And push my needles down, and lead me out
To see in that south angle of the house
The figs grow black as if by a Tuscan rock,
On some light pretext. She would turn her head
At other moments, go to fetch a thing,
And leave me breath enough to speak with him,
For his sake; it was simple.
⁠Sometimes too
He would have saved me utterly, it seemed,
He stood and looked so.
⁠Once, he stood so near
He dropped a sudden hand upon my head
Bent down on woman’s work, as soft as rain—
But then I rose and shook it off as fire,
The stranger’s touch that took my father’s place,
Yet dared seem soft.
⁠I used him for a friend
Before I ever knew him for a friend.
’Twas better, ’twas worse also, afterward:
We came so close, we saw our differences
Too intimately. Always Romney Leigh
Was looking for the worms, I for the gods.
A godlike nature his; the gods look down,
Incurious of themselves; and certainly
’Tis well I should remember, how, those days
I was a worm too, and he looked on me.

A little by his act perhaps, yet more