love poems

If for
even
one night
the grasses
of my passion
were cut and gathered,
ah, what
a pile
they would make—
a mountain reaching

If I entreat this lady that all grace
Seem not unto her heart an enemy,
Foolish and evil thou declarest me,
And desperate in idle stubbornness.
Whence is such cruel judgement thine, whose face,
To him that looks thereon, professeth thee
Faithful, and wise, and of all courtesy,
And made after the way of gentleness?
Alas! my soul within my heart doth find
Sighs, and its grief by weeping doth enhance,
That, drowned in bitter tears, those sighs depart:
And then there seems a presence in the mind,

"These Gothic windows, how they wear me out
With cusp and foil, and nothing straight or square,
Crude colours, leaden borders roundabout,
And fitting in Peter here, and Matthew there!

"What a vocation! Here do I draw now
The abnormal, loving the Hellenic norm;
Martha I paint, and dream of Hera's brow,
Mary, and think of Aphrodite's form."

O ye who love today,
Turn away
From Patience with her silver ray:
For Patience shows a twilight face,
Like a half-lighted moon
When daylight dies apace.

But ye who love tomorrow
Beg or borrow
Today some bitterness of sorrow:
For Patience shows a lustrous face,
In depth of night her noon;
Then to her sun gives place.

Lightsome as convey'd by sparrows,
Love and Beauty cross'd the plains,
Flights of little pointed arrows
Love dispatch'd among the swains:
But so much our shepherds dread him,
(Spoiler of their peace profound)
Swift as scudding fawns they fled him,
Frighted, though they felt no wound.

Now the wanton God grown slyer,
And for each fond mischief ripe,
Comes disguis'd in Pan's attire,
Tuning sweet an oaten pipe:
Echo, by the winding river,
Doubles his delusive strains;
While the boy conceals his quiver,

I am lying in the tomb, love,
Lying in the tomb,
Tho' I move within the gloom, love,
Breathe within the gloom!
Men deem life not fled, dear,
Deem my life not fled,
Tho' I with thee am dead, dear,
I with thee am dead,
O my little child!

What is the grey world, darling,
What is the grey world,
Where the worm lies curled, darling,
The death-worm lies curled?
They tell me of the spring, dear!
Do I want the spring?
Will she waft upon her wing, dear,
The joy-pulse of her wing,
Thy songs, thy blossoming,

I will not follow you, my bird,
I will not follow you.
I would not breathe a word, my bird,
To bring thee here anew.

I love the free in thee, my bird,
The lure of freedom drew;
The light you fly toward, my bird,
I fly with thee unto.

And there we yet will meet, my bird,
Though far I go from you
Where in the light outpoured, my bird,
Are love and freedom too.

Let the light flame consume them and be done
While their charred fragments in the embers lie,
The old, sweet record of the days gone by.
Read them and burn them, lingering, one by one;
The swift months gather and the seasons run
With none to tell us of the when or why;
Let them as ashes vanish in the sky,
Since this our courtship has but just begun.

Better to miss them when we parted be
Than through some fault or lapsing of the years,
To have them made a target for the sneers
Or jest, or scorn, of Curiosity;

Like a willow, like a reed
Is my Love's grace:
And her face

Like a soft, pale-petaled rose:
And my Love's breast
Like the rest

Of a snow-drift bright and white:
And to kiss there—
Ah! what compare

Can I find in rhyme for that!
Where is Love's own
Jewelled throne.

Love, when I die, your thought of me
Shall make the earth a magic bed.
Though buried in the deepest sea,
I shall not join the weary dead.

For you shall make me live and rise,
Your thought shall be my blood and breath—
And only when your memory dies
Will I too die—a double death.