Sonnets from the Portuguese: II

Sonnets from the Portuguese: II

Original Text
A Selection from the Poetry of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. First Series. New Edition. London: Smith, Elder, & Co., 1886. 1: 181-202.
1But only three in all God’s universe
2Have heard this word thou hast said,—Himself, beside
3Thee speaking, and me listening! and replied
4One of us . . . that was God, . . . and laid the curse
5So darkly on my eyelids, as to amerce
6My sight from seeing thee,—that if I had died,
7The death-weights, placed there, would have signified
8Less absolute exclusion. “Nay” is worse
9From God than from all others, O my friend!
10Men could not part us with their worldly jars,
11Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests bend;
12Our hands would touch for all the mountain-bars:
13And, heaven being rolled between us at the end,
14We should but vow the faster for the stars.

Notes

5] to amerce: to punish arbitrarily (a legal term) Back to Line
7] death-weights: small weights placed upon the eyes of a dead person, to keep the eyes closed Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1850
RPO poem Editors
Marc R. Plamondon
RPO Edition
2007
Form
sonnet