I THOUGHT once how Theocritus had sung
Of the sweet years, the dear and wish'd-for years,
Who each one in a gracious hand appears
To bear a gift for mortals old or young:
And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,
I saw in gradual vision through my tears
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years--
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware,
So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move
Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,
'Guess now who holds thee?'--'Death,' I said. But there
The silver answer rang--'Not Death, but Love.'
(C) Elizabeth Barrett Browning
03/11/2017
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