J. C. Squire, ed. A Book of Women’s Verse. 1921.
By Elizabeth Barrett Browning (18061861)Sonnets from the Portuguese. xxviii
M
And yet they seem alive and quivering
Against my tremulous hands which loose the string
And let them drop down on my knee to-night.
This said,… he wished to have me in his sight
Once, as a friend: this fixed a day in spring
To come and touch my hand … a simple thing,
Yet I wept for it!—this,… the paper’s light …
Said, Dear, I love thee; and I sank and quailed
As if God’s future thundered on my past.
This said, I am thine—and so its ink has paled
With lying at my heart that beat too fast.
And this … O Love, thy words have ill availed,
If, what this said, I dared repeat at last!