10.
Renouncement
I must not think of thee; and, tired yet strong, I shun the thought that lurks in all delight— The thought of thee—and in the blue heaven’s height, And in the sweetest passage of a song. Oh, just beyond the fairest thoughts that throng This breast, the thought of thee waits hidden yet bright; But it must never, never come in sight; I must stop short of thee the whole day long. But when sleep comes to close each difficult day, When night gives pause to the long watch I keep, And all my bonds I needs must loose apart, Must doff my will as raiment laid away,— With the first dream that comes with the first sleep I run, I run, I am gathered to thy heart.
Alice Meynell
Now she feels arrested and entangled in this sweet spider web, where she knows the spider won't devour her (although she desires it) and with her mind's eye open, nearly aghast towards Heaven, waiting for release, for a handhold that never comes. Even if freedom casts a veil over a portion of her insight, would she still make the trade, I wonder... It is so that everything is so intertwined at this time, that the love can't be disentangled from the other elements that compose it. We both know why our beguine walked peacefully to the center and seized her destiny with a serene and tranquil resolve. She knew what she wrote was right; she couldn't recant it. She knew what it was to be this love, and, in a way, she sacrificed herself through it, and with it, and in it.