Wilfrid and Alice Meynell had eight children: Sebastian, Monica, Everard, Madeleine, Viola, Vivian, Olivia, and Francis. In the “Biographical Note” introducing the book Selected Poems of Francis Thompson, Wilfrid Meynell writes of Francis Thompson:

The children of the family in London, into which he was received, were the subjects of Poppy, The Making of Viola, To Monica Thought Dying, To my Godchild—all in the first book of Poems; while two of their number have a noble heritage in Sister Songs. Constant to the end, when he died some newly pencilled lines were found, addressed “To Olivia,” a yet younger sister, recalling the strains of fifteen years before.

Indeed, this poem dedicated to the youngest Meynell daughter, born in 1890, was published by Wilfrid Meynell several years after Thompson’s death in 1907. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…