Poem by Elizabeth Barrett-Browning

Sonnets from the Portuguese. 40. Oh, yes! they love through all this world of ours!

Oh, yes! they love through all this world of ours!
I will not gainsay love, called love forsooth:
I have heard love talked in my early youth,
And since, not so long back but that the flowers
Then gathered, smell still.  Mussulmans and Giaours
Throw kerchiefs at a smile, and have no ruth
For any weeping.  Polypheme’s white tooth
Slips on the nut if, after frequent showers,
The shell is over-smooth,—and not so much
Will turn the thing called love, aside to hate
Or else to oblivion.  But thou art not such
A lover, my Belovëd! thou canst wait
Through sorrow and sickness, to bring souls to touch,
And think it soon when others cry “Too late.”

1. The Holy Night
2. Sonnets from the Portuguese. 11. And therefore if to love can be desert
3. Sonnets from the Portuguese. 25. A heavy heart, Belovëd, have I borne
4. Sonnets from the Portuguese. 41. I thank all who have loved me in their hearts
5. Sonnets from the Portuguese. 12. Indeed this very love which is my boast

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