The spacious open vale, the vale of doom, <br />Is full of autumn sunset; blue and strong <br />The semicirque of water sweeps among <br />Her lofty acres, each a martyr's tomb; <br />And slowly, slowly, melt into the gloom <br />Two little idling clouds, that look for long <br />Like roseleaf bodies of two babes in song <br />Correggio left to flush a convent room. <br /> <br />Dear hill deflowered in the frantic war! <br />In my day, rather, have I seen thee blest <br />With pastoral roofs to break the darker crest <br />Of apple-woods by many-islèd Loire, <br />And fires that still suffuse the lower west, <br />Blanching the beauty of thine evening star.<br /><br />Louise Imogen Guiney<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/saint-florent-le-vieil/
