If I were dead, and in my place Some fresher youth designed To warm thee with new fires, and grace Those arms I left behind; Were he as faithful as the sun, That's wedded to the sphere; His blood as chaste and temp'rate run, As April's mildest tear; Or were he rich, and with his heaps And spacious share of earth, Could make divine affection cheap, And court his golden birth: For all these arts I'd not believe, No, though he should be thine The mighty amorist could not give So rich a heart as mine. Fortune and beauty thou might'st find, And greater men than I; But my true resolvéd mind They never shall come nigh. For I not for an hour did love, Or for a day desire, But with my soul had from above This endless, holy fire. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...HALF-WAKING by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM SNOW-FLAKES by MARY ELIZABETH MAPES DODGE THE BUNCH OF GRAPES by GEORGE HERBERT THE CAPTAINS OF THE YEARS by ARTHUR RAYMOND MACDOUGALL JR. THE SALZBURG CHIMES by HENRY ALFORD MY VOCATION by PIERRE JEAN DE BERANGER SONNET by ETIENNE DE LA BOETIE PARLEYINGS WITH CERTAIN PEOPLE OF IMPORTANCE: DANIEL BARTOLI by ROBERT BROWNING |