Modern Love III: This Was the Woman by George Meredith
This was the woman; what now of the man? But pass him. If he comes beneath a heel, He shall be crushed until he cannot feel, Or, being callous, haply till he can. But he is nothing:--nothing? Only mark The rich light striking out from her on him! Ha! what a sense it is when her eyes swim Across the man she singles, leaving dark All else! Lord God, who mad'st the thing so fair, See that I am drawn to her even now! It cannot be such harm on her cool brow To put a kiss? Yet if I meet him there! But she is mine! Ah, no! I know too well I claim a star whose light is overcast: I claim a phantom-woman in the Past. The hour has struck, though I heard not the bell!
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