Everyday's Most Quiet Need

"I love thee with a love I seemed to lose with my lost Saints."
--Elizabeth Barret Browning, Sonnets from the Portuguese

Why this line suddenly came to me now, I don't know. It is from the famous "How do I love thee?" sonnet she wrote for her husband to be. They are titled sonnets from the portugues because she had to pretend that she was translating them instead of writing them due to her father's disapproval of her writing.

I had to memorize it at one point. The whole sonnet. We were in British Literature at Santa Cruz and we all met at our professor's house on the hillside in his beautiful rose garden and recieted the poems we had memorized. It was something of a magical day. Something of a magical moment in time that can be remembered, but not recreated or recaptured.

"How do I love thee?
Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the breadth
And depth and height
My soul can reach...

I love thee to the ends of being
And ideal grace...

And if God so choose
I shall but love thee better after death."

i don't even remember the whole thing now but I bet I could find it on the internet...it's not the same as having the beauty float around in my head and surface at random moments. At least I have the scraps of it left...it has not drowned among the medical facts.

"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with a passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, --- I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death."