The Shades of Francesca de Rimini and Paolo Malatesta Appear to Dante and Virgil, 1855, Ary Scheffer, Oil on Canvas, The Louvre, Paris, France |
I
wonder, by my troth, what thou and I
Did,
till we loved? Were we not weaned till then?
But
sucked on country pleasures, childishly?
Or
snorted we in the Seven Sleepers’ den?
’Twas so; but this, all
pleasures fancies be.
If
ever any beauty I did see,
Which
I desired, and got, ’twas but a dream of thee.
And
now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which
watch not one another out of fear;
For
love, all love of other sights controls,
And
makes one little room an everywhere.
Let
sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone,
Let
maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown,
Let
us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.
My
face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And
true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where
can we find two better hemispheres,
Without
sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever
dies, was not mixed equally;
If
our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love
so alike, that none do slacken, none can die.
Source:
The Norton Anthology of Poetry Third Edition (1983)
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