love poem

She alone knew, of victors first and best,
To fold the vanquished to her pardoning breast:
To gather 'neath her wings, in one great brood,
The tribes of Man, by might, then love, subdued,
Mother, not Queen, calling those sons by birth
Whom she had conquered — linking ends of Earth.

If I create wealth beyond the dream of past ages and increase not love, my heat is the flush of fever and my success will deal death.
Though I have foresight to locate the fountains of riches, and power to pre-empt them, and skill to tap them, and have no loving vision for humanity, I am blind.
Though I give of my profits to the poor and make princely endowments for those who toil for me, if I have no human fellowship of love with them, my life is barren and doomed.

Come, love, help me move all the mirrors out of my workshop,
All the sore spots out of my heart!
You only can give me what I need;
A steel girder faith to build on,
The feel of tomorrow in my land.
Andante of a happy city's hundred thousand feet,
Keeping step in a grand procession,
Telling the world they walk in peace and freedom,
Broadcasting a forever and ever armistice day.

Friend, if the mute and shrouded dead
Are touched at all by tears,
By love long fled and friendship sped
And the unreturning years,

O then, to her that early died,
O doubt not, bridegroom, to thy bride
Thy love is sweet and sweeteneth
The very bitterness of death.

Of a true love clean and derne
I have now written thee a Ron,
How thou might, if thou wilt, learn
For to love thy Leman
That truest is of alle bearn;
And more of love there knoweth none:
Beware, for He is somewhat stern,
His eye is ever thee upon.

Thou art wrought of such a kind,
Withouten love thou may not be;
And nevermore shalt thou find
One so sweet and fair as He.
If thou wilt Him to thee bind
With true love-bondes three,
With all thine heart and will and mind, —

Along the edge of the great, moving sea —
That moaned forever on her barren bars,
The old, sad love came back again to me,
Moving quietly under the quiet stars.

O sad love, do not smile upon me so,
Nodding so gently with your little head —
All the old wonder of your eyes is dead,
And the sea-winds have chilled you long ago!

Sing, O sing again, lovely lark of mine,
Sitting there alone amidst the green of May!

In the prison-tower the lad sits mournfully;
To his father writes, to his mother writes:
Thus he wrote, and these, these were the very words:
“O good father mine, thou belovèd sir!
O good mother mine, thou belovèd dame!
Ransom me, I pray, ransom the good lad,—
He is your beloved, is your only son!”
Father, mother,—both,—both refused to hear,
Cursed their hapless race, cursed their hapless seed:

Nightingale, O nightingale,
Nightingale so full of song!
Tell me, tell me, where thou fliest,
Where to sing now in the night?
Will another maiden hear thee,
Like to me, poor me, all night
Sleepless, restless, comfortless,
Ever full of tears her eyes?
Fly, O fly, dear nightingale,
Over hundred countries fly,
Over the blue sea so far!
Spy the distant countries through,
Town and village, hill and dell,
Whether thou find'st anyone,
Who so sad is as I am?

Oh, I bore a necklace once,

Carnations and my first love! And he was seventeen,
And I was only twelve years — a stately gulf between!
I broke them on the morning the school-dance was to be,
To pin among my ribbons in hopes that he might see. ...
And all the girls stood breathless to watch as he came through
With curly crest and grand air that swept the heart from you!
And why he paused at my side is more than I can know —
Shyest of the small girls who all adored him so —
I said it with my prayer-times: I walked with head held high:

Dear Love, it was so hard to say
Good-bye to-day!
You turned to go, yet going turned to stay!
Till suddenly at last you went away.

Then all at last I found my love unsaid,
And bowed my head;
And went in tears up to my lonely bed —
Oh, would it be like this if you were dead?