Lines (“Although My Old…”)
Although my old ear
Hath neither hammer nor drum,
Methinks I can hear
Living skeletons come.
The cloister re-echoes the call,
And it frightens the lizard,
And, like an old hen, the wall
Cries “cluck! cluck! back to my gizzard;
“‘Tis warm, though it’s stony,
“My chickens so bony.”
So come let us hide, each with his bride,
For the wicked are coming who have not yet died.
[Kelsall, 1851]
