free-verse26 lines
A Young Wife
by D. H. Lawrence (David Herbert Richards)The pain of loving you
Is almost more than I can bear.
I walk in fear of you.
The darkness starts up where
You stand, and the night comes through
Your eyes when you look at me.
Ah never before did I see
The shadows that live in the sun!
Now every tall glad tree
Turns round its back to the sun
And looks down on the ground, to see
The shadow it used to shun.
At the foot of each glowing thing
A night lies looking up.
Oh, and I want to sing
And dance, but I can't lift up
My eyes from the shadows: dark
They lie spilt round the cup.
What is it? - Hark
The faint fine seethe in the air!
Like the seething sound in a shell!
It is death still seething where
The wild-flower shakes its bell
And the sky lark twinkles blue -
The pain of loving you
Is almost more than I can bear.