AT A BRIDAL
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HEN you paced forth, to wait maternity,A dream of other offspring held my mind,Compounded of us twain as Love designed;Rare forms, that corporate now will never be! Should I, too, wed as slave to Mode’s decree,And each thus found apart, of false desire,A stolid line, whom no high aims will fireAs had fired ours could ever have mingled we; And, grieved that lives so matched should mis-compose,Each mourn the double waste; and question dareTo the Great Dame whence incarnation flows.Why those high-purposed children never were:What will she answer? That she does not careIf the race all such sovereign types unknows. 1866.
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