Look on a love which knows not to despair,

But all unquenched is still my better part,

Dwelling deep in my shut and silent heart,

As dwells the gathered lightning in its cloud,

Encompassed with its dark and rolling shroud,

Till struck,—forth flies the all-ethereal dart!

And thus at the collision of thy name

The vivid thought still flashes through my frame,

And for a moment all things as they were

Flit by me;—they are gone—I am the same.120

And yet my love without ambition grew;

I knew thy state—my station—and I knew

A Princess was no love-mate for a bard;[182]

I told it not—I breathed it not[183]—it was

Sufficient to itself, its own reward;

And if my eyes revealed it, they, alas!

Were punished by the silentness of thine,

And yet I did not venture to repine.

Thou wert to me a crystal-girded shrine,

Worshipped at holy distance, and around130

Hallowed and meekly kissed the saintly ground;

Not for thou wert a Princess, but that Love

Had robed thee with a glory, and arrayed

Thy lineaments in beauty that dismayed—

Oh! not dismayed—but awed, like One above!

And in that sweet severity[184] there was

A something which all softness did surpass—

I know not how—thy Genius mastered mine—

My Star stood still before thee:—if it were

Presumptuous thus to love without design,140

That sad fatality hath cost me dear;

But thou art dearest still, and I should be

Fit for this cell, which wrongs me—but for thee.

The very love which locked me to my chain

Hath lightened half its weight; and for the rest,

Though heavy, lent me vigour to sustain,

And look to thee with undivided breast,

And foil the ingenuity of Pain.