Sonnets from the Portuguese 26: I Lived with Visions

By Elizabeth Barrett Browning 1806–1861 Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I lived with visions for my company,

Instead of men and women, years ago,

And found them gentle mates, nor thought to know

A sweeter music than they played to me.

But soon their trailing purple was not free

Of this world's dust, — their lutes did silent grow,

And I myself grew faint and blind below

Their vanishing eyes. Then THOU didst come ... to be,

Belovèd, what they seemed. Their shining fronts,

Their songs, their splendours, (better, yet the same,

As river-water hallowed into fonts)

Met in thee, and from out thee overcame

My soul with satisfaction of all wants —

Because God's gifts put man's best dreams to shame.

Biography

Among all women poets of the English-speaking world in the nineteenth century, none was held in higher critical esteem or was more admired for the independence and courage of her views than Elizabeth Barrett Browning. During the years of her marriage to Robert Browning, her literary reputation far surpassed that of her poet-husband; when visitors came to their home in Florence, she was invariably the greater attraction. Both in . . .

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