Poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

The House of Life. Sonnet 36. Life-in-Love

Not in thy body is thy life at all
But in this lady's lips and hands and eyes;
Through these she yields thee life that vivifies
What else were sorrow's servant and death's thrall.
Look on thyself without her, and recall
The waste remembrance and forlorn surmise
That lived but in a dead-drawn breath of sighs
O'er vanished hours and hours eventual.

Even so much life hath the poor tress of hair
Which, stored apart, is all love hath to show
For heart-beats and for fire-heats long ago;
Even so much life endures unknown, even where,
'Mid change the changeless night environeth,
Lies all that golden hair undimmed in death.

1. At Issue
2. The House of Life. Sonnet 89. The Trees of the Garden
3. The House of Life. Sonnet 27. Heart's Compass
4. The House of Life. Sonnet 32. Equal Troth
5. The House of Life. Sonnet 95. The Vase of Life

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