What Can I Give Thee Back, O Liberal

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Title:     What Can I Give Thee Back, O Liberal
Author: Elizabeth Barrett Browning [More Titles by Browning]

Sonnet VIII.

What can I give thee back, O liberal
And princely giver, who hast brought the gold
And purple of thine heart, unstained, untold,
And laid them on the outside of the wall
For such as I to take or leave withal,
In unexpected largesse? am I cold,
Ungrateful, that for these most manifold
High gifts, I render nothing back at all?
Not so; not cold,--but very poor instead
Ask God who knows. For frequent tears have run
The colours from my life, and left so dead
And pale a stuff, it were not fitly done
To give the same as pillow to thy head.
Go farther! let it serve to trample on.

[The end]
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem: What Can I Give Thee Back, O Liberal

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