How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

On this day in 1846 legendary poets Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning were secretly wed. Their love story is one that has remained in the hearts and imagination of so many romantics.

Already a published poet at age 13 thanks to some help from her father who organized the printing of her work Elizabeth then suffered a severe spine injury when she was 15 and retreated to her room living as an invalid into her early 30s. Writing poetry was her only release. In 1844, fellow English poet Robert Browning wrote to Elizabeth to tell her how much he admired her work. They continued to correspond through letters and the courtship began despite Elizabeth's father's disapproval. After their secret marriage in 1846, Elizabeth and Robert moved to Italy, where Elizabeth's health became far improved. In 1849 they welcomed their only child, a son named Pen. Elizabeth passed away in 1861 at which point Robert took his son back to England. Their poetry and love letters are classics to this day and give us some nice insight into a great story of passion and love.

Here are some samples:

Sonnet XLIII by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Life in Love by Robert Browning

Escape me?
Never---Beloved!
While I am I, and you are you,
So long as the world contains us both,
Me the loving and you the loth
While the one eludes, must the other pursue.
My life is a fault at last, I fear: It seems too much like a fate, indeed!
Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed.
But what if I fail of my purpose here?
It is but to keep the nerves at strain, To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall,
And, baffled, get up and begin again,---

So the chace takes up one's life ' that's all.
While, look but once from your farthest bound
At me so deep in the dust and dark,
No sooner the old hope goes to ground
Than a new one, straight to the self-same mark,
I shape me---
Ever
Removed!