love poems for her

My mistress loves no woodcocks
Yet loves to pick the bones;
My mistress loves no jewels
Yet loves the precious stones;
My mistress loves no hunting
Yet loves to hear the horn;
My mistress loves no tables
Yet loves to see men lorn;
My mistress loves no wrestling
Yet loves to take a fall;
My mistress loves not some things,
And yet she loveth all;
My mistress loves a spender
Yet loves she not a waster;
My mistress loves no cuckold,
And yet she loves my master.

Miraculous love's wounding!
E'en those darts my sweet Phyllis
So fiercely shot against my heart rebounding,
Are turned to roses, violets and lilies,
With odour sweet abounding.

To you, my conqueror, this ivy wound
In wreaths I give—the ivy that alway
Holds trees and walls close twined in spray on spray,
Tendril on tendril, wrapt, embraced, and bound.

It is your right to be with ivy crowned!
Would it were mine to wind me, night and day,
Round you, my column, in the ivy's way,
And lie along your breast in love's deep swound. . . .

Ah, will the time not come, will it not be—
When, just as dawn awakes the world to life,
'Neath branches of a bower thick shade encloses,

Oh, you are near, my love, so near tonight
That, sitting in the dusk and silence here,
With miles between, I feel your spirit's might,
I know your heart's whole message to me, dear.

The dark is golden with you, music-filled;
My reaching thoughts have drawn you, you are mine.
So near you are, I feel your touch, love-thrilled,
The magic of you makes the moments wine.

Love—you are here! Your arms about me fold
O! blinding rapture of this certainty
O! storm of stars, O! universe of gold

Oh! doubt me not—the season
Is o'er, when Folly made me rove,
And now the vestal, Reason,
Shall watch the fire awaked by love.
Altho' this heart was early blown,
And fairest hands disturbed the tree,
They only shook some blossoms down,
Its fruit has all been kept for thee.
Then doubt me not—the season
Is o'er, when Folly made me rove,
And now the vestal, Reason,
Shall watch the fire awaked by Love.

And tho' my lute no longer
May sing of Passion's ardent spell,
Yet, trust me, all the stronger

Take hence this tuneful Trifler's lays!
I'll hear no more the' unmeaning strain
Of Venus' doves, and Cupid's darts,
And killing eyes, and wounded hearts;
All Flattery's round of fulsome praise,
All Falsehood's cant of fabled pain.

Bring me the Muse whose tongue has told
Love's genuine, plaintive, tender tale;
Bring me the Muse whose sounds of woe
Midst Death's dread scenes so sweetly flow,
When Friendship's faithful breast lies cold,
When Beauty's blooming cheek is pale:
Bring these—I like their grief sincere;

Severn, dear Severn, friend of our boy-bard,
Thy hallowed offices of love for whom
Through that long closing agony in Rome
Outshine bright beams of great verse we would guard
Among the soul's regalia unmarred,
Thy patient loving care in that dark doom
That fell on Keats, the singer, doth illume
Our night of life above the noblest word
Of noblest poet; yet I love the boy
Who sang and suffered, saw the glorious sight
Behind the poor appearance, child of light,
Told some of his high vision, nursed a joy,

L OVE'S herald is not speech—
His fear-fraught tongue is mute—
His presence is bewrayed
By blushes deep that shoot
Athwart the conscious brow,
And mantle on the cheek,
Then fleet for tints of snow
Which soft confusion speak;
Thus red and white have place
By turns on true love's face.

Love vaunteth not his worth
In gaudy, glozing phrase,
His home is not in breast
Where thought of worlding stays;
In modest loyaltie
His fountain doth abide;
In bosom greatly good

O C IRCUMSTANCE ! what ruin thou hast made
In Love's fair world we ever may behold
By the imaginative, gentle aid
Of woful stories by old poets told;
But this stern fact gives not philosophy
Sufficient to control the grieving heart,
From bearing thee a lover's enmity,
Because thou doom'st me from my love to part.
Ah! when I think, a little while ago
I gazed into those eyes of love and light,
And lived as though time would not onward go,
But, standing still for aye, feed our delight,—

We watch'd him, while the moonlight,
Beneath the shadow'd hill,
Seem'd dreaming of good angels,
And all the woods were still.
The brother of two sisters
Drew painfully his breath:
A strange fear had come o'er him,
For love was strong in death.
The fire of fatal fever
Burn'd darkly on his cheek,
And often to his mother
He spoke, or tried to speak:
“I felt, as if from slumber
I never could awake:
Oh, Mother, give me something
To cherish for your sake!
A cold, dead weight is on me,