I Am Not Yours
I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.
You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.
Oh plunge me deep in love, put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind.
About this poem
“I Am Not Yours” is one of the best-known poems of Sara Teasdale (1884–1933), from her collection Rivers to the Sea (1915).
The speaker is loved and loves in return, yet she remains herself: “I am I.” What she longs for is to lose that separate self — “lost as a candle lit at noon, / Lost as a snowflake in the sea.” The last stanza becomes a plea to be swept away by love “like a taper in a rushing wind.” In three short stanzas, the poem expresses the tension between independence and the wish to give oneself up completely.