Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

The Dumb Shepherdess

Edward Sapir, trans.

HARK ye to the complaint,

Grown and little,

Of a dumb shepherdess

Who in her fields

Did guard her little sheep

Along the mead!

’Twas Jesus, out of goodness,

Made her speak.

One day the holy Maid

To her appeared.

“Good day, sweet shepherdess,

Big Isabeau!

And would you give to me

One of the lambs?”

“Ah, no indeed!” she said,

“They are not mine.

To father, to my mother,

I’ll speak of it;

To father, to my mother,

I’ll tell of it.”

She came back to her home

Straightaway.

“My father, there’s a lady

In my flock.

O God! she asks of me

One of the lambs.”

Her father, mother too,

They were amazed

To hear the speechless maiden

Speaking thus.

To God they made a prayer,

Giving thanks.

“Go tell her, shepherdess,

In thy flock,

That they are at her pleasure,

Big and little,

That all are for her pleasing,

Even the best.”

The shepherdess was dead

Before three days.

A letter she was holding

In her hand,

Writ by the sovereign master,

Mighty God.

Her father, mother too,

They could not read.

It had to be the bishop

Came to them

To speak to the dumb maid,

Big Isabeau.

“Open, shepherdess,

Open thy hand,

For the sake of the sovereign master,

Mighty God!”

And well he read the letter

And understood:

“Whoever sings on Friday

This complaint,

Is freed of sinful taint,

Gains Paradise.”