Sonnets from the Portuguese 26: I Lived with Visions
Sonnets from the Portuguese 26: I Lived with Visions
Original Text
Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Poems. 4th edn. 3 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1856. PR 4180 E44a ROBA
1I lived with visions for my company,
2Instead of men and women, years ago,
3And found them gentle mates, nor thought to know
4A sweeter music than they played to me.
5But soon their trailing purple was not free
6Of this world's dust, -- their lutes did silent grow,
7And I myself grew faint and blind below
8Their vanishing eyes. Then THOU didst come ... to be,
9Belovèd, what they seemed. Their shining fronts,
10Their songs, their splendours, (better, yet the same,
11As river-water hallowed into fonts)
12Met in thee, and from out thee overcame
13My soul with satisfaction of all wants --
14Because God's gifts put man's best dreams to shame.
Publication Start Year
1850
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
Not in printed RP.
Form