PIPPA PASSES.
29
Change into you, beloved! You by me,
And I by you; this is your hand in mine,
And side by side we sit: all ’s true. Thank God!
I have spoken: speak you!
I have spoken: speak you! O my life to come!
My Tydeus must be carved that ’s there in clay;
Yet how be carved, with you about the room?
Where must I place you? When I think that once
This room-full of rough block-work seemed my heaven
Without you! Shall I ever work again,
Get fairly into my old ways again,
Bid each conception stand while, trait by trait
My hand transfers its lineaments to stone?
Will my mere fancies live near you, their truth—
The live truth, passing and repassing me,
Sitting beside me?
Sitting beside me? Now speak!
Sitting beside me? Now speak! Only first,
See, all your letters! Was ’t not well contrived?
Their hiding-place is Psyche’s robe; she keeps
Your letters next her skin: which drops out foremost?
Ah,—this that swam down like a first moonbeam
Into my world!
Into my world! Again those eyes complete
Their melancholy survey, sweet and slow,
Of all my room holds; to return and rest
On me, with pity, yet some wonder too:
As if God bade some spirit plague a world,
And this were the one moment of surprise
And sorrow while she took her station, pausing
O’er what she sees, finds good, and must destroy!
What gaze you at? Those? Books, I told you of;
Let your first word to me rejoice them, too:
And I by you; this is your hand in mine,
And side by side we sit: all ’s true. Thank God!
I have spoken: speak you!
I have spoken: speak you! O my life to come!
My Tydeus must be carved that ’s there in clay;
Yet how be carved, with you about the room?
Where must I place you? When I think that once
This room-full of rough block-work seemed my heaven
Without you! Shall I ever work again,
Get fairly into my old ways again,
Bid each conception stand while, trait by trait
My hand transfers its lineaments to stone?
Will my mere fancies live near you, their truth—
The live truth, passing and repassing me,
Sitting beside me?
Sitting beside me? Now speak!
Sitting beside me? Now speak! Only first,
See, all your letters! Was ’t not well contrived?
Their hiding-place is Psyche’s robe; she keeps
Your letters next her skin: which drops out foremost?
Ah,—this that swam down like a first moonbeam
Into my world!
Into my world! Again those eyes complete
Their melancholy survey, sweet and slow,
Of all my room holds; to return and rest
On me, with pity, yet some wonder too:
As if God bade some spirit plague a world,
And this were the one moment of surprise
And sorrow while she took her station, pausing
O’er what she sees, finds good, and must destroy!
What gaze you at? Those? Books, I told you of;
Let your first word to me rejoice them, too:
