AGAIN in her blue, blue mantle
Riding at Joseph's side,
She says, “I went to Cythera,
And woe betide!”
Her heart is a swinging cradle
That holds the perfect child,
But the shade on her forehead ill becomes
A mother mild.
So on with the slow, mean journey
In the pride of humility;
Till they halt at a cliff on the edge of the land
Over a sullen sea.
While Joseph pitches the sleep-tent
She goes far down to the shore
To where a man in a heaving boat
Waits with a lifted oar.