The yellow book: an illustrated quarterly (3.1894)

A Ballad of a Nun

No question did the warder ask :
Her ragged robe, her shrunken limb.
Her dreadful eyes ! " It is no mask ;
It is a she-wolfj gaunt and grim ! "

She ran across the icy plain ;
Her worn blood curdled in the blast;
Each footstep left a crimson stain ;
The white-faced moon looked on aghast.
She said between her chattering jaws,
" Deep peace is mine, I cease to strive ;
Oh, comfortable convent laws,
That bury foolish nuns alive !

" A trowel for my passing-bell,
A little bed within the wall,
A coverlet of stones ; how well
I there shall keep the Carnival ! "
Like tired bells chiming in their sleep,
The wind faint peals of laughter bore ;
She stopped her ears and climbed the steep,
And thundered at the convent door.
It opened straight: she entered in,
And at the wardress' feet fell prone :
" I come to purge away my sin,
Bury me, close me up in stone."