Anne. I loved you.
Shakespeare. And you lied to me—
Anne. To hold you. I couldn’t lose you. I was mad with pain.
Shakespeare. Are you so weak, So candle-wavering, that a gust of pain Could snuff out honour?
Anne. ’Ware this hurricane Of pain! The deserts heed it not, nor rocks, Nor the perpetual sea; but oh, the fields Where barley grows and small beasts hide, they fear— And haggard woods that feel its violent hand Entangled in their hair and wrestling, shriek Crashing to ruin. What shall their pensioners Do now, the rustling mice, the anemones, The whisking squirrels, ivies, nightingales, The hermit bee whose summer goods were stored In a south bank? How shall the small things stand Against the tempest, against the cruel sun That stares them, homeless, out of countenance, Through the day’s heats?
Shakespeare. Coward! They see the sun Though they die seeing, and the wider view, The vast horizons, the amazing skies Undreamed before.
Anne. I cannot see so far. I want my little loves, I want my home. My life is rooted up, my prop is gone, And like a vine I lie upon the ground, Muddied and broken.
Shakespeare. I could be sorry for you Under the heavy hand of God or man But your own hand has slain yourself and me. Woman, the shame of it, to trap me thus, Knowing I never loved you!
Anne. Oh, for a month— In the spring, in the long grass, under the apple-trees—
Shakespeare. I never loved you.