Keeping a Heart

Arthur O'Shaughnessy

1844 to 1881

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Track 1

Reconstruct the poem by dragging each line into its correct position. Your goal is to reassemble the original poem as accurately as possible. As you move the lines, you'll see whether your arrangement is correct, helping you explore the poem's flow and meaning. You can also print out the jumbled poem to cut up and reassemble in the classroom. Either way, take your time, enjoy the process, and discover how the poet's words come together to create something truly beautiful.

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I would keep that heart as the thought of heaven, 
I only should know, and to enter there 
No heathen should look therein;
And so on the eve of some blissful day, 
As a heart so loving and true, 
Of old, and nothing seems changed.
That another had stolen one thought away 
You think you love again as you did 
I must hold myself from sin.
It should ne'er know pain, be weary, or weep, 
But ah, I should know that heart so well, 
On glimmering splendours of love, and stay 
My good should be done, my gift be given,
Never to open it more.
That so long as I changed not I could foretell 
Where precious jewels are ranged,
And it did not open to me.
In hope of the recompense there; yea, even
Its chaste marmoreal beauty rare
A memory each; as you raise the lid,
My life should be led in that heart.
I would keep that heart as a casket hid 
In that heart shut up from the world away,
Lest aught in the heart were changed, or say 
To dwell in a life apart,
The giver might live at ease or sleep;
With love for the golden key,
From within we should close the door 
As a heart that I held with a golden spell, 
How I should tremble day after day, 
If one should give me a heart to keep, 
The heart watched over by me.
As I touched with the golden key, 
I would keep that heart as a temple fair,
That heart would be changeless too.