XV~XX

XV

Accuse me not, beseech thee, that I wear

Too calm and sad a face in front of thine;

For we two look two ways, and cannot shine

With the same sunlight on our brow and hair.

On me thou lookest with no doubting care,

As on a bee shut in a crystalline;

Since sorrow hath shut me safe in loves divine,

And to spread wing and fly in the outer air

Were most impossible failure, if I strove

To fail so. But I look on thee--on thee--

Beholding, besides love, the end of love,

Hearing oblivion beyond memory;

As one who sits and gazes from above,

Over the rivers to the bitter sea.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XVI

And yet, because thou overcomest so,

Because thou art more noble and like a king,

Thou canst prevail against my fears and fling

Thy purple round me, till my heart shall grow

Too close against thine heart henceforth to know

How it shook when alone. Why, conquering

May prove as lordly and complete a thing

In lifting upward, as in crushing low !

And as a vanquished soldier yields his sword

To one who lifts him from the bloody earth,

Even so, Beloved, I at last record,

Here ends my strife. If thou invite me forth,

I rise above abasement at the word.

Make thy love larger to enlarge my worth.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XVII

My poet, thou canst touch on all the notes

God set between his After and Before,

And strike up and strike off the general roar

Of the rushing worlds a melody that floats

In a serene air purely. Antidotes

Of medicated music, answering for

Mankinds forlornest uses, thou canst pour

From thence into their ears. Gods will devotes

Thine to such ends, and mine to wait on thine.

How, Dearest, wilt thou have me for most use ?

A hope, to sing by gladly ? or a fine

Sad memory, with thy songs to interfuse ?

A shade, in which to sing--of palm or pine ?

A grave, on which to rest from singing ? Choose.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XVIII

I never gave a lock of hair away

To a man, Dearest, except this to thee,

Which now upon my fingers thoughtfully,

I ring out to the full brown length and say

Take it. My day of youth went yesterday;

My hair no longer bounds to my foots glee,

Nor plant I it from rose or myrtle-tree,

As girls do, any more: it only may

Now shade on two pale cheeks the mark of tears,

Taught drooping from the head that hangs aside

Through sorrows trick. I thought the funeral-shears

Would take this first, but Love is justified,--

Take it thou,--finding pure, from all those years,

The kiss my mother left here when she died.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XIX

The souls Rialto hath its merchandise;

I barter curl for curl upon that mart,

And from my poets forehead to my heart

Receive this lock which outweighs argosies,--

As purply black, as erst to Pindars eyes

The dim purpureal tresses gloomed athwart

The nine white Muse-brows. For this counterpart, . . .

The bay-crowns shade, Beloved, I surmise,

Still lingers on thy curl, it is so black !

Thus, with a fillet of smooth-kissing breath,

I tie the shadows safe from gliding back,

And lay the gift where nothing hindereth;

Here on my heart, as on thy brow, to lack

No natural heat till mine grows cold in death.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

XX

And wilt thou have me fashion into speech

The love I bear thee, finding words enough,

And hold the torch out, while the winds are rough,

Between our faces, to cast light on each ?--

I drop it at thy feet. I cannot teach

My hand to hold my spirit so far off

From myself--me--that I should bring thee proof

In words, of love hid in me out of reach.

Nay, let the silence of my womanhood

Commend my woman-love to thy belief,--

Seeing that I stand unwon, however wooed,

And rend the garment of my life, in brief,

By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude,

Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief

Elizabeth Barrett Browning