Elizabeth Barrett Browning - The Poet's Vow (Showing How The Vow Was Broken) lyrics

I. The poet oped his bolted door  The midnight sky to view; A spirit-feel was in the air Which seemed to touch his spirit bare  Whenever his breath he drew; And the stars a liquid softness had, As alone their holiness forbade  Their falling with the dew. II. They shine upon the steadfast hills,  Upon the swinging tide, Upon the narrow track of beach  And the murmuring pebbles pied: They shine on every lovely place, They shine upon the corpse's face,  As it were fair beside. III. It lay before him, humanlike,  Yet so unlike a thing! More awful in its shrouded pomp  Than any crownèd king: All calm and cold, as it did hold  Some secret, glorying. IV. A heavier weight than of its clay  Clung to his heart and knee: As if those folded palms could strike  He staggered groaningly, And then o'erhung, without a groan, The meek close mouth that smiled alone,  Whose speech the scroll must be.