In Absence

My love for thee is like a winged seed
Blown from the heart of thy rare beauty's flower,
And deftly guided by some breezy power
To fall and rest, where I should never heed,
In deepest caves of memory. There, indeed,
With virtue rife of many a sunny hoar,-
Ev'n making cold neglect and darkness dower
Its roots with life,-swiftly it 'gan to breed,
Till now wide-branching tendrils it outspreads
Like circling arms, to prison its own prison,
Fretting the walls with blooms by myriads,
And blazoning in my brain full summer-season:
Thy face, whose dearness presence had not taught.
In absence multiplies, and fills all thought.