The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV

reat harmony
The saints keep step to when their bonds are loose,
Not weigh me down? am _I_ a wife to choose?

Look in my face and see--

V.

While I behold, as plain as one who dreams,

Some woman of full worth,
Whose voice, as cadenced as a silver stream's,
Shall prove the fountain-soul which sends it forth;

One younger, more thought-free
And fair and gay, than I, thou must forget,
With brighter eyes than these ... which are not wet ...

Look in my face and see!

VI.

So farewell thou, whom I have known too late

To let thee come so near.
Be counted happy while men call thee great,
And one belovèd woman feels thee dear!--

Not I!--that cannot be.
I am lost, I am changed,--I must go farther, where
The change shall take me worse, and no one dare

Look in my face and see.

VII.

Meantime I bless thee. By these thoughts of mine

I bless thee from all such!
I ble