Edith Nesbit

The Offering

What will you give me for this heart of mine,
No heart of gold, and yet my dearest treasure?
It has its graces, it can ache and pine,

And beat true time to your sweet voice's measure;
It bears your name, it lives but for your pleasure:
What will you give me for this heart I bring,
That holds my life, my joy, my everything?

How can I ask a price, when all my prayer
Is that, without return, you will but take it,
Feed it with hope, or starve it to despair,

Keep it to play with, mock it, crush it, break it,
And, if your will lies there, at last forsake it?
Its epitaph shall voice its deathless pride:
'She held me in her hands until I died.'