love poetry

Love!—what is love? a mere machine, a spring
For freaks fantastic, a convenient thing,
A point to which each scribbling wight most steer,
Or vainly hope for food or favour here;
A summer's sigh; a winter's wistful tale:
A sound at which th' untutor'd maid turns pale;
Her soft eyes languish, and her bosom heaves,
And Hope delights as Fancy's dream deceives.

Thus speaks the heart which cold disgust invades,
When time instructs, and Hope's enchantment fades;
Through life's wide stage, from sages down to kings,

Think not 'cause men flattering say
Y' are fresh as April, sweet as May,
Bright as is the morning star,
That you are so; or though you are
Be not therefore proud, and deem
All men unworthy your esteem.
For, being so, you lose the pleasure
Of being fair, since that rich treasure
Of rare beauty and sweet feature
Was bestowed on you by nature
To be enjoyed, and 'twere a sin
There to be scarce where she hath been
So prodigal of her best graces;
Thus common beauties and mean faces
Shall have more pastime, and enjoy

Love whets the dullest wittes, his plagues be such;
But makes the wise, by pleasing, doat as much.
So wit is purchast by this dire disease:
Oh let me doat, so Love be bent to please.

All things are hushed, as Nature's self lay dead;
The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head,
The little birds in dreams their song repeat,
And sleeping flowers beneath the night-dew sweat;
Even lust and envy sleep, yet love denies
Rest to my soul and slumber to my eyes.

My dear love died last night;
Shall I clothe her in white?
My passionate love is dead,
Shall I robe her in red?
But nay, she was all untrue,
She shall not go drest in blue;
Still my desolate love was brave,
Unrobed let her go to her grave.

Open my heart and you will find
My Heliodora's name,
Soul of my soul, mind of my mind,
Two made by love the same.

I have a wish I dare not name
A wish I may not tell
But if thy bosom beats the same
Thy first guess aye may tell
I have a grief thats fain to flye
To find a place of rest
& could you love as well as I
That spot were easy guest

If life can own a thing so fair
To lift our love so high
That time & trouble cannot tire
& triumph when we die
If ere a thought earths joys can give
With death may ever be
Those that in other worlds shall live
Will be the thoughts of thee

O FAR-OFF darling in the South,
Where grapes are loading down the vine,
And songs are in the throstle's mouth,
While love's complaints are here in mine,
Turn from the blue Tyrrhenian Sea!
Come back to me! Come back to me!

Here all the Northern skies are cold,
And in their wintriness they say
(With warnings by the winds foretold)
That love may grow as cold as they!
How ill the omen seems to be!
Come back to me! Come back to me!

Come back, and bring thy wandering heart—
Ere yet it be too far estranged!

There breathed a soul of pearl and fear,
Who in his feign hath but weeping,
E'er he wrests from ill but cheer
That sorrows from love's beating.

The tale of an orb's purple
Was but the slumberer dim
From the space that let life joy therein,
From the winds of beastly trace.

The banner shade was the crayon oil
By the painted dives of monotonous swamps,
As if heat glowed the colors into beaten foil
Which stripes the path of lamps.

He never lived nor ate,
Nor breathed the wind;
And sat not with love

Though love has grown cold
The woods are bright with flowers,
Why not as of old
Go to the wildwood bowers
And dream of—bygone hours.