The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/A Girl Burning a Love Letter

by Letitia Elizabeth Landon

For other versions of this work, see Lines Written Under a Picture of a Girl Burning a Love Letter.

LINES

WRITTEN UNDER A PICTURE OF A GIRL BURNING
A LOVE-LETTER.

The lines were fill'd with many a tender thing,
All the impassioned heart's fond communing.

I took the scroll: I could not brook
    An eye to gaze on it, save mine;
I could not bear another's look
    Should dwell upon one thought of thine.
My lamp was burning by my side,
    I held thy letter to the flame,
I marked the blaze swift o'er it glide,
    It did not even spare thy name.

Soon the light from the embers past,
    I felt so sad to see it die,
So bright at first, so dark at last,
    I feared it was love's history.