II.

Like rock or stone, it is o’ergrown With lichens to the very top, And hung with heavy tufts of moss, A melancholy crop: Up from the earth these mosses creep, And this poor thorn they clasp it round So close, you’d say that they were bent With plain and manifest intent, To drag it to the ground; And all had joined in one endeavour To bury this poor thorn for ever.