The Soul's Expression

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

 
With stammering lips and insufficient sound
I strive and struggle to deliver right
That music of my nature, day and night
With dream and thought and feeling interwound
And only answering all the senses round
With octaves of a mystic depth and height
Which step out grandly to the infinite
From the dark edges of the sensual ground.
This song of soul I struggle to outbear
Through portals of the sense, sublime and whole,
And utter all myself into the air:
But if I did it,—as the thunder-roll
Breaks its own cloud, my flesh would perish there,
Before that dread apocalypse of soul.
 

Poems by This Author

A Musical Instrument by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
What was he doing, the great god Pan
Beloved, my Beloved... (Sonnet 20) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Beloved, my Beloved, when I think
How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
If thou must love me... (Sonnet 14) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Love by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
We cannot live, except thus mutually
My Letters! all dead paper... (Sonnet 28) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
My letters! all dead paper, mute and white!
Say over again... (Sonnet 21) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Say over again, and yet once over again
The Face of All the World (Sonnet 7) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
The face of all the world is changed, I think
The Sleep by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Of all the thoughts of God that are
To George Sand: A Desire by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Thou large-brained woman and large-hearted man
To George Sand: A Recognition by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
True genius, but true woman! dost deny
When our two souls... (Sonnet 22) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
When our two souls stand up erect and strong