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Browning: Selected Poetry (Poetry Library, Penguin)

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Consider Browning's

'Parting at Morning'
Round the cape of a sudden came the sea,
And the sea looked over the mountain's rim:
And straight was a path of gold for him,
And the need of a world of men for me.

Consider the famous opening from Rabbi Ben Ezra

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet tobe,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in his hand
Who saith, "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God, see all, nor be afraid"

This selection contains many of Browning's most well- known poems, " Pippa Passes " "My Last Duchess" " Love Amoung the Ruins" "Home Thoughts from Abroad " "Fra Lippo Lippi"

The greatness of Browning is a strength of character in the poetry. The technique of 'dramatic monologue' that he develops enables him to provide story and portrait at once, combine colloquial language and rich specialized language suited to the character and world of the speaker.
He has been criticized for a facile optimism( God's in his Heaven, All's right with the world) when he had in fact a deep sense of the tragic disappointments most of human flesh is in one way or another heir to.
He time and again makes his 'historical characters and their situations' come to life. And he has a richness and broadness in capturing life's varied moods .
A wise, moral strong poet.