V
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
· (no date)
Published 01/07/1880
Part of A Woman's Shortcomings
Unless you can muse in a crowd all day,
On the absent face that fixed you;
Unless you can love, as the angels may,
With the breadth of heaven betwixt you;
Unless you can dream that his faith is fast,
Through behoving and unbehoving;
Unless you can die when the dream is past—
Oh, never call it loving!