Absence

I love: and day by day, as absent, pine
Barr'd from her sight and converse whom I love:
And yet the fair by plighted vows is mine;
Mine by affection far those vows above
Mine by possession;--O the bliss divine;--
Nor can my heart her constancy reprove.
Why does she then society decline
With me, me whose desires never from her remove?
O night, return and give her to my arms!
Full of constraint and tedious is the day.
Though the same roof enshrine her wedded charms
Though on my board beam her benignant ray.--
O, haste the hour when private and alone
Joys only she can give shall be my own!