The Collected Works of Oscar Wilde: 250+ Titles in One Edition. Оскар Уайльд

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       O dear saint,

       If I have been too daring, pardon me!

       Thy beauty sets my boyish blood aflame,

       And, when my reverent lips touch thy white hand,

       Each little nerve with such wild passion thrills

       That there is nothing which I would not do

       To gain thy love. [Leaps up.]

       Bid me reach forth and pluck

       Perilous honour from the lion’s jaws,

       And I will wrestle with the Nemean beast

       On the bare desert! Fling to the cave of War

       A gaud, a ribbon, a dead flower, something

       That once has touched thee, and I’ll bring it back

       Though all the hosts of Christendom were there,

       Inviolate again! ay, more than this,

       Set me to scale the pallid white-faced cliffs

       Of mighty England, and from that arrogant shield

       Will I raze out the lilies of your France

       Which England, that sealion of the sea,

       Hath taken from her!

       O dear Beatrice,

       Drive me not from thy presence! without thee

       The heavy minutes crawl with feet of lead,

       But, while I look upon thy loveliness,

       The hours fly like winged Mercuries

       And leave existence golden.

      DUCHESS

       I did not think

       I should be ever loved: do you indeed

       Love me so much as now you say you do?

      GUIDO

       Ask of the sea-bird if it loves the sea,

       Ask of the roses if they love the rain,

       Ask of the little lark, that will not sing

       Till day break, if it loves to see the day:-

       And yet, these are but empty images,

       Mere shadows of my love, which is a fire

       So great that all the waters of the main

       Can not avail to quench it. Will you not speak?

      DUCHESS I hardly know what I should say to you.

      GUIDO Will you not say you love me?

      DUCHESS

       Is that my lesson?

       Must I say all at once? ‘Twere a good lesson

       If I did love you, sir; but, if I do not,

       What shall I say then?

      GUIDO

       If you do not love me,

       Say, none the less, you do, for on your tongue

       Falsehood for very shame would turn to truth.

      DUCHESS

       What if I do not speak at all? They say

       Lovers are happiest when they are in doubt

      GUIDO

       Nay, doubt would kill me, and if I must die,

       Why, let me die for joy and not for doubt.

       Oh, tell me may I stay, or must I go?

      DUCHESS

       I would not have you either stay or go;

       For if you stay you steal my love from me,

       And if you go you take my love away.

       Guido, though all the morning stars could sing

       They could not tell the measure of my love.

       I love you, Guido.

      GUIDO

       [stretching out his hands]

       Oh, do not cease at all;

       I thought the nightingale sang but at night;

       Or if thou needst must cease, then let my lips

       Touch the sweet lips that can such music make.

      DUCHESS To touch my lips is not to touch my heart.

      GUIDO Do you close that against me?

      DUCHESS

       Alas! my lord,

       I have it not: the first day that I saw you

       I let you take my heart away from me;

       Unwilling thief, that without meaning it

       Did break into my fenced treasury

       And filch my jewel from it! O strange theft,

       Which made you richer though you knew it not,

       And left me poorer, and yet glad of it!

      GUIDO [clasping her in his arms]

       O love, love, love! Nay, sweet, lift up your head,

       Let me unlock those little scarlet doors

       That shut in music, let me dive for coral

       In your red lips, and I’ll bear back a prize

       Richer than all the gold the Gryphon guards

       In rude Armenia.

      DUCHESS

       You are my lord,

       And what I have is yours, and what I have not

       Your fancy lends me, like a prodigal

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