Page:Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë, 1846).djvu/39

Rh O leave me not! for ever be

Thus, more than life itself to me!

Yes, close beside thee, let me kneel—­

Give me thy hand that I may feel

The friend so true—­so tried—­so dear,

My heart's own chosen—­indeed is near;

And check me not—­this hour divine

Belongs to me—­is fully mine.

'Tis thy own hearth thou sitt'st beside,

After long absence—­wandering wide;

'Tis thy own wife reads in thine eyes,

A promise clear of stormless skies,

For faith and true love light the rays,

Which shine responsive to her gaze.

Aye,—­well that single tear may fall;

Ten thousand might mine eyes recall,

Which from their lids, ran blinding fast,

In hours of grief, yet scarcely past,

Well may'st thou speak of love to me;

For, oh! most truly—­I love thee!

Yet smile­—for we are happy now.

Whence, then, that sadness on thy brow?

What say'st thou? "We must once again,

Ere long, be severed by the main?"

I knew not this—­I deemed no more,

Thy step would err from Britain's shore.