Yet were thine heart not then dislinked from mine.
GUENDOLEN.
Nay, life nor death, nor love whose child is hate,
May sunder hearts made one but once by fate.
Wrath may come down as fire between them—life
May bid them yearn for death as man for wife—
Grief bid them stoop as son to father—shame
Brand them, and memory turn their pulse to flame—
Or falsehood change their blood to poisoned wine—
Yet all shall rend them not in twain, Locrine.
LOCRINE.
Who knows not this? but rather would I know
What thought distempers and distunes thy woe.
I came to wed my grief awhile to thine
For love’s sake and for comfort’s—
GUENDOLEN.
Thou, Locrine?
Today thou knowest not, nor wilt learn tomorrow,
The secret sense of such a word as sorrow.
Thy spirit is soft and sweet: I well believe
Thou wouldst, but well I know thou canst not grieve.
The tears like fire, the fire that burns up tears,
The blind wild woe that seals up eyes and ears,
The sound of raging silence in the brain
That utters things unutterable for pain,
The thirst at heart that cries on death for ease,
What knows thy soul’s live sense of pangs like these?
LOCRINE.
Is no love left thee then for comfort?
GUENDOLEN.