Accuse me not, beseech thee, that I wear Too calm and sad a face in front of thine; For we two look two ways, and cannot shine With the same sunlight on our brow and hair. On me thou lookest with no doubting care, As on a bee shut in a crystalline; Since sorrow hath shut me safe in love's divine, And to spread wing and fly in the outer air Were most impossible failure, if I strove To fail so. But I look on thee - on thee - Beholding, besides love, the end of love, Hearing oblivion beyond memory; As one who sits and gazes from above, Over the rivers to the bitter sea. Elizabeth Barrett Browning