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 foot's 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 sorrow's 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.
(C) Elizabeth Barrett Browning
01/01/2000
Best Poems of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
- Xxx
- Sonnet 24 - Let The Worlds Sharpness, Like A Clasping Knife
- Sonnet 21 - Say Over Again, And Yet Once Over Again
- Sonnet 06 - Go From Me. Yet I Feel That I Shall Stand
- Sonnet 26 - I Lived With Visions For My Company
- The Cry Of The Children
- A Musical Instrument
- The Best Thing In The World
- Sonnet 10 - Yet, Love, Mere Love, Is Beautiful Indeed
- Sonnet 42 - my Future Will Not Copy Fair My Past
- Sonnet Ii
- Sonnet 27 - My Own Beloved, Who Hast Lifted Me
- Sonnet 35 - If I Leave All For Thee, Wilt Thou Exchange
- Bianca Among The Nightingales
- Grief
- Sonnet 36 - When We Met First And Loved, I Did Not Build
- Sonnet 25 - A Heavy Heart, Beloved, Have I Borne
- Sonnet 03 - Unlike Are We, Unlike, O Princely Heart!
- Sonnet 11 - And Therefore If To Love Can Be Desert
- Sonnet 09 - Can It Be Right To Give What I Can Give?
- Sonnet 18 - I Never Gave A Lock Of Hair Away