We sat together at one summer’s end,

That beautiful mild woman, your close friend,And you and I, and talked of poetry.

I said: “A line will take us hours maybe;

If it does not seem a moment’s thought,

Our stitching and unstitching has been naught.

Better go down upon your marrow-bones

And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;

For to articulate sweet sounds together

Is to work harder than all these, and yet

Be thought an idler by the noisy set

Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen

The martyrs call the world.

And thereupon

That beautiful mild woman for whose sak

There’s many a one shall find out all heartac On finding that her voice is sweet and lo

Replied: “To be born woman is to know—

Although they do not talk of it at school—

That we must labour to be beautiful.

I said: “It’s certain there is no fine thin

Since Adam’s fall but needs much labouring.

There had been lovers who thought love should b So much compounded of high courtesy

That they would sign and quote with learned look Precedents out of beautiful old books;

Yet now it seems an idle trade enough.”

We sat grown quiet at the name of love;

We saw the last embers of daylight die,

And in the trembling blue-green of the sky A moon, worn as if it had been a shell

Washed by time’s waters as they rose and fell About the stars and broke in days and years.

I had a thought for no one’s but your ears:

That your were beautiful, and that I strov

To love you in the old high way of love;

That it had all seemed happy, and yet we’d grow As weary-hearted as that hollow moon. 7tUygfpBh/+0hBDZQYNkRnJRvdjYpOn3txQMySq1EYXbTxneuYEhNOGO3F9H408c