Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Robert Browning. 18121889722. Earl Mertoun’s Song
THERE ‘s a woman like a dewdrop, she ‘s so purer than the purest; | |
And her noble heart ‘s the noblest, yes, and her sure faith’s the surest: | |
And her eyes are dark and humid, like the depth on depth of lustre | |
Hid i’ the harebell, while her tresses, sunnier than the wild-grape cluster, | |
Gush in golden-tinted plenty down her neck’s rose-misted marble: | 5 |
Then her voice’s music … call it the well’s bubbling, the bird’s warble! | |
And this woman says, ‘My days were sunless and my nights were moonless, | |
Parch’d the pleasant April herbage, and the lark’s heart’s outbreak tuneless, | |
If you loved me not!’ And I who (ah, for words of flame!) adore her, | |
Who am mad to lay my spirit prostrate palpably before her— | 10 |
I may enter at her portal soon, as now her lattice takes me, | |
And by noontide as by midnight make her mine, as hers she makes me! |