Set in the heart of the carven gloom, Lights with herself, when alone She sits by her music and books, And her brother lingers late With a roystering company) looks Upon Maud's own garden-gate: And I thought as I stood, if a hand, as white As ocean-foam in the moon, were laid On the hasp of the window, and my Delight Had a sudden desire, like a glorious ghost, to glide, Like a beam of the seventh Heaven, down to my side, There were but a step to be made. 3. The fancy flatter'd my mind, And again seem'd overbold; Now I thought that she cared for me, Now I thought she was kind Only because she was cold. 4. I heard no sound where I stood But the rivulet on from the lawn Running down to my own dark wood; Or the voice of the long sea-wave as it swell'd Now and then in the dim-gray dawn; But I look'd, and round, all round the house I beheld The death-white curtain drawn; Felt a horror over me creep, Prickle my skin and catch my breath, Knew that the death-white curtain meant but sleep, Yet I shudder'd and thought like a fool of the sleep of death. XV. So dark a mind within me dwells, And I make myself such evil cheer, That if I be dear to some one else, Then some one else may have much to fear; But if I be dear to some one else, Then I should be to myself more dear. Shall I not take care of all that I think, Yea ev'n of wretched meat and drink, If I be dear, If I be dear to some one else. XVI. 1. THIS lump of earth has left his estate His heart in the gross mud-honey of town, He may stay for a year who has gone for a week: But this is the day when I must speak, And I see my Oread coming down, O this is the day! O beautiful creature, what am I That I dare to look her way; Think I may hold dominion sweet, Lord of the pulse that is lord of her breast, And dream of her beauty with tender dread, To the grace that, bright and light as the crest Perhaps from madness, perhaps from crime, Perhaps from a selfish grave. 2. What, if she be fasten'd to this fool lord, Dare I bid her abide by her word? Should I love her so well if she Had given her word to a thing so low? Shall I love her as well if she Can break her word were it even for me? I trust that it is not so. |