Femininity (Motif)
When listing potential things that might cause her addressee to love her, the speaker includes a series of actions and traits associated with femininity. Among these are gentleness, beauty, and tearfulness. The speaker does not argue that these "feminine" traits are inherently bad. In fact, she does not differentiate them visibly from other, less stereotypically feminine traits such as intelligence. These ideals of femininity pose a problem, not because they are inferior to "masculine" ones, but because they—like all human characteristics—are short-lived.
Tears (Symbol)
Browning uses the act of crying as a symbolic stand-in to describe a certain variety of love—namely, one in which comfort is a foundational part of affection in a relationship. To describe this dynamic, she hypothetically positions herself as one who weeps, and her lover as the person who dries her tears. She then problematizes this variety of love by imagining what might happen if her weeping ceases, leaving the lover without the ability to wipe those tears or offer comfort. This type of love, she concludes, is viable only as long as one person is in need of comfort—or, put figuratively, as long as they are weeping.
