Study notes 'Echo'

Eyes:

• The speaker asks that the lover comes back with ‘eyes as bright / As sunlight on a stream' (line 3). This image suggests both youthfulness and good, accurate vision. It also works to merge the beloved with the natural environment and convey ideas of reflection. 

The door:

• The speaker imagines that ‘in Paradise', all eyes are fixed on the ‘slow door' opening and letting in souls, which hints at the potential reunion of lovers
• Several of Rossetti's devotional poems, such as Despised and Rejected, use the image of the door to depict the entrance to heaven. However, in Revelation, the image of heaven that is given is one of security, rest and peace. 

Water:

• The stream - In addition to alluding to ideas of reflection, the description of the brightness of the lover's eyes as ‘sunlight on a stream' suggests tranquility, peace and movement. Just as a stream glimmers in the sun and runs towards a river or the sea, so too, does the speaker wish that his/her eyes would gleam brightly and move towards her
• Tears - The speaker asks that his/her lover would come back to his/her ‘in tears'. As well as expressing sorrow, tears can express deep, heart-felt emotion. The hope that the lover would come in tears suggests anticipation that s/he would demonstrate his passion and love by reciprocating and sharing in the speaker's sorrow
• Brimful - The speaker describes the souls in paradise as being ‘brimful of love'. The word brimful is usually associating with an overflow of water. By describing souls as overflowing with love, Rossetti may be drawing on the words that Jesus spoke to a Samaritan woman as she drew water from a well, declaring that he himself is the Water of Life. He told her that, whereas everyone who drinks regular water will inevitably be thirsty again: ‘Those who drink the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life'. {John 4:14 TNIV}

The tone is one of longing throughout. From the first repetition of the word ‘come' to the final expression of desire that the speaker can breathe life back into the beloved, the speaker's attention is focused solely on his/her love. Longing is expressed through the repeated call to the beloved and language associated with desire.