- There is a willow grows aslant a brook,
- That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;
- There with fantastic garlands did she come
- Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples.
- There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds
- Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke;
- When down her weedy trophies and herself
- Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide;
- And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up:
- Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes;
- As one incapable of her own distress,
- Or like a creature native and indued
- Unto that element: but long it could not be
- Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
- Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay
- To muddy death.
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