Elizabeth Barrett Browning

What is art
But life upon the larger scale, the higher,
When, graduating up in a spiral read more

What is art
But life upon the larger scale, the higher,
When, graduating up in a spiral line
Of still expanding and ascending gyres,
It pushed toward the intense significance
Of all things, hungry for the Infinite?
Art's life--and where we live, we suffer and toil.

How he sleepeth! having drunken
Weary childhood's mandragore,
From his pretty eyes have sunken
read more

How he sleepeth! having drunken
Weary childhood's mandragore,
From his pretty eyes have sunken
Pleasures to make room for more--
Sleeping near the withered nosegay which he pulled the day
before.

Eyes of gentianellas azure,
Staring, winking at the skies.

Eyes of gentianellas azure,
Staring, winking at the skies.

That headlong ivy! not a leaf will grow
But thinking of a wreath, . . .
I read more

That headlong ivy! not a leaf will grow
But thinking of a wreath, . . .
I like such ivy; bold to leap a height
'Twas strong to climb! as good to grow on graves
As twist about a thyrsus; pretty too
(And that's not ill) when twisted round a comb.

There's not a crime
But takes its proper change out still in crime
If once rung on read more

There's not a crime
But takes its proper change out still in crime
If once rung on the counter of this world.