3. 
Therefore, if now I see you seldomer,
Dear friends, dear FRIEND! know that I only fly
Your looks, because they stir
Griefs that should sleep, and hopes that cannot die:  20
The very comfort that they minister
I scarce can bear, yet I,
So deeply is the arrow gone,
Should quickly perish if it were withdrawn.

4. 
When I return to my cold home, you ask 25
Why I am not as I have ever been. 
YOU spoil me for the task
Of acting a forced part in life’s dull scene,—­
Of wearing on my brow the idle mask
Of author, great or mean, 30
In the world’s carnival.  I sought
Peace thus, and but in you I found it not.

5. 
Full half an hour, to-day, I tried my lot
With various flowers, and every one still said,
‘She loves me—­loves me not.’ 35
And if this meant a vision long since fled—­
If it meant fortune, fame, or peace of thought—­
If it meant,—­but I dread
To speak what you may know too well: 
Still there was truth in the sad oracle. 40

6. 
The crane o’er seas and forests seeks her home;
No bird so wild but has its quiet nest,
When it no more would roam;
The sleepless billows on the ocean’s breast
Break like a bursting heart, and die in foam, 45
And thus at length find rest: 
Doubtless there is a place of peace
Where MY weak heart and all its throbs will cease.

7. 
I asked her, yesterday, if she believed
That I had resolution.  One who HAD 50
Would ne’er have thus relieved
His heart with words,—­but what his judgement bade
Would do, and leave the scorner unrelieved. 
These verses are too sad
To send to you, but that I know, 55
Happy yourself, you feel another’s woe.

NOTES:  10 Indifference, which once hurt me, is now grown Trelawny manuscript. 18 Dear friends, dear friend Trelawny manuscript, 1839, 2nd edition;
    Dear gentle friend 1834, 1839, 1st edition.
26 ever]lately Trelawny manuscript. 28 in Trelawny manuscript; on 1834, editions 1839, 43 When 1839, 2nd edition; Whence 1834, 1839, 1st edition. 48 will 1839, 2nd edition; shall 1834, 1839, 1st edition. 53 unrelieved Trelawny manuscript, 1839, 2nd. edition;
    unreprieved 1834, 1839, 1st edition.
54 are]were Trelawny manuscript.

***

TO —.

[Published by Mrs. Shelley, “Posthumous Poems”, 1824.]

1. 
One word is too often profaned
For me to profane it,
One feeling too falsely disdained
For thee to disdain it;
One hope is too like despair 5
For prudence to smother,
And pity from thee more dear
Than that from another.