A Light Woman

5My friend was already too good to lose,

6 And seemed in the way of improvement yet,

7When she crossed his path with her hunting noose

8 And over him drew her net.

9When I saw him tangled in her toils,

10 A shame, said I, if she adds just him

11To her nine-and-ninety other spoils,

12 The hundredth for a whim!

13And before my friend be wholly hers,

14 How easy to prove to him, I said,

15An eagle's the game her pride prefers,

16 Though she snaps at a wren instead!

17So, I gave her eyes my own eyes to take,

18 My hand sought hers as in earnest need,

19And round she turned for my noble sake,

20 And gave me herself indeed.

21The eagle am I, with my fame in the world,

22 The wren is he, with his maiden face.

23You look away and your lip is curled?

24 Patience, a moment's space!

25For see, my friend goes shaking and white;

26 He eyes me as the basilisk:

27I have turned, it appears, his day to night,

28 Eclipsing his sun's disk.

29And I did it, he thinks, as a very thief:

30 "Though I love her — that, he comprehends —

31One should master one's passions (love, in chief)

32 And be loyal to one's friends!"

33And she, — she lies in my hand as tame

34 As a pear late basking over a wall;

35Just a touch to try and off it came;

36 'Tis mine, — can I let it fall?

37With no mind to eat it, that's the worst!

38 Were it thrown in the road, would the case assist?

39'Twas quenching a dozen blue-flies' thirst

40 When I gave its stalk a twist.

41And I, — what I seem to my friend, you see:

42 What I soon shall seem to his love, you guess:

43What I seem to myself, do you ask of me?

44 No hero, I confess.

45'Tis an awkward thing to play with souls,

46 And matter enough to save one's own:

47Yet think of my friend, and the burning coals

48 He played with for bits of stone!

49One likes to show the truth for the truth;

50 That the woman was light is very true:

51But suppose she says, — Never mind that youth!

52 What wrong have I done to you?

53Well, any how, here the story stays,

54 So far at least as I understand;

55And, Robert Browning, you writer of plays,

56 Here's a subject made to your hand!