Leave Me Tomorrow

Dost Thou Not Care?

I love and love not: Lord, it breaks my heart

  To love and not to love.

Thou veiled within Thy glory, gone apart

  Into Thy shrine, which is above,

Dost Thou not love me, Lord, or care

  For this mine ill? —

I love thee here or there,

  I will accept thy broken heart, lie still.

Lord, it was well with me in time gone by

  That cometh not again,

When I was fresh and cheerful, who but I?

  I fresh, I cheerful: worn with pain

Now, out of sight and out of heart;

  O Lord, how long? —

I watch thee as thou art,

  I will accept thy fainting heart, be strong.

‘Lie still,’ ‘be strong,’ today; but, Lord, tomorrow,

  What of tomorrow, Lord?

Shall there be rest from toil, be truce from sorrow,

  Be living green upon the sward

Now but a barren grave to me,

  Be joy for sorrow? —

Did I not die for thee?

  Did I not live for thee? Leave Me tomorrow. 

~Christina Rossetti