Now!
by Robert Browning
Out of your whole life give but a moment!
...All of your life that has gone before,
...All to come after it,--so you ignore,
So you make perfect the present; condense,
In a rapture of rage, for perfection's endowment,
Thought and feeling and soul and sense,
Merged in a moment which gives me at last
You around me for once, you beneath me, above me--
Me, sure that, despite of time future, time past,
This tick of life-time's one moment you love me!
How long such suspension may linger? Ah, Sweet,
...The moment eternal--just that and no more--
...When ecstasy's utmost we clutch at the core,
While cheeks burn, arms open, eyes shut, and lips
meet!
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