Poems (Rossetti, 1901)/Echo
ECHO.
COME to me in the silence of the night; Come in the speaking silence of a dream; Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright As sunlight on a stream Come back in tears, O memory, hope, love of finished years.
O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet, Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,Where souls brimfull of love abide and meet; Where thirsting longing eyes Watch the slow door That opening, letting in, lets out no more.
Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live My very life again though cold in death: Come back to me in dreams, that I may give Pulse for pulse, breath for breath: Speak low, lean low, As long ago, my love, how long ago.