love poems

Could love give strength to thank thee! Love can give
Strong sorrow heart to suffer: what we bear
We would not put away, albeit this were
A burden love might cast aside and live.
Love chooses rather pain than palliative,
Sharp thought than soft oblivion. May we dare
So trample down our passion and our prayer
That fain would cling round feet now fugitive
And stay them—so remember, so forget,
What joy we had who had his presence yet,
What griefs were his while joy in him was ours
And grief made weary music of his breath,

Her passions the shy violet
From Hafiz never hides;
Love-longings of the raptured bird
The bird to him confides.

Test of the poet is knowledge of love,
For Eros is older than Saturn or Jove;
Never was poet, of late or of yore,
Who was not tremulous with love-lore.

Love on his errand bound to go
Can swim the flood, and wade through snow,
Where way is none, 't will creep and wind
And eat through Alps its home to find.

In the high-vaulted temple of my heart
There is an oratory thine alone—
A sweet, hushed, sacred chantry all thine own.
There do I fly when I would be apart
To dream dear dreams, for there I know thou art,
Albeit I see thee not. There is thy throne;
There thou art crowned, and as at altar-stone
Fain would I kneel and let the day depart!
While this remains I cannot lose thee, dear,
Though countless centuries between us roll,
Though earth dissolves, and planets disappear,
And all the splendor of the starry scroll

Hoe too is an edged tool,
But in sharpness sickle certainly wins.
Father too is a parent,
Wi tongdo tungsyong
But in love mother surely surpasses.
O love, his indeed cannot be more than hers.

See the stars, love,
In the water much clearer and brighter
Than those above us, and whiter,
Like nenuphars!

Star-shadows shine, love:
How many stars in your bowl?
How many shadows in your soul?
Only mine, love, mine?

When I move the oars, see
How the stars are tossed,
Distorted, even lost!
Even yours, do you see?

The poor waters spill
The stars, waters troubled, forsaken!—
The heavens are not shaken you say, love;
Its stars stand still.

There! did you see

Dear! let me dream of love,
Ah! though a dream it be!
I'll ask no boon, above
A word, a smile, from thee:
At most, in some still hour, one kindly thought of me.

Sweet, let me gaze awhile
Into those radiant eyes!
I'll scheme not to beguile
The heart, that deeper lies
Beneath them, than yon star in night's pellucid skies.

Love, let my spirit bow
In worship at thy shrine!
I'll swear, thou shalt not know
One word from lips of mine,
An instant's pain to send through that shy soul of thine.

Is not Love here, as 'tis in other Clymes,
And diff'reth it, as doe the sev'rall Nations?
Or hath it lost the Vertue, with the Times,
Or in this Iland alt'reth with the Fashions?
Or have our Passions lesser pow'r then theirs,
Who had lesse Art them lively to expresse?
Is Nature growne lesse pow'rfull in their Heires,
Or in our Fathers did she more transgresse?
I am sure my Sighes come from a Heart as true,
As any Mans, that Memory can boast,
And my Respects and Services to you
Equall with his, that loves his Mistres most:

I heare some say, this Man is not in love:
Who? can he love? a likely thing, they say;
Reade but his Verse, and it will eas'ly prove.
O, judge not rashly (gentle Sir) I pray,
Because I loosely trifle in this sort,
As one that faine his Sorrowes would beguile:
You now suppose me all this time in sport,
And please your selfe with this Conceit the while;
Yee shallow Censures, sometime see yee not,
In greatest Perils some Men pleasant be,
Where Fame by Death is onely to be got,
They resolute? so stands the case with me;