Life in a Love by Robert Browning
A speaker vows to keep pursuing a reluctant beloved despite expecting little success. Each failure prompts another attempt, and each lost hope gives way to a new hope directed toward the same elusive beloved.
By Robert Browning · Genre: Love Poetry, Lyric Poetry · 237 words
First lines
Escape me? / Never -- / Beloved! / While I am I, and you are you, / So long as the world contains us both, / Me the loving and you the loth, / While the one eludes, must the other pursue. / My life is a fault at last, I fear: / It seems too much like a fate, indeed! / Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed. / But what if I fail of my purpose here? / It is but to keep the nerves at strain, / To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall, / And baffled, get up and begin again, -- / So the chase takes up one's life, that's all. / While, look but once from your farthest bound / At me so deep in the dust and dark, / No sooner the old hope goes to ground / Than a new one, straight to the selfsame mark, / I shape me -- / Ever / Removed!
Genres
- Love Poetry — The speaker addresses an unwilling beloved and pledges continued pursuit despite repeated disappointment.
- Lyric Poetry — Short, rhymed lines express the speaker's resolve, fear of failure, and repeated renewal of hope.
Tags
unrequited love · romantic pursuit · persistence · renewed hope
What this Textopian page supports
Life in a Love is listed on Textopian as a poem by Robert Browning, dated Date unknown.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Poem
- Author: Robert Browning
- Date: Date unknown
- Language: English
- Genres: Love Poetry, Lyric Poetry
- Length: 237 words
- Structure: 1 section, 1 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Easy (6th Grade)
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