Sara Teasdale’s speaker describes a state of complete emptiness when separated from the beloved. Without that person, the speaker says, there is no one else and nothing that comforts. The absence is physical as well as emotional: suddenly sick, surrounded by blackness, as if everything has been taken away. The speaker has tried music, cities, constellations, and the sea, yet none of these reaches the feeling. Even pride collapses, bent like grass in a rainstorm under the weight of longing. The mood is intimate and almost claustrophobic—love here is not joyful but desperate, a need so total that night becomes unbearable and all the speaker wants is to return to the beloved. The repeated lines give the feeling of one obsessive thought circling back.
When I Am Not with You — Summary
When I am not with you I am alone, For there is no one else And there is nothing That comforts me but you. When you are gone Suddenly I am sick, Blackness is round me, There is nothing left. I have tried many things, Music and cities, Stars in their constellations And the sea, But there is nothing That comforts me but you; And my poor pride bows down Like grass in a rain-storm Drenched with my longing. The night is unbearable, Oh let me go to you For there is no one, There is nothing To comfort me but you.