“And wilt thou have me fashion into speechThe love I bear thee, finding words enough,And hold the torch out, while the winds are rough,Between our faces, to cast light on each? -I dropt it at thy feet. I cannot teachMy hand to hold my spirits so far offFrom myself--me--that I should bring thee proofIn words, of love hid in me out of reach.Nay, let the silence of my womanhoodCommend my woman-love to thy belief, -Seeing that I stand unwon, however wooed,And rend the garment of my life, in brief,By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude,Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief.”

“My letters! all dead paper, mute and white!And yet they seem alive and quiveringAgainst my tremulous hands which loose the stringAnd let them drop down on my knee to-night.This said, -- he wished to have me in his sightOnce, as a friend: this fixed a day in springTo come and touch my hand ... a simple thing,Yet I wept for it! -- this, ... the paper's light ...Said, Dear I love thee; and I sank and quailedAs if God's future thundered on my past.This said, I am thine -- and so its ink has paledWith lying at my heart that beat too fast.And this ... O Love, thy words have ill availedIf, what this said, I dared repeat at last!”

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.I love thee to the depth and breadth and heightMy soul can reach, when feeling out of sightFor the ends of being and ideal grace.I love thee to the level of every day'sMost quiet need, by sun and candle-light.I love thee freely, as men strive for right.I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.I love thee with the passion put to useIn my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.I love thee with a love I seemed to loseWith my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,I shall but love thee better after death.”

“I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love thee with passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.”

“If I leave all for thee, wilt thou exchangeAnd be all to me?”

“Yet, love, mere love, is beautiful indeedAnd worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright,Let temple burn, or flax; an equal lightLeaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed:And love is fire. And when I say at needI love thee ... mark! ... I love thee -- in thy sightI stand transfigured, glorified aright,With conscience of the new rays that proceedOut of my face toward thine. There's nothing lowIn love, when love the lowest: meanest creaturesWho love God, God accepts while loving so.And what I feel, across the inferior featuresOf what I am, doth flash itself, and showHow that great work of Love enhances Nature's.”

“If Thou Must Love MeIf thou must love me, let it be for naughtExcept for love's sake only. Do not say,'I love her for her smile—her look—her wayOf speaking gently,—for a trick of thoughtThat falls in well with mine, and certes broughtA sense of pleasant ease on such a day'—For these things in themselves, Belovèd, mayBe changed, or change for thee—and love, so wrought,May be unwrought so. Neither love me forThine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry:A creature might forget to weep, who boreThy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!But love me for love's sake, that evermoreThou mayst love on, through love's eternity.”