Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti in instalments

[Guest]

Instalment 1 ( The temptation starts)

Morning ang night
Maids heard the goblins cry:
"Comy buy our orchard fruits,
Come buy, come buy:
Apples and quinces,
Lemons and oranges'
Plump, unpecked cherries,
Melons and raspberries,
Bloom-down-cheeked peaches,
Swart-headed mulberries,
Wild free-born cranberries,
Crab-apples, dewberries
Pine-apples, blackberries,
Apricots, strawberries,-
All ripe together
In summer weather,-
Morns that pass by,
Fair eves that fly;
Come buy, come buy;
Our grapes fresh from the vine,
Pomegranates, full and fine,
Dates and harp bullaces,
Rare pears and greengages,
Damsons and bilberries,
Taste them and try.
Currants and gooseberries,
Figs to fill your mouth,
Citron from the South
Sweet to tongue ans sound to eye,
Come buy, come buy."

 

[KillerMuffin]

*squeals like an eighth grade girl backstage and an In Synch concert*

I Christina Rossetti!!!

 

[Guest]

Instalment 2

Evening by evening
Among the brookside rushes,
Laura bowed her head to hear,
Lizzie veiled her blushes;
Crouching closer together
In the cooling weather
With clasping arms and cautioning lips,
With tingling cheeks and finger tips.
"Lie close," Laura said,
Pricking up her golden head;
"We must not look at gobln men,
We must not buy their fruits;
Who knows upon what soil they fed
Their hungry thirsty roots?"
"Come buy," call the goblins
Hobbling down the glen.
"Oh," cried Lizzie, "Laura, Laura,
You should not peep at goblin men."
Lizzie covered up her eyes
Covered close lest they should look,
Laura reared her glossy head,
And whispered like the restless brook;
"Look lizzie, look Lizzie,
Down the glen trap little men.
One hauls a basket,
One bears a plate,
One lugs a golden dish
Of many pounds weight.
How fair the vine must grow
Whose grapes are so luscious
How warm the wind must blow
Through those fruit bushes,"

 

[eagleyez]

thread as jingle...


music to nap by...

lets try to rest...

 

[Guest]

Instalment 3

"No" said Lizzie, "no, no, no,
Their offer should not charm us,
Their evil gifts would harm us,"
She thrust a dimpled finger
In each ear, shut eyes and ran.
Curious Laura chose to linger
Wondering at each merchant man.
One had a cat's face,
One whisked a tail,
One trampd at a rat's pace
One crawled like a snail
One like a wombat prowled obtuse and furry
One like a ratel tumbled hurry skurry
She heard a voice like voice of doves
Cooing all together
They sounded kind and full of loves
In the pleasant weather


Laura stretched her gleaming neck
Like a rush-embedded swan,
Like a lily from the beck,
Like a moonlit poplar branch,
Like a vessel at the launch
When its last restrant is gone

 

[Guest]

That's it for tonight, folks.

Tune in tomorrow.

 

[Guest]

Instalment 4

Backwards up the mossy glen
Turned and trooped the goblin men
With their shrill repeated criy
"Come buy, come buy."
When they reached where Laura was
They stood stock still upon the moss,
Leering at each other,
Brother with queer brother:
Signalling each other,
Brother with sly brother.
One set his basket down,
One reared his plate:
One began to weave a crown
Of tendrils, leaves and rough nuts brown,
(Men sell not such in any town);
One heaved the golden weight
Of dish and fruit to offer her.
"Come buy, come buy." was still their cry.
Laura stared but did not stir,
Longed but had no money.
The whisk-tailed merchant bade her taste
In tones a smooth as honey,
The cat-faced purr'd,
The rat-paced spoke a word
Of welcome, and the snail-paced even was heard:
One parrot faced and jolly
Cried " Pretty Goblin" still for "Pretty Polly";
One whistled like a bird.

 

[Guest]

Instalment 5 (Laura is dooomed)

But sweet-toothed Laura spoke in haste
"Good folk, I have no coin:
To take were to purloin;
I have no copper in my purse,
I have no silver either,
And all my gold is on the furze
That shakes in windy weather
Above the rust of heather."
"You have much gold upon your head,"
They answered all together":
"Buy from us with a golden curl.:
She clipped a precious golden lock,
She dropped a tear more rare than pearl,
Then sucked their fruit globes fair or red.
Sweeter than honeyfrom the rock,
Stronger than man-rejoicing wine,
Clearer than water flowed the juice;
She never tasted such before,
How should it cloy with length of use?
She sucked and sucked and sucked the more
Fruits which that unknown orchard bore;
She sucked until her lips were sore;
Then flung the emptied rinds away
But gathered up one kernel stone,
And knew not was it night or day
As she turned home alone.

 

[DarkAngel]

Re: Instalment 5

*mmm *

 

[Rambling Rose]

This is one of my favorites. I've read it aloud publicly. After reading it you tend to think and speak in that rolling rhythm for awhile.

 

[DarkAngel]

This is one of my favorites. I've read it aloud publicly. After reading it you tend to think and speak in that rolling rhythm for awhile.

*stare*

 

[Guest]

Instalment 6

Lizzie met her at the gate
Full of wise upbraidings.
"Dear,you should not stay so late,
Twilight is not good for maidens;
Should not loiter in the glen
In the haunts of goblin men.
Do you not remember Jeanie,
How she met them in the moonlight,
Took their gifts both choice and many;
Ate their fruits and wore their flowers
Plucked from bowers
Where summer ripens at all hours?
But ever in the moonlight
She pined and pined away;
Sought them by night and day
Found them no more, but dwindled and grew grey:
Then fell with the first snow,
While to this day. no grass will grow.
Where she lies low:
I planted daisies ther a year ago
That never blow.
You should not loiter so."

 

[Ms_Lilith]

I wrote a paper last year on that poem... it was about the sexual imagery vs the bad bedtime story aspects of the poem. One could read that with an innocent mind, and not pick up on the intense sexual drama occurring, but one more worldly would have picked up on it right away. And I can't imagine the scandal the audience at the time must have felt.

 

[Killswitch]

I've never heard of this lady...I'm not well schooled in poetry either....but I write a fair amount of poetry when it hits me.

From one novice poet....it's nice to see some poetry that rhymes for a change.

All mine rhyme, and I get the impression it's somehow a cardinal sin to write poetry that rhymes.

At least with poetry snobs it is.

pffft!

 

[Guest]

Instalment 7

"Nay, hush." said Laura
"Nay, hush my sister.
I ate and ate my fill,
Yet my mouth waters still:
Tomorrow night I will
Buy more." and kissed her
"Have done with sorrow:
I'll bring you plums tomorrow
Fresh on the mother twigs,
Cherries worth getting
You cannot think what figs
My teeth have met in,
What melons icy-cold
Piled on a dish of gold
Too huge for me to hold,
What peaches with a velvet nap,
Pellucid grapes without a seed;
Odorous indeed must be the mead
Whereon the grow, and pure the wave they drink
With lillies at the brink
And sugar sweet their sap.'

 

[Guest]

Instalment 7

Golden head by golden head,
Like two pigeons in one nest
Folded in each other's wings,
They lay down in their curtained bed:
Like two blossoms on one stem,
Like two flakes of new-fall'n snow,
Like two wands of ivory
Tipped with gold for awful kings.
Moon and stars gazed in at them,
Wind sang to them a lullaby,
Lumbering owls forebore to fly,
Not a batt flew to and fro
Round their nest:
Cheek to cheek and breast to breast
Locked together in on nest

 

[Guest]

Instalment 8

Early in the morning
When the cock cowed his warning,
Neat like bee, as sweet and busy,
Laura rose with Lizzie:
Fetched in honey, milked the cows,
Aired and set to rihts the house
Kneaded cakes of whitest wheat,
Cakes for dainty mouths to eat,
Next churned butter, whipped up cream,
Fed the poultry, sat and sewed
Talked as modest maidens should:
Lizzie with an open heart,
Laura in an absent dream,
One content, on sick in part;
One warbling for the mere bright day's delight,
One longing for the night

At length slow evening came;
They went with pitchers to the reedy brook.
Lizzi most placid in her look,
Laura ost like leaping flame.
They drew the gurgling water from its deep.
Lizzie lucked rich and purple flags,
Then turning homeward said. 'The sunset fluhes
Those fartherest lofties crags:
Come, Laura. not another maiden ags.
No wilful squirrel wags,
The beasts and birds are fast asleep."
But Laura loitered still among the rushes
And said the bank was steep.

 

[Guest]

Instalment 9

And said the hour was early still,
The dew not fall'n, the wind not chill:
Listening ever, but not catching
The customary cry,
"Come buy, come buy."
With its iterated jingle
Of sugar baited words'
Not for all her watching
Once discerning even one goblin
Racing, whisking, tumbling, hobbling -
Let alone the herds
That used to tramp along he glen
In groups or single,
Of brisk fruit-merchant men.

Till Lizzie urged, "O Laura, come:
I hear the fruit-call, but I dare not look.
You should not loiter longer at this brook;
Come with me home.
The stars rise, the moon bends her arc,
Each glow-worm winks her spark,
Let us get home before the night grows dark
For clouds may gather
Though this is summer weather,
Put out the lights and drench us through;
Then if we lost our way what should we do?"

 

[Guest]

10

Laura turned as cold as stone
To find her sister heard the cry alone,
That goblin cry,
"Come buy our fruits, come buy."
Must she then buy no more such dainty fruit?
Must she no more such succous pastures find,
Gone deaf and blind?
Her tree of life drooped from the root:
She said not one word in her heart's sore ache:
But peering thro' the dimness, nought discerning,
Trudged home, her pitcher drippinng all the way;
So crept to bed and lay
Silent 'til Lizzie slept;
Then sat up in a passionatte yearning
And gnashed her teeth for baulked desire, and wept
As if her heart would break.


Day after day, night after night,
Laura kept watch in vain
In sullen silence of exceeding pain.
She never caught the goblin cry
"Come buy, come buy."
She never spied the goblin men
Hawking their fruits along the glen:
But when the moon waxed bright
Her hair grew thin and grey;
She dwindled as the fair full moon doth turn
To swift decay and burn
Her fire away.

 

[Guest]

11

One day remembering her kernel stone
She set it by a wall that faced the south:
Dewed it with tears, hoped for a root,
Watched for a waxing shoot,
But there came none.
It never saw the sun,
It never felt the trickling moisture run:
While, with sunk eyes and faded mouth
She dreamed of melons, as a traveller sees
False waves in a desert drouth
With shade of leaf crowned trees
And burns the thirstier in the sandful breeze.

She no more swept the house,
Tended the fowls or cows,
Fetched honey, kneaded cakes of wheat,
Bought water from the brook;
But sat listlessl in the chimney-nook
And would not eat.

 

[DarkAngel]

Still staring

 

[Guest]

12 (Lizzie to the rescue)

Tender Lizzie could ot bear
To watch her sister's cankerous care,
Yet not share.
She night and morning
Caught the goblins' cry;
"Come buy our otchard fruits,
Come buy, come buy."
Beside the brook along the glen
She heard the tramp of goblin men,
The voice and stir
Poor Laura could not hear;
Longed to buy fruit to comfort her,
But feared to pay too dear.
She thought of Jeanie in her grave,
Who should have been a bride.
But who for joys brides hope to have
Fell sick and died
In her gay prime,
In earliest winter time,
With the first glazing rime,
With the first snow-fall of wintertime.
Till Laura dwindling
Seemed knocking at Death's door.
Then Lizzie weighed no more
Better and worse:
But put a silver penny in her purse,
Kissed Laura, crossed the heath with clumps of furze
At twilight, halted by th brook;
And for the first time in her life
Began to listen and look.

 

[Guest]

Still staring

*Getting bog-eyed*

 

[DarkAngel]

*Getting bog-eyed*

O hi.. sorry.. Uhm...

I was just making sure that there wasn't anything... O forget it ..

I am just lost looking at your body in a dream of wonders...

 

[Guest]

O hi.. sorry.. Uhm...

I was just making sure that there wasn't anything... O forget it ..

I am just lost looking at your body in a dream of wonders...

want me to clench em?