love poetry

Just a few themes,
Love, God, and glory,
Laughter and dreams,
Make all my story.

I croon them idly
In the sunbeams.
How to spread widely
Just a few themes?

Cemeteries are places for departed souls
And bones interred,
Or hearts with shattered loves.
A woman with lips made warm for laughter
Would find grey stones and roving spirits
Too chill for living, moving pulses . . .
And thou, great spirit, wouldst shiver in thy granite shroud
Should idle mirth or empty talk
Disturb thy tranquil sleeping.

A cemetery is a place for shattered loves
And broken hearts. . . .
Bowed before the crystal chalice of thy soul,
I find the multi-colored fragrance of thy mind

Love came to the Unlighted House
When all the world was dark and mute
As some dust-covered, stringless lute;
The bare trees shivered in the cold—
Poor trees that once knew flower and fruit;
On either hand lay heaped the snow
When silently as cravens go,
Love came to the Unlighted House.

Love came to the Unlighted House—
The windows stared like dead men's eyes
Set wide in unexplained surprise
Unkindled by the soul within;
The wide door closed on secrecies;
There came no sign to greet this guest

But true love is a durable fire,
In the mind ever burning,
Never sick, never old, never dead,
From itself never turning.

In March, when the winds begin to love,
and the world begins to crave,
I dream of my lady of the dead.
I go alone to her grave.

I go by the road that threads the woods——
a way that few men know.
I glance behind me, along the road——
for I always fear to go.

Long, long I stand by the sunken mound——
as long as I ever dare.
I often glance about the place,
for I know I should not be there.
Not for myself do I care,

but for the lady who loved me long,
with a love that well she hid——

There was an evil in Pandora's box
Beyond all other ones, yet it came forth
In guise so lovely, that men crowded round
And sought it as the dearest of all treasure.
Then were they stung with madness and despair;
High minds were bowed in abject misery.
The hero trampled on his laurell'd crown,
While genius broke the lute it waked no more.
Young maidens, with pale cheeks, and faded eyes,
Wept till they died. Then there were broken hearts—
Insanity—and Jealousy, that feeds
Unto satiety, yet loathes its food;

The rose and the lily, the moon and the dove,
Once loved I them all with a perfect love.
I love them no longer, I love alone
The Lovely, the Graceful, the Pure, the One
Who twines in one wreath all their beauty and love,
And rose is, and lily, and moon and dove.

As once, at midnight deep, I lay with sleepless eyes,
These words between the moth and light did me surprise.
The moth kisses the flame, and says, with tender sigh:
“Dear radiance! I rejoice from love for thee to die.
My love, thou diest not, yet anxious groans and strong
Break loudly from thy heart, through all the darkness long!”
The bright flame says, “O moth! whom love to me attracts,
Know that I also burn with love for this sweet wax.
Must I not groan, as more my lover melting sinks,
And from his life my fatal fire still deeper drinks?”

Lovely fairy! Charming sprite!
Kindly listen and appear,
Whether bathed in dewdrops bright,
Or in chrystal riv'lets clear.

Howe'er divine, the mortal youth
Yet hopes thy gentleness to move,
With the soft energy of truth,
And the prevailing voice of love.

Put down your pen, said love, and start again,
The pen has done for love all that the pen can do,
The pen has done all things but live, yet life is love.
Now I demand of you confirming deeds,
Demand the notes so long accrued—their pay in full,
The notes of prophet voices and poet rhymes and echoing formulas,
The notes of sinais, meccas, sepulchers and crosses,
In lieu of dead postponements long decreed.