He reuses the phrase “Keeping time, time, time/In a kind of runic rhyme”, which recalls the idea that the music of the bell is somehow magical. He repeats this phrase several times, but rather than seeing the joyful imagery found in the first stanza, it is played against words that share the same melancholic tone as the rest of the first stanza. An example: “Keep time, time, time,/in a kind of runic rhyme/To the beating of bells.” » The contrast between these lines, especially with the prior context we have from the first stanza, creates an interesting contradiction that carries the poem through to its end, as its singing quality changes from pleasant and jovial to something much more.