love poems

On LOVE.

One midnight when the bear did stand
A-level with Bootes ' hand,
And, with their labour sore oppress'd,
The race of men were lay'd to rest,
Then to my doors, at unawares,
Came Love , and tried to force the bars.

Who thus assails my doors, I cry'd?
Who breaks my slumbers? Love reply'd,
Open: a child alone is here!
A little child! — — you need not fear;
Here through the moonless night I stray,
And, drench'd in rain, have lost my way.

If I were king my pipe should be premier.
The skies of time and chance are seldom clear;
We would inform them all with azure weather.
Delight alone would need to shed a tear,
For dream and deed should war no more together.

Art should aspire, yet ugliness be dear;
Beauty, the shaft, should speed with wit for feather;
And love, sweet love, should never-fall to sere
If I were king.

But politics should find no harbour near;
The Philistine should dread to slip his tether;
Tobacco should be duty free, and beer;

All that's not love is the dearth of my days,
The leaves of the volume with rubric unwrit,
The temple in times without prayer, without praise,
The altar unset and the candle unlit.

Let me survive not the lovable sway
Of early desire, nor see when it goes
The courts of Life's abbey in ivied decay,
Whence sometime sweet anthems and incense arose.

The delicate hues of its sevenfold rings
The rainbow outlives not; their yellow and blue
The butterfly sees not dissolve from his wings,

When Love w i th vnconfined wings
hovers w i thin my gates,
& my divine Althea brings
to whisp er at my grates,

when I lye tangled in her heere
& fettered w i th her eye,
the burds tha t wanton in the ayre
enioyes such Lybertye.

When, Lynett like confined, I
w i th shriller note shall sing
the mercy, goodnesse, maiestye
& glory of my kinge,

Written in the Time of J ULIUS C ÆSAR , and by some ascrib'd to C ATULLUS .

Let those love now, who never lov'd before;
Let those who always lov'd, now love the more.

The Spring , the new, the warb'ling Spring appears,
The youthful season of reviving Years ;
In Spring the Loves enkindle mutual Heats,
The feather'd Nation chuse their tuneful Mates,
The Trees grow fruitful with descending Rain
And drest in diff'ring Greens adorn the Plain.
She comes ; to-morrow Beauty's Empress roves

Dear, you have come into my loving heart
In these last fateful days,
Nearer and dearer, and I have learned in part
Your tender, wistful ways.

Thy gentle, loving thoughts have come to me
As one, who waiting, stands
Expectant for some gift of poesy
With eager heart and hands.

And oh! my very dear one, I have given
To thee that inner stream
Of tender thoughts linked happily with heaven,
Love's vision and Love's dream.

To W. A.

Was I a Samurai renowned,
Two-sworded, fierce, immense of bow?
A histrion angular and profound?
A priest? a porter? — Child, although
I have forgotten clean, I know
That in the shade of Fujisan,
What time the cherry-orchards blow,
I loved you once in old Japan.

As here you loiter, flowing-gowned
And hugely sashed, with pins a-row
Your quaint head as with flamelets crowned,
Demure, inviting — even so,
When merry maids in Miyako

I dreamed my loue lay in her bedd:
itt was my Chance to take her:
her leggs & armes abroad were spredd;
shee slept; I durst not awake her.
O pitty itt were, tha t one soe faire
shold Crowne her loue w i th willowe;
the tresses of her golden haire
did kisse he[r] louely pillowe

Methought her belly was a hill
much like a mount of pleasure,
vnder whose height there growes a well;

Oh, take me into the still places of your heart,
And hide me under the night of your deep hair;
For the fear of love is upon me;
I am afraid lest God should discover the wonderfulness of our love.

Shall I find life but to lose it?
Shall I stretch out my hands at last to joy
And take but the irremediable anguish?
For the cost of heaven is the fear of hell;
The terrible cost of love
Is the fear to be cast out therefrom.

Oh, touch me! Oh, look upon me!
Look upon my spirit with your eyes

When my hair is thin and gray,
When there's wrinkles on my brow;
When my eyes are dim, and when
Feeble is my step and slow,
This one question I would ask,
This one question, sweetheart, dear,
Will you love me then as now,
Love me truly and sincere.