Late Have I Loved Thee

¹Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty so old and so new; late have I loved Thee!

²For behold Thou wert within me, and I outside; and I sought Thee outside and in my unloveliness fell upon those lovely things that Thou hast made.

³Thou wert with me and I was not with Thee. I was kept from Thee by those things, yet had they not been in Thee, they would not have been at all.

⁴Thou didst call and cry to me and break open my deafness: and Thou didst send forth Thy beams and shine upon me and chase away my blindness.

⁵Thou didst breathe fragrance upon me, and I drew in my breath and do now pant for Thee: I tasted Thee, and now hunger and thirst for Thee.

⁶Thou didst touch me, and I have burned for Thy peace.

⁷When I shall with my whole self cleave to Thee, I shall nowhere have sorrow or labour; and my life shall wholly live, as wholly full of Thee.

⁸But now since whom Thou fillest, Thou liftest up, because I am not full of Thee I am a burden to myself.