English poem
I love and love not: Lord, it breaks my heart
To love and not to love. Thou veiled within Thy glory, gone apart Into Thy shrine, which is above, Dost Thou not love me, Lord, or care For this mine ill?-- I love thee here or there, I will accept thy broken heart, lie still.
Lord, it was well with me in time gone by That cometh not again, When I was fresh and cheerful, who but I? I fresh, I cheerful: worn with pain Now, out of sight and out of heart; O Lord, how long?-- I watch thee as thou art, I will accept thy fainting heart, be strong.
"Lie still," "be strong," to-day; but, Lord, to-morrow, What of to-morrow, Lord? Shall there be rest from toil, be truce from sorrow, Be living green upon the sward Now but a barren grave to me, Be joy for sorrow?-- Did I not die for thee? Do I not live for thee? leave Me to-morrow.
More by Christina Rossetti
- How comes it, Flora, that, whenever we
- I did not chide him, though I knew
- I dream of you to wake: would that I might
- I dreamed and did not seek: to-day I seek
- I loved my love from green of Spring
- I loved you first: but afterwards your love
- I marked where lovely Venus and her court
- I plucked pink blossoms from mine apple-tree