Page:Wessex poems and other verses (IA wessexpoemsother00hard).pdf/75

 Blanked by such love, I stood as in a drowse, And the slow moon edged from the upland nigh, My sad thoughts moving thuswise: "I may house

"And I may husband her, yet what am I But licensed tyrant to this bonded pair? Says Charity, Do as ye would be done by." . ..

Hurling my iron to the bushes there, I bade them stay. And, as if brain and breast Were passive, they walked with me to the stair.

Inside the house none watched; and on we prest Before a mirror, in whose gleam I read Her beauty, his,—and mine own mien unblest;