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How do I love thee1? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth2 and height
My soul can reach, when feeling3 out of sight4
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's5
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light6.
I love thee freely7, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely8, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use9
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith10.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints11. I love thee with the breath12,
Smiles, tears, of all my life13; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death14
1.thee: the poet's husband, Robert Browning
2. depth, breadth: internal rhyme
3. when . . . Grace: when my soul feels its way into the spiritual realm
4. out of sight: to find the goal of being alive and living uprightly
5,6. I love you enough to meet all of your simple needs during the day (sun) and even during the night (candle-light)
7.freely: willingly–and just as intensely as men who fight for freedom
8. purely: genuinely, without desire for praise
9,10. with an intensity equal to that experienced during suffering or mourning; I love you with the blind faith of a child
11. with . . . saints: with a childlike fervor for saints and holiness that I seemed to lose when I grew older.
12. breath: echoes breadth, Line 2
13. Smiles . . . life: perhaps too sentimental
14. their love is eternal, never ending
For more information about the poem see: http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/G.../Sonnet43.html