corn.

Herseemed she scarce had been a day
	One of God’s choristers;
The wonder was not yet quite gone
	From that still look of hers;
Albeit, to them she left, her day
	Had counted as ten years.

( To one, it is ten years of years.
	… Yet now, and in this place,
Surely she leaned o’er me- her hair
	Fell all about my face…
Nothing: the autumn- fall of leaves.
	The whole year sets apace)

It was the rampart of God’s house
	That she was standing on
By God built over the sheer depth
	The which is Space begun;
So high, that looking downward thence
	She scarce could see the sun.

It lies in Heaven, across the flood
	Of ether, as a bridge.
Beneath, the tides of day and night
	With flame and darkness ridge
The void, as low as where this earth
	Spins like a fretful midge.

Around her, lovers, newly met
	‘ Mid deathless love’s acclaims,
Spoke evermore among themselves
	Their heart- remembered names;
And the souls mounting up to God
	Went by her like thin flames.


( 1875) The Blessed Damozel, Dante Gabriel Rossetti. 
( http://www.uv.es/~fores/poesia/dantepoems.html#blessed)

the picture The Blessed Damozel in http://rossettiarchieve.org