A Woman’s Sonnets: Xi

Wild words I write, and lettered in deep pain, To lay in your loved hand as love's farewell. It is the thought we shall not meet again Nerves me to write and my whole secret tell. For when I speak to you, you only jest, And laughing break the sentence with a kiss, Till my poor love is never quite confessed, Nor know you half its tears and tenderness. When the first darkness and the clouds began I hid it from you fearing your reproof; I would not vex your life's high aim and plan With my poor woman's woe, and held aloof. But now that all is ended, pride and shame, My tumults and my joys I may proclaim.