Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnets from the Portuguese

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I THOUGHT once how Theocritus had sung
    Of the sweet years, the dear and wish'd-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,
    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
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.'