Dante Gabriel Rossetti

The House of Life. Sonnet 46. Parted Love

What shall be said of this embattled day
And armed occupation of this night
By all thy foes beleaguered,--now when sight
Nor sound denotes the loved one far away?
Of these thy vanquished hours what shalt thou say,--
As every sense to which she dealt delight
Now labours lonely o'er the stark noon-height
To reach the sunset's desolate disarray?

Stand still, fond fettered wretch! while Memory's art
Parades the Past before thy face, and lures
Thy spirit to her passionate portraitures:
Till the tempestuous tide-gates flung apart
Flood with wild will the hollows of thy heart,
And thy heart rends thee, and thy body endures.