Can it be right to give what I can give?
To let thee sit beneath the fall of tears
As salt as mine, and hear the sighing years
Re-sighing on my lips renunciative
Through those infrequent smiles which fail to live
For all thy adjurations? O my fears,
That this can scarce be right! We are not peers
So to be lovers; and I own, and grieve,
That givers of such gifts as mine are, must
Be counted with the ungenerous. Out, alas!
I will not soil thy purple with my dust,
Nor breathe my poison on thy Venice-glass,
Nor give thee any love—which were unjust.
Beloved, I only love thee! let it pass.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Notes on "Can it be right to give what I can give?"
This is poem number XIX (9) of Sonnets from the
Portuguese, written by Elizabeth Barrett for Robert Browning in the 1840s, during their courtship. Elizabeth Barrett
returns to the theme that she has nothing to give Robert Browning, as she is old and an invalid, and therefore their
love was not meant to be. Compare with What can I give thee back, O liberal.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) is now best remembered for her
"Sonnets from the Portuguese," a cycle of sonnets written during her courtship with Robert Browning.
In fact however, she was an accomplished poet before she met Browning.
Most of her poems were not about romantic love.
They were topical poems about political issues such as child labor, slavery and the Italian national cause.
Elizabeth Barrett was a "hopeless" invalid and recluse, six years older than Robert Browning. They were happily married and had a son.
The fame of the poets, and the fairy-tale story of the girl who was thought to be doomed to be an old maid,
rescued from a loveless existence and brought back to life and
the world by a gallant suitor, kindled the imagination of the public.
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