The Weight of Two Souls
a love poem for you <3 by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
IV
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore
Alone upon the threshold of my door
Of individual life, I shall command
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand
Serenely in the sunshine as before,
Without the sense of that which I forbore—
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine
With pulses that beat double. What I do
And what I dream include thee, as the wine
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue
God for myself, He hears that name of thine,
And sees within my eyes the tears of two. Elizabeth Barrett wrote her Sonnets from the Portuguese during the early years of her budding romance with Robert Browning. She was then living as an invalid in her father’s house, quite a pitiable character, as I think she herself would say. In January of 1845, she received a letter from Browning that began, “I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett.” Within a few months he was regularly visiting her in secret, and they were writing to each other every day, sometimes more than once a day.
Elizabeth’s father was very controlling—loathe to let any of his children fly the nest, but especially Elizabeth. On top of that, having suffered a good deal—through the death of her mother, her own illness, and later the death of her favorite brother—Elizabeth had all but resigned herself to a life of solitude and sorrow. It seems she lived both physically and mentally on the brink of death, and had not imagined that she might have a second act (at 39, she was firmly in her middle-age).
It was very difficult—painful really—for her to give this love with Robert Browning a chance. Sonnets from the Portuguese is a series of 44 sonnets (not actually translated from any source material) that charts the course of EBB’s loving struggle to accept her unexpected happiness and to go against her father’s wishes. The earlier poems are tentative and disbelieving. By the end, her proclamations of love are more confident—the penultimate sonnet is certainly the most famous, beginning, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” I like to imagine that by this point, her elopement was already well in the works.
The sonnet above is number six, and EBB is still struggling to claim Browning’s love for herself in the face of obstacles real and imagined. She entreats her lover to go from her—she cannot take part in such happiness after years of sorrow. And yet (it’s all in that “yet), she knows that even now it’s too late. She has been altered by this love, and will never live without the mark of it. Browning’s shadow will be her constant companion. Going beyond companionship, she feels that her soul is no longer hers alone to command—even if he goes, that worst imagining, she has tied herself to him irrevocably.
Even an action as simple as lifting her hand “serenely” is now imbued with high emotion owing to the memory of his touch. He touched this hand! No matter the distance between them, his heart will be not only with hers, but in hers, beating double. There is a sensuality in this nesting, which continues into the following image: the wine must taste of the grapes that are juiced (also perhaps a hint of destruction here) to make it. Again, Browning is within her; she is somehow made of him. The creative act is also top of mind here, as both EBB and Browning were poets of some acclaim during their lifetimes.
She closes: “When I sue God for myself, he hears that name of thine.” So powerful is her love that it makes her secondary to Browning. When she prays for herself, the prayers come out in his name. Otherwise read, when she goes to God at her death, when her soul is weighed, it will have the weight—and the tears—of two souls, not one. There is in it that terrifying loss of self, balanced by immeasurable gain—which is love.
Happy Valentine’s Day <3
