love poems

Farewell, false love, the oracle of lies,
A mortal foe and enemy to rest;
An envious boy, from whom all cares arise,
A bastard vile, a beast with rage possessed;
A way of error, a temple full of treason,
In all effects contrary unto reason.

A poisoned serpent covered all with flowers,
Mother of sighs and murtherer of repose,
A sea of sorrows from whence are drawn such showers
As moisture lends to every grief that grows;
A school of guile, a net of deep deceit,
A gilded hook that holds a poisoned bait.

The family is a little book,
The children are the leaves,
The parents are the cover that
Safe protection gives.

At first, the pages of the book
Are blank, and smooth, and fair;
But time soon writeth memories,
And painteth pictures there.

Love is the golden clasp
That bindeth up the trust;
O break it not, lest all the leaves
Shall scatter like the dust.

Fair lovely Maid, or if that Title be
Too weak, too Feminine for Nobler thee,
Permit a Name that more Approaches Truth:
And let me call thee, Lovely Charming Youth.
This last will justifie my soft complaint,
While that may serve to lessen my constraint;
And without Blushes I the Youth persue,
When so much beauteous Woman is in view,
Against thy Charms we struggle but in vain
With thy deluding Form thou giv'st us pain,
While the bright Nymph betrays us to the Swain.
In pity to our Sex sure thou wer't sent,

Fair as the night — when all the astral fires
Of heaven are burning in the clear expanse,
My love is; and her eyes like star-depths glance
Lustrous with glowing thoughts and pure desires,
And that mysterious pathos which inspires
All moods divine in mortal passion's trance —
All that its earthly music doth enhance
As with the rapture of seraphic lyres!
I gaze upon her till the atmosphere
Sweetens intensely, and to my charmed sight
All fair associated forms appear
Swimming in joy, as swim yon orbs in light —

The faint-flushed buds awake within the cup
Of myriad folded roses yet to be;
Ere Life can drink its utmost sweetness up,
Love flutters, wakens, O how sweet to see!

 The eyes open to a cry of pulleys,
And spirited from sleep, the astounded soul
Hangs for a moment bodiless and simple
As false dawn.
Outside the open window
The morning air is all awash with angels.

 Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses,
Some are in smocks: but truly there they are.
Now they are rising together in calm swells
Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear
With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing;

 Now they are flying in place, conveying

A LADY in whom love is manifest —
That love which perfect honour doth adorn —
Hath ta'en the living heart out of thy breast,
Which in her keeping to new life is born:
For there by such sweet power it is possest
As even is felt of Indian unicorn:
And all its virtue now, with fierce unrest,
Unto thy soul makes difficult return.
For this thy lady is virtue's minister
In suchwise that no fault there is to show,
Save that God made her mortal on this ground.
And even herein His wisdom shall be found:

Through this my strong and new misaventure,
All now is lost to me
Which most was sweet in Love's supremacy.

So much of life is dead in its control,
That she, my pleasant lady of all grace,
Is gone out of the devastated soul:
I see her not, nor do I know her place;
Nor even enough of virtue with me stays
To understand, ah me!
The flower of her exceeding purity.

Because there comes — to kill that gentle thought
With saying that I shall not see her more —
This constant pain wherewith I am distraught,

Even as the day when it is yet at dawning
Seems mild and kind, being fair to look upon,
While the birds carol underneath their awning
Of leaves, as if they never would have done;
Which on a sudden changes, just at noon,
And the broad light is broken into rain
That stops and comes again;
Even as the traveller, who had held his way
Hopeful and glad because of the bright weather,
Forgetteth then his gladness altogether;
Even so am I, through Love, alas the day!

It plainly is through Love that I am so.

Lady , with all the pains that I can take,
I'll sing my love renewed, if I may, well,
And only in your praise.
The stag in his old age seeks out a snake
And eats it, and then drinks, (I have heard tell)
Fearing the hidden ways
Of the snake's poison, and renews his youth.
Even such a draught, in truth,
Was your sweet welcome, which cast out of me,
With whole cure instantly,
Whatever pain I felt, for my own good,
When first we met that I might be renew'd.

A thing that has its proper essence changed