Canto LI

I cannot love thee as I ought,

      For love reflects the thing beloved;

      My words are only words, and moved

Upon the topmost froth of thought.

'Yet blame not thou thy plaintive song,'

      The Spirit of true love replied;

      ‘Thou canst not move me from thy side,

Nor human frailty do me wrong.

'What keeps a spirit wholly true

      To that ideal which he bears?

      What record? not the sinless years

That breathed beneath the Syrian blue:

'So fret not, like an idle girl,

      That life is dash'd with flecks of sin.

      Abide: thy wealth is gather'd in,

When Time hath sunder'd shell from pearl.'