| J. C. Squire, ed. A Book of Women’s Verse. 1921. | | | | Sonnets from the Portuguese. i | | By Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861) |
| | | I THOUGHT once how Theocritus had sung | |
| Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years, | |
| Who each one in a gracious hand appears | |
| To bear a gift for mortals, old or young: | |
| And, as I mused it in his antique tongue, | 5 |
| I saw, in gradual vision through my tears, | |
| The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years, | |
| Those of my own life, who by turns had flung | |
| A shadow across me. Straightway I was ’ware, | |
| So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move | 10 |
| Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair, | |
| And a voice said in mastery while I strove,… | |
| ‘Guess now who holds thee.’—‘Death,’ I said. But, there, | |
| The silver answer rang,… ‘Not Death, but Love.’ | | | | |
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