When I would image her features, <br />Comes up a shrouded head: <br />I touch the outlines, shrinking; <br />She seems of the wandering dead. <br /> <br />But when love asks for nothing, <br />And lies on his bed of snow, <br />The face slips under my eyelids, <br />All in its living glow. <br /> <br />Like a dark cathedral city, <br />Whose spires, and domes, and towers <br />Quiver in violet lightnings, <br />My soul basks on for hours.<br /><br />George Meredith<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/when-i-would-imagine/
