XI

If I might see you dead, Beloved — dead —

Your false eyes closed forever to the light,

Your false smile stilled upon my aching sight;

If I might know that nevermore your head,

Cruelly fair, could lie upon the bed

Of my torn heart; if I beheld the night

Free from your living thought — ah! if I might,

Then could my desolate soul be comforted.

For this is worst of all the woes you gave —

My heart may not forgive. The tired years go

And leave the great love weeping for a grave,

Scorned and unburied,‘ neath the open sky.

I could not love you less, to see you so.

Loving you more, I might forgive — and die.