When Sorrow first came wailing to my door, <br />April rehearsed the madrigal of May; <br />And, as I ne'er had seen her face before, <br />I kept on singing, and she went her way. <br /> <br />When next came Sorrow, life was winged with scent <br />Of glistening laurel and full-blossoming bay: <br />I asked, but understood not, what she meant, <br />Offered her flowers, and she went her way. <br /> <br />When yet a third time Sorrow came, we met <br />In the ripe silence of an Autumn day: <br />I gave her fruit I had gathered, and she ate, <br />Then seemed to go unwillingly away. <br /> <br />When last came Sorrow, around barn and byre <br />Wind-carven snow, the Year's white sepulchre, lay. <br />``Come in,'' I said, ``and warm you by the fire.'' <br />And there she sits, and never goes away.<br /><br />Alfred Austin<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/sorrow-s-importunity/
