Thomas Hardy (1840–1928). Wessex Poems and Other Verses. 1898.

16. She, to Him. IV

THIS love puts all humanity from me;

I can but maledict her, pray her dead,

For giving love and getting love of thee—

Feeding a heart that else mine own had fed!

How much I love I know not, life not known,

Save as some unit I would add love by;

But this I know, my being is but thine own—

Fused from its separateness by ecstasy.

And thus I grasp thy amplitudes, of her

Ungrasped, though helped by nigh-regarding eyes;

Canst thou then hate me as an envier

Who see unrecked what I so dearly prize?

Believe me, Lost One, Love is lovelier

The more it shapes its moans in selfish-wise.

1866.