Poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

The House of Life. Sonnet 40. Severed Selves

Two separate divided silences,
Which, brought together, would find loving voice;
Two glances which together would rejoice
In love, now lost like stars beyond dark trees;
Two hands apart whose touch alone gives ease;
Two bosoms which, heart-shrined with mutual flame,
Would, meeting in one clasp, be made the same;
Two souls, the shores wave-mocked of sundering seas:--

Such are we now. Ah! may our hope forecast
Indeed one hour again, when on this stream
Of darkened love once more the light shall gleam?--
An hour how slow to come, how quickly past,--
Which blooms and fades, and only leaves at last,
Faint as shed flowers, the attenuated dream.

1. The House of Life. Sonnet 70. The Hill Summit
2. On Certain Elizabethan Revivals
3. Penumbra
4. At Issue
5. The House of Life. Sonnet 66. The Heart of the Night

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