I had from you passed and the world
Through endless nothing rudely was I hurled
While you there hung above, your proud lip curled,
Regarding me with piercing hate
Crying I deserved my fate."

We met each other, as when waters meet
In long continued shock, and muttering, sweet
Confusion mixed in unity complete
That changing time may not dissever;
One in love and one for ever.

Purged by remorse, love knit my strength; and now
Came gracious power to still upon her brow
Those troubled waves of some dark underflow;
Her soul victorious over pain
Spoke in golden smiles again.

We sat and read how Prospero closed his strife
With evil, wrought his charm, and crowned his life
In making two fair beings man and wife:
Of brave Count Gismond's happy lot;
And the Lady of Shalott.

We ceased; for eve had come by dusky stealth.
I saw, while lifting her, like crimson health
Burn in her cheeks, holding the weighted wealth
Of all the worlds in heaven to me;
Held her long, long, lingeringly:

And laying down more than my life, her weight;
Scarce kissed her pallid hands, then moved with great
Reluctance, bodeful, from her placid state;
But, ere my slow feet reached the door,
Turned and caught one last look more,

And awe-struck stood to see portentous loom
From her large eyes full gazing through the gloom
Love darkly wedded to eternal doom,
As she were gazing from the dead:
Falling at her feet I said,

"Bless me, dear Love, bless me before I go;
With love divine a beam of comfort throw,
For guidance and support, that I through woe
Be raised and purified in grace
Worthy to behold your face."

She bowed her head in stately tenderness
Low whispering as her hands my brow did press,
"I pray that He will your lone spirit bless,
And if to leave you be my fate,
Pray you for me while I wait."

A useless pang in her no more to wake,
I forced myself away, nor dared to take
Another look for her beloved sake;
My face had told of the distressed
Swollen heart labouring in my breast.

When in the outer air, I felt as one
Fresh startled from a dream, wherein the sun
Had dying left the earth a dingy, dun
Annihilation. The nightjar
Only thrilled the air afar:

No other sound was there: a muffled breeze
Crept in the shrubs, and shuddered up the trees,
Then sought the ghost-white vapour of the leas,
Where one long sheet of dismal cloud
Swathed the distance