The Mistress.

If he's capricious she'll be so.

   But, if his duties constant are,

She lets her loving favour glow

   As steady as a tropic star.

Appears there nought for which to weep.

   She'll weep for nought, for his dear sake;

She clasps her sister in her sleep;

   Her love in dreams is most awake.

Her soul, that once with pleasure shook.

   Did any eyes her beauty own,

Now wonders how they dare to look

   On what belongs to him alone;

The indignity of taking gifts

   Exhilarates her loving breast;

A rapture of submission lifts

   Her life into celestial rest;

There's nothing left of what she was;

   Back to the babe the woman dies;

And all the wisdom that she has

   Is to love him for being wise.

--Coventry Patmore, The Angel in the House: The Espousals (1856), rpt. New York: Dutton, 1876.