Elizabeth Browning - The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Volume 2

More calm and free, speak out to me why such a vow was made.

Because that God decreed my death and I shrank back afraid.
Have patience, O dead father mine! I did not fear to die —
I wish I were a young dead child and had thy company!
I wish I lay beside thy feet, a buried three-year child,
And wearing only a kiss of thine upon my lips that smiled!
The linden-tree that covers thee might so have shadowed twain,
For death itself I did not fear – 't is love that makes the pain:
Love feareth death. I was no child, I was betrothed that day;
I wore a troth-kiss on my lips I could not give away.
How could I bear to lie content and still beneath a stone,
And feel mine own betrothed go by – alas! no more mine own —
Go leading by in wedding pomp some lovely lady brave,
With cheeks that blushed as red as rose, while mine were white in grave?
How could I bear to sit in heaven, on e'er so high a throne,
And hear him say to her – to her ! that else he loveth none?
Though e'er so high I sate above, though e'er so low he spake,
As clear as thunder I should hear the new oath he might take,
That hers, forsooth, were heavenly eyes – ah me, while very dim
Some heavenly eyes (indeed of heaven!) would darken down to him !

Who told thee thou wast called to death?

I sate all night beside thee:
The grey owl on the ruined wall shut both his eyes to hide thee,
And ever he flapped his heavy wing all brokenly and weak,
And the long grass waved against the sky, around his gasping beak.
I sate beside thee all the night, while the moonlight lay forlorn
Strewn round us like a dead world's shroud in ghastly fragments torn:
And through the night, and through the hush, and over the flapping
wing,
We heard beside the Heavenly Gate the angels murmuring:
We heard them say, "Put day to day, and count the days to seven,
And God will draw Onora up the golden stairs of heaven.
And yet the Evil ones have leave that purpose to defer,
For if she has no need of Him, He has no need of her."

Speak out to me, speak bold and free.

And then I heard thee say —
"I count upon my rosary brown the hours thou hast to stay!
Yet God permits us Evil ones to put by that decree,
Since if thou hast no need of Him, He has no need of thee:
And if thou wilt forgo the sight of angels, verily
Thy true love gazing on thy face shall guess what angels be;
Nor bride shall pass, save thee" … Alas! – my father's hand's a-cold,
The meadows seem …

Forbear the dream, or let the vow be told.

I vowed upon thy rosary brown, this string of antique beads,
By charnel lichens overgrown, and dank among the weeds,
This rosary brown which is thine own, – lost soul of buried nun!
Who, lost by vow, wouldst render now all souls alike undone, —
I vowed upon thy rosary brown, – and, till such vow should break,
A pledge always of living days 't was hung around my neck —
I vowed to thee on rosary (dead father, look not so!),
I would not thank God in my weal, nor seek God in my woe.

And canst thou prove …

O love, my love! I felt him near again!
I saw his steed on mountain-head, I heard it on the plain!
Was this no weal for me to feel? Is greater weal than this?
Yet when he came, I wept his name – and the angels heard but his .

Well done, well done!

Ah me, the sun! the dreamlight 'gins to pine, —
Ah me, how dread can look the Dead! Aroint thee, father mine!

She starteth from slumber, she sitteth upright,
And her breath comes in sobs, while she stares through the night;
There is nought; the great willow, her lattice before,
Large-drawn in the moon, lieth calm on the floor:
But her hands tremble fast as their pulses and, free
From the death-clasp, close over – the BROWN ROSARY.

'Tis a morn for a bridal; the merry bride-bell
Rings clear through the green-wood that skirts the chapelle,
And the priest at the altar awaiteth the bride,
And the sacristans slyly are jesting aside
At the work shall be doing;

While down through the wood rides that fair company,
The youths with the courtship, the maids with the glee,
Till the chapel-cross opens to sight, and at once
All the maids sigh demurely and think for the nonce,
"And so endeth a wooing!"

And the bride and the bridegroom are leading the way,
With his hand on her rein, and a word yet to say;
Her dropt eyelids suggest the soft answers beneath,
And the little quick smiles come and go with her breath
When she sigheth or speaketh.

And the tender bride-mother breaks off unaware
From an Ave, to think that her daughter is fair,
Till in nearing the chapel and glancing before,
She seeth her little son stand at the door:
Is it play that he seeketh?

Is it play, when his eyes wander innocent-wild
And sublimed with a sadness unfitting a child?
He trembles not, weeps not; the passion is done,
And calmly he kneels in their midst, with the sun
On his head like a glory.

"O fair-featured maids, ye are many!" he cried,
"But in fairness and vileness who matcheth the bride?
O brave-hearted youths, ye are many! but whom