Elizabeth Barrett Browning - Catarina to Camoens lyrics

I. On the door you will not enter,  I have gazed too long: adieu! Hope withdraws her peradventure;  d**h is near me,—and not you.   Come, O lover,   Close and cover These poor eyes, you called, I ween, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” II. When I heard you sing that burden  In my vernal days and bowers, Other praises disregarding,  I but hearkened that of yours—   Only saying   In heart-playing, “Blessed eyes mine eyes have been, If the sweetest his have seen!” III. But all changes. At this vesper,  Cold the sun shines down the door. If you stood there, would you whisper  “Love, I love you,” as before,—   d**h pervading   Now, and shading Eyes you sang of, that yestreen, As the sweetest ever seen? IV. Yes. I think, were you beside them,  Near the bed I die upon, Though their beauty you denied them,  As you stood there, looking down,   You would truly   Call them duly, For the love's sake found therein, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” V. And if you looked down upon them,  And if they looked up to you, All the light which has foregone them  Would be gathered back anew:   They would truly   Be as duly Love-transformed to beauty's sheen, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” VI. But, ah me! you only see me,  In your thoughts of loving man, Smiling soft perhaps and dreamy  Through the wavings of my fan;   And unweeting   Go repeating, In your reverie serene, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen——” VII. While my spirit leans and reaches  From my body still and pale, Fain to hear what tender speech is  In your love to help my bale.   O my poet,   Come and show it! Come, of latest love, to glean “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” VIII. O my poet, O my prophet,  When you praised their sweetness so, Did you think, in singing of it,  That it might be near to go?   Had you fancies   From their glances, That the grave would quickly screen “Sweetest eyes were ever seen”? IX. No reply. The fountain's warble  In the courtyard sounds alone. As the water to the marble  So my heart falls with a moan   From love-sighing   To this dying. d**h forerunneth Love to win “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” X. Will you come? When I'm departed  Where all sweetnesses are hid, Where thy voice, my tender-hearted,  Will not lift up either lid.   Cry, O lover,   Love is over! Cry, beneath the cypress green, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” XI. When the angelus is ringing,  Near the convent will you walk, And recall the choral singing  Which brought angels down our talk?   Spirit-shriven   I viewed Heaven, Till you smiled—“Is earth unclean, Sweetest eyes were ever seen?” XII. When beneath the palace-lattice  You ride slow as you have done, And you see a face there that is  Not the old familiar one,—   Will you oftly   Murmur softly, “Here ye watched me morn and e'en, Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” XIII. When the palace-ladies, sitting  Round your gittern, shall have said, “Poet, sing those verses written  For the lady who is dead,”   Will you tremble   Yet dissemble,— Or sing hoarse, with tears between, “Sweetest eyes were ever seen”? XIV. “Sweetest eyes!” how sweet in flowings  The repeated cadence is! Though you sang a hundred poems,  Still the best one would be this.   I can hear it   'Twixt my spirit And the earth-noise intervene— “Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” XV. But the priest waits for the praying,  And the choir are on their knees, And the soul must pa** away in  Strains more solemn-high than these.   Miserere   For the weary! Oh, no longer for Catrine “Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” XVI. Keep my riband, take and keep it,  (I have loosed it from my hair) Feeling, while you overweep it,  Not alone in your despair,   Since with saintly   Watch unfaintly Out of heaven shall o'er you lean “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” XVII. But—but now—yet unremovèd  Up to heaven, they glisten fast; You may cast away, Belovèd,  In your future all my past:   Such old phrases   May be praises For some fairer bosom-queen— “Sweetest eyes were ever seen!” XVIII. Eyes of mine, what are ye doing?  Faithless, faithless,—praised amiss If a tear be of your showing,  Dropt for any hope of his!   d**h has boldness   Besides coldness, If unworthy tears demean “Sweetest eyes were ever seen.” XIX. I will look out to his future;  I will bless it till it shine. Should he ever be a suitor  Unto sweeter eyes than mine,   Sunshine gild them,   Angels shield them, Whatsoever eyes terrene Be the sweetest his have seen!