Poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

All Poems Original Poems Translations

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Cry Of The Children

Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,

Ere the sorrow comes with years?

They are leaning their young heads against their mothers—-

And that cannot stop their tears.

The young lambs are bleating in the meadows;

The young birds are chirping in the nest;

The young fawns are playing with the shadows;

The young flowers are blowing toward the west—-

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The Best Thing in the World

What's the best thing in the world?

June-rose, by May-dew impearled;

Sweet south-wind, that means no rain;

Truth, not cruel to a friend;

Pleasure, not in haste to end;

Beauty, not self-decked and curled

Till its pride is over-plain;

Love, when, so, you're loved again.

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Pain In Pleasure

A THOUGHT ay like a flower upon mine heart,

And drew around it other thoughts like bees

For multitude and thirst of sweetnesses;

Whereat rejoicing, I desired the art

Of the Greek whistler, who to wharf and mart

Could lure those insect swarms from orange-trees

That I might hive with me such thoughts and please

My soul so, always. foolish counterpart

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnet XXIX: I Think of Thee

I think of thee! — my thoughts do twine and bud

About thee,as wild vines, about a tree,

Put out broad leaves, and soon there's nought to see

Except the straggling green which hides the wood.

Yet, O my palm-tree, be it understood

I will not have my thoughts instead of thee

Who art dearer, better! Rather, instantly

Renew thy presence; as a strong tree should,

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The Soul's Expression

WITH stammering lips and insufficient sound

I strive and struggle to deliver right

That music of my nature, day and night

With dream and thought and feeling interwound

And inly answering all the senses round

With octaves of a mystic depth and height

Which step out grandly to the infinite

From the dark edges of the sensual ground.

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A Child Asleep

How he sleepeth! having drunken

Weary childhood's mandragore,

From his pretty eyes have sunken

Pleasures, to make room for more—-

Sleeping near the withered nosegay, which he pulled the day before.

Nosegays! leave them for the waking:

Throw them earthward where they grew.

Dim are such, beside the breaking

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnet X: Yet Love, Mere Love

Yet, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed

And worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright,

Let temple burn, or flax; an equal light

Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed:

And love is fire. And when I say at need

I love thee…mark!…I love thee—in thy sight

I stand transfigured, glorified aright,

With conscience of the new rays that proceed

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnet XXII: When Our Two Souls Stand Up

When our two souls stand up erect and strong,

Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and nigher,

Until the lengthening wings break into fire

At either curvèd point,—what bitter wrong

Can the earth do to us, that we should not long

Be here contented? Think. In mounting higher,

The angels would press on us and aspire

To drop some golden orb of perfect song

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The House Of Clouds

I would build a cloudy House

For my thoughts to live in;

When for earth too fancy-loose

And too low for Heaven!

Hush! I talk my dream aloud—-

I build it bright to see,—-

I build it on the moonlit cloud,

To which I looked with thee.

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Change Upon Change

Five months ago the stream did flow,

The lilies bloomed within the sedge,

And we were lingering to and fro,

Where none will track thee in this snow,

Along the stream, beside the hedge.

Ah, Sweet, be free to love and go!

For if I do not hear thy foot,

The frozen river is as mute,

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Aurora Leigh: Book One

Of writing many books there is no end;

And I who have written much in prose and verse

For others' uses, will write now for mine,—

Will write my story for my better self,

As when you paint your portrait for a friend,

Who keeps it in a drawer and looks at it

Long after he has ceased to love you, just

To hold together what he was and is.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

A Woman's Shortcomings

She has laughed as softly as if she sighed,

She has counted six, and over,

Of a purse well filled, and a heart well tried -

Oh, each a worthy lover!

They "give her time"; for her soul must slip

Where the world has set the grooving;

She will lie to none with her fair red lip:

But love seeks truer loving.

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning