| Alfred H. Miles, ed. Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907. | | | Lyrics.
IV. In Extremis | | By Emily Pfeiffer (1841–1890) |
| | | I LOVE to feel your hand, beloved, | |
| I love to feel your hand; | |
| Then hold me fast until we part | |
| Upon the gloomy strand, | |
| And I upon the silent sea | 5 |
| Go forth alone from love and thee! | |
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| I love to see your smile, which says | |
| What else you dare not say: | |
| It gilds for me the gloomy shore, | |
| It seems to light my way. | 10 |
| Brave love, keep back your tears awhile | |
| That parting I may see your smile! | |
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| Oh, let me hear your voice, beloved,— | |
| Your face I see no more! | |
| That tender voice still sounds above | 15 |
| The breakers of the shore; | |
| And for a space may follow me | |
| Out, out upon the silent sea! | |
| |
| One kiss upon my lips, sad lips | |
| That cannot kiss thee back, | 20 |
| Let love proclaim his bitter truth— | |
| Bear witness on the rack! | |
| One kiss, the longest and the last, | |
| Resuming all the sacred past! | |
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| Oh love that seems to rise as rise | 25 |
| The waters of that sea, | |
| To rise and overflow, and float | |
| My soul, O God, to thee! | |
| Thy voice, thy smile, thy kiss, thy breath, | |
| Beloved, have rapt my soul from death! | 30 | | | |
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