Lutwyche! Who else? But all of them, no doubt, Hated me: they at Venice--presently Their turn, however! You I shall not meet: 240 If I dreamed, saying this would wake me. Keep What's here, the gold--we cannot meet again, Consider! and the money was but meant For two years' travel, which is over now, All chance or hope or care or need of it. 245 This--and what comes from selling these, my casts And books and medals, except--let them go Together, so the produce keeps you safe Out of Natalia's clutches! If by chance (For all's chance here) I should survive the gang 250 At Venice, root out all fifteen of them, We might meet somewhere, since the world is wide.
[_From without is heard the voice of_ PIPPA, _singing_--
_Give her but a least excuse to love me!_ _When--where--_ _How--can this arm establish her above me,_ 255 _If fortune fixed her as my lady there,_ _There already, to eternally reprove me?_ _("Hist!"--said Kate the Queen;_ _But "Oh!" cried the maiden, binding her tresses,_ _"'Tis only a page that carols unseen,_ 260 _Crumbling your hounds their messes!")_
_Is she wronged?--To the rescue of her honor,_ _My heart!_ _Is she poor?--What costs it to be styled a donor?_ _Merely an earth to cleave, a sea to part_. 265 _But that fortune should have thrust all this upon her!_ _("Nay, list!"--bade Kate the Queen;_ _And still cried the maiden, binding her tresses,_ _"'Tis only a page that carols unseen_ _Fitting your hawks their jesses!")_ 270
What name was that the little girl sang forth? Kate? The Cornaro, doubtless, who renounced The crown of Cyprus to be lady here At Asolo, where still her memory stays, And peasants sing how once a certain page 275 Pined for the grace of her so far above His power of doing good to, "Kate the Queen-- She never could be wronged, be poor," he sighed, "Need him to help her!" Yes, a bitter thing To see our lady above all need of us; 280 Yet so we look ere we will love; not I, But the world looks so. If whoever loves Must be, in some sort, god or worshiper, The blessing or the blest-one, queen or page, Why should we always choose the page's part? 285 Here is a woman with utter need of me-- I find myself queen here, it seems! How strange! Look at the woman here with the new soul, Like my own Psyche--fresh upon her lips Alit the visionary butterfly, 290 Waiting my word to enter and make bright, Or flutter off and leave all blank as first. This body had no soul before, but slept Or stirred, was beauteous or ungainly, free From taint or foul with stain, as outward things 295 Fastened their image on its passiveness; Now, it will wake, feel, live--or die again! Shall to produce form out of unshaped stuff Be Art--and further, to evoke a soul From form be nothing? This new soul is mine! 300