If Thou Must Love Me, Let It Be For Nought

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Title:     If Thou Must Love Me, Let It Be For Nought
Author: Elizabeth Barrett Browning [More Titles by Browning]

Sonnet XIV.

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
"I love her for her smile--her look--her way
Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day"--
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,--and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry,--
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.

[The end]
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem: If Thou Must Love Me, Let It Be For Nought

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