Deliver’d up, ’t was whisper’d, tried and burned. 
So be it methought, I would not live, not I.
But none did question me.  A beldame old,
Kind, heedless of my sayings, tended me. 
I raved at Holy Church and she was deaf,
And at whose tower detained me, she was dumb. 
So had I food and water, rest and calm. 
Then on the third day I rose up and sat
On the side of my low bed right melancholy,
All that high force of passion overpast,
I sick with dolourous thought and weak through tears
Spite of myself came to myself again
(For I had slept), and since I could not die
Looked through the window three parts overgrown
With leafage on the loftiest ivy ropes,
And saw at foot o’ the rise another tower
In roof whereof a grating, dreary bare. 
Lifetimes gone by, long, slow, dim, desolate,
I knew even there had been my lost love’s cell.

So musing on the man that with his foot
Spurned me, the robed ecclesiastic stern,
‘Would he had haled me straight to prison’ methought,
‘So made an end at once.’

My sufferings rose
Like billows closing over, beating down;
Made heavier far because of a stray, strange,
Sweet hope that mocked me at the last. 
’T was thus,
I came from Oxford secretly, the news
Terrible of her danger smiting me,—­
She was so young, and ever had been bred
With whom ’t was made a peril now to name. 
There had been worship in the night; some stole
To a mean chapel deep in woods, and heard
Preaching, and prayed.  She, my betrothed, was there. 
Father and mother, mother and father kind,
So young, so innocent, had ye no ruth,
No fear, that ye did bring her to her doom? 
I know the chiefest Evil One himself
Sanded that floor.  Their footsteps marking it
Betrayed them.  How all came to pass let be. 
Parted, in hiding some, other in thrall,
Father and mother, mother and father kind,
It may be yet ye know not this—­not all.

I in the daytime lying perdue looked up
At the castle keep impregnable,—­no foot
How rash so e’er might hope to scale it.  Night
Descending, come I near, perplexedness,
Contempt of danger, to the door o’ the keep
Drawing me.  There a short stone bench I found,
And bitterly weeping sat and leaned my head
Against the hopeless hated massiveness
Of that detested hold.  A lifting moon
Had made encroachment on the dark, but deep
Was shadow where I leaned.  Within a while
I was aware, but saw no shape, of one
Who stood beside me, a dark shadow tall. 
I cared not, disavowal mattered nought
Of grief to one so out of love with life. 
But after pause I felt a hand let down
That rested kindly, firmly, a man’s hand,
Upon my shoulder; there was cheer in it. 
And presently a voice clear, whispering, low,
With pitifulness that faltered, spoke to me. 
Was I, it asked, true son of Mother Church?