We cannot die wholly against our wills;
And in the texture of women I have found
Harder determination than in men:
The body grows impatient of enduring,
The harried mind is from the body estranged,
And we consent to go: by the Queen's touch,
The way she moves--or does not move--in bed,
The eyes so cold and keen in her white mask,
I know she has consented.
The snarling look of a mute wounded hawk,
That would be let alone, is always hers--
Yet she was sorely tender: it may be
Some wound in her affection will not heal.
We should be careful--the mind can so be hurt
That nought can make it be unhurt again.
Where, then, did her affection most persist?


Lear:

Old bone-patcher, old digger in men's flesh,
Doctors are ever itching to be priests,
Meddling in conduct, natures, life's privacies.
We have been coupled now for twenty years,
And she has never turned from me an hour--
She knows a woman's duty and a queen's:
Whose, then, can her affection be but mine?
How can I hurt her--she is still my queen?
If her strong inward pain is a real pain
Find me some certain drug to medicine it: