love poetry

C HLORIS , whilst thou and I were free,
Wedded to nought but Liberty,
How sweetly happy did we live,
How free to promise, free to give?

Then, Monarchs of our selves, we might
Love here, or there, to change delight,
And ty'd to none, with all dispence,
Paying each Love its recompence.

But in that happy freedom, we
Were so improvidently free,
To give away our liberties;

And now in fruitless sorrow pine
At what we are, what might have bin,
Had thou, or I, or both been wise.

There is a state that all may know,
No fear, no shame we feel;
For God doth all his mercy show,
And all his love reveal.

His goodness manifested is,
And all his ways are clear;
The Spirit seals our souls as his,
For we to him are dear.

A Father's love, in our past years,
By us is clearly known;
For he has wiped away our tears,
And as his sons doth own.

And he has called us by his Son
To know a higher life,
With them forever to be one,
No more with sin at strife.

Who love would seek,
Let him love evermore
And seldom speak;
For in love's domain
Silence must reign;
Or it brings the heart
Smart

They put their finger on their lip,—
The Powers above;
The seas their islands clip,
The moons in Ocean dip,—
They love but name not love.

Under dusky laurel leaf,
—Scarlet leaf of rose,
I lie prone, who have known
—All a woman knows.

Love and grief and motherhood,
—Fame and mirth and scorn—
These are all shall befall
—Any woman born.

Jewel-laden are my hands,
—Tall my stone above—
Do not weep that I sleep,
—Who was wise in love.

Where I walk, a shadow gray
—Through gray asphodel,
I am glad, who have had
—All that Life could tell.

'Twas granted:—but the bitter god of Love,
As in revenge for some disparagement,
Left us to strive, inextricably blent,
Before we knew in truth for what we strove,
Or why we went, unwillingly, who went,
Or whether driven, or who he was that drove.
The countless haps that draw vague heart to heart,
The countless hands that push true hearts apart—
Of these we nothing recked, and nothing knew.
The wonder of the world, the faint surmise,
The clouded looks of hate, the harrowing eyes,
But pierced and pinned together: 'twas one to us.

A poet's moonshine! Yes, for love must lend
Answer to reason, though 'tis bitter breath.
Better wild roses died their natural death
Than evilly or idly them to rend.
The girl was fair as flower the moon beneath,
Gentle and good, and constant to her friend,
Yet out of her own place, not so complete:
Was wedded to her kind—had leave to lack,
But old associations rarely slip.
Tight as a stem of grass within its sheath,
You yet may draw and nibble, touch the sweet
With the tip tongue and browse the tender end

G OD'S Silence! Holiest speech that is
Is but a dew-fall out of this;
And human Love's own tongues of bliss
But broken language caught from His.

Why should we question, though our cry—
“Lord, hear me—answer, or I die!”—
Seems echoed from an empty sky?
He hears—He answers, utterly.

“Lord, answer!” And with shuddering breath,
As those already doomed to death,
We wait for Him who rescueth
The very bird that perisheth.

O sword of doubt, two-edged with pain,
That cuts the quivering heart in twain!

When kindly years have given me grace
To read your spirit through;
To see the starlight on your face,
Upon your hair the dew;

To touch the fingers of your hands,
The shining wealth they hold;
To find in dim and dreamy lands
That tender dusks enfold

The ancient sorrows that were sealed,
The hidden wells of joy,
The secrets that were unrevealed
To one who was a boy.

Then to my patient ponderings
Will fruits of solace fall,
When I have learned through many Springs,
Mighty and mystical,

Just the gods are, and they were not willing
Any heart should bear a double burden.
So it is that, when they gave to woman
Love and its anguish.

Man they made the singer and the seer,
Laid on him the burden of the message,
Bade him voice the gladness and the travail
Borne by the world-soul.

So man sang; but ever, as they listened,
Something lacked, some depth of pain unfathomed,
Some starred height of self-outsoaring rapture
He could not compass.

Something too they missed of patient, lowly