Do I hold the Past
Thus firm and fast
Yet doubt if the Future hold I can?
This path so soft to pace shall lead
Thro' the magic of May to herself indeed!
Or narrow if needs the house must he,
Outside are the storms and strangers: we--
Oh, close, safe, warm sleep I and she,
--I and she!





IV


DRAMATIC LYRICS

Browning's poetic career extended from 1833 to 1889, nearly sixty
years of fairly continuous composition. We may make a threefold
division: first, the thirteen years before his marriage in 1846;
second, the fifteen years of married life, closing in 1861; third,
the remaining twenty-eight years. During the first period he
published twelve works; during the second, two; during the third,
eighteen. The fact that so little was published during the years
when his wife was alive may be accounted for by the fact that the
condition of her health required his constant care, and that after
the total failure of _Men and Women_ (1855) to attract any
popular attention, Browning for some time spent most of his