love poems for her

Not in sleep I saw it, but in daylight,
Clear and beautiful by day before me:
Saw a meadow overgrown with daisies,
Round a cottage white in green embowered;
Statues of the gods gleam in the arbor.
And the lady that I walk with loves me,
With a quiet spirit in the coolness
And the peacefulness of this white dwelling,
Full of beauty waiting till we enter.

A tree is more than a shadow
Blurred against the sky,
More than ink spilled on the fringe
Of white clouds floating by.
A tree is more than an April design
Or a blighted winter bough
Where love and music used to be.
A tree is something in me,
Very still and lonely now.

And art Thou come, blest Babe, and come to me?
Come down to teach me how to come to Thee?

Welcome, thrice welcome to my panting soul,
Which, as it loves, doth grieve that 'tis so foul.

The less 'tis fit for Thee come from above,
The more it needs Thee, and the more I love.

Ah me, dread friends of mine,—Love, Time, and Death:
Sweet Love, who came to me on shining wing,
And gave her to my arms,—her lips, her breath,
And all her golden ringlets clustering:
And Time, who gathers in the flying years,
He gave me all, but where is all he gave?
He took my love and left me barren tears:
Weary and lone I follow to the grave.
There Death will end this vision half-divine.
Wan Death, who waits in shadow evermore,
And silent, ere he give the sudden sign;
Oh, gently lead me through thy narrow door,

My life she takes between her hands;
My spirit at her feet
Is taught the lore inscrutable [,]
The wisdom bitter sweet.

The world becomes a little thing;
Art, travel, music, men,
And all that these can ever give
Are in her brow's white ken.

I look into her eyes and learn
The mystery of tears;
The pang of doubt; the doom that haunts
The fleeting of the years;

And pale foreknowledge, hid from all
But those who fear to know;
And memory's treason, that betrays
Joy to the nameless woe;

O come while youth's bright rosy veil
Beguiles your eyes and mine,
Let's tread the asphodel of bliss,
And drink life's magic wine:
Soon time will rend the gossamer,
To wisdom's cruelty,
While we are blind, my love, be kind,
For soon, too soon, we see!

Here awa', there awa', here awa' Willie,
Here awa', there awa', here awa' hame;
Long have I sought thee, dear have I bought thee,
Now have I gotten my Willie again.

Thro' the lang muir I have follow'd my Willie,
Thro' the lang muir I have follow'd him hame;
Whatever betide us, nought shall divide us;
Love now rewards all my sorrow and pain.

Here awa', there awa', here awa' Willie,
Here awa', there awa', here awa' hame;
Come Love, believe me, nothing can grieve me;
Ilka thing pleases while Willie 's at hame.

I DARE to love you in the face of death:
Not death that's near at hand, but sure to come
Some day, somewhere, when drawing further breath
Refuses issue, as the lips go dumb.

We take our heaven in the moment's touch;
Our hands are lifted to protest the Fate
That waits all lovers, be they small or much;
The dust that chokes delirium, soon or late.

With such dark certainty to block our bliss,
Nathless, the central fire that floods the soul,
Shines but the brighter, and our every kiss

And thus it is with all that made life fair,
Gone with the freshness that it used to wear.
'Tis sad to mark the ravage that the heart
Makes of itself; how one by one depart
The colours that made hope. We seek, we find;
And find, too, charm has, with the change, declined.
Many things have I loved, that now to me
Are as a marvel how they loved could be;
Yet, on we go, desiring to the last
Illusions vain, as any in the past.

I wandered far from my mother's tent;
Alone through the shade of the woods I went:
Where leaves grew greenest, where trees were high,
We met in the shadow, my love and I.
So kindly and fondly he gazed at me—
But he did not know I was Rommani.

He led me out where the sun shone down,
He looked at my face that was Gipsy-brown;
He looked in my eyes, and he took my hand;
He said, “You come from a distant land—
From a warmer country across the sea?”
I never told I was Rommani.

“Come, love!” he said. When I heard him call,