Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor,
Most gracious singer of high poems! where
The dancers will break footing, from the care
Of watching up thy pregnant lips for more.
And dost thou lift this house’s latch too poor
For hand of thine? and canst thou think and bear
To let thy music drop here unaware
In folds of golden fulness at my door?
Look up and see the casement broken in,
The bats and owlets builders in the roof!
My cricket chirps against thy mandolin.
Hush, call no echo up in further proof
Of desolation! there’s a voice within
That weeps . . . as thou must sing . . . alone, aloof.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Notes on "Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor"
This is poem number IV (4) of Sonnets from the
Portuguese, written by Elizabeth Barrett for Robert Browning in the 1840s, during their courtship. When they decided to
publish these poems, the Brownings tried to pretend that these sonnets had been translated from the Portuguese in order
to preserve their privacy. This is
one of the many poems in the series that expresses her doubts that Browning, six years younger than her, healthy,
dashing and worldly,
could love the shut-in invalid Elizabeth, as they were so unlike.
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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