What the stupid sense of the grown-up man
  Urges, she cannot perceive; but prefers
  The simple faith of her own sweet plan,
  And the brothers in Heaven still are hers.

  The very last day that Harry was here
  I read him those verses, and Harry smil’d;
  And we held some converse, divinely dear,
  Which was all about that dear little child.

  Is it for this that I think of it now? 
  Is it for this he let seven words fall? 
  O pulses are beating behind my brow,
  And I think my heart is not beating at all! 
  And my brain, it keeps whirling round and round,
  Like a sing-song wheel through a ship at night;
  And the seven words that constantly sound
  Are ‘you shall follow me, sweet,’ and ‘I’ll write.’

  I wonder if I have been going mad,
  In the strange wild world I am living in? 
  I think that I have—­I hop’d that I had—­
  For I weary with wondering, what is sin?

  There’s blood on your hand—­there’s blood on your soul—­
  O lily-white hand—­soul noble and true! 
  You murder’d him where the blue waters roll,
  And he set the seal of his death on you.

  I have sat so happily by your side,
  I have lain so tranquilly on your breast;
  But I think that you died, and I think that I died—­
  And death is the end of all, and the best.

  It was God who created men and time;
  And a better than you He could not need;
  So if you did it, it was not a crime,
  And if ’twas a crime, you did not the deed.

  I am fighting with life, with death I strive;
  Ready for neither; both crush with their might;
  Only those seven words keep me alive—­
  You said ‘you shall follow me,’ and ‘I’ll write.’

  They stealthily talk; I hear what they say—­
  Sharply she hears who each syllable dreads—­
  Glancing at me in significant way,
  Touching their foreheads and shaking their heads.

’Mad?’—­’not exactly—­bewilder’d—­confus’d;
Thoughts turn’d astray by grief’s terrible force;
Not even by love is murder excus’d;
She cannot believe that he did it, of course. 
She thinks him a hero, and so loves on;
Reason enthron’d would annihilate this;
Love would have nothing to nestle upon,
Did she perceive him the sinner he is.’

* * * * *

Words striking my brain like sunshine on ice,
Bursting the bulwarks that kept the flood in;
Is love only madness?  Will reason suffice
To crucify love at the presence of sin?

Reason comes back with all honours she had,
Calmly accepting my life as it is;
I will not go mad—­I dare not go mad—­
I must prove love is not treason like this!

  Is he not all that I thought him?  Be still
  O treacherous heart—­then you were to blame: 
  I married my Harry for good or ill,
  And through good and ill I love him the same.