Chapter XLIII

While sad at heart, that thou wilt not give me
Thy treasured self, more often than the time
Of every year doth change; thy lover’s crime
I still may countervail, while I do see
Thy lovely form once more, enclosing thee
Reclining in my arms, and leave sad rhyme
For power to rejoice, that love sublime
Hath still returned again to solace me.
If not thyself, let that remembrance come:
The holiest hour that I have known in life,
When all I felt were God and Heaven and thee,
To still remain, when thou dost leave my home,
That without thee is only a sad strife
’Twixt my desire and that which cannot be.