Men and Women (Browning)/Volume 2/In Three Days
IN THREE DAYS.
1.So, I shall see her in three daysAnd just one night, but nights are short,Then two long hours, and that is morn.See how I come, unchanged, unworn—Feel, where my life broke off from thine,How fresh the splinters keep and fine,—Only a touch and we combine!
2.Too long, this time of year, the days!But nights—at least the nights are short. As night shows where her one moon is,A hand's-breadth of pure light and bliss,So, life's night gives my lady birthAnd my eyes hold her! what is worthThe rest of heaven, the rest of earth?
3.O loaded curls, release your storeOf warmth and scent as once beforeThe tingling hair did, lights and darksOut-breaking into fairy sparksWhen under curl and curl I priedAfter the warmth and scent insideThro' lights and darks how manifold—The dark inspired, the light controlled!As early Art embrowned the gold.
4.What great fear—should one say, "Three daysThat change the world, might change as well Your fortune; and if joy delays,Be happy that no worse befell."What small fear—if another says,"Three days and one short night besideMay throw no shadow on your ways;But years must teem with change untried,With chance not easily defied,With an end somewhere undescried."No fear!—or if a fear be bornThis minute, it dies out in scorn.Fear? I shall see her in three daysAnd one night, now the nights are short,Then just two hours, and that is morn.