Fainter and fainter runs my blood

With desperate fight for breath—

This, my Beloved, thou sayest is Love,

Or I should have deemed it Death!

The First Wife

Ah, my lord, are the tidings true,

That thy mother’s jewels are shapen anew?

I hear that a bride has chosen been,

The stars consulted, the parents seen.

Had I been childless, had never there smiled