poems about love

At my threshold stands a guest;
Shall I, dare I, bid him enter?
'T is the very dead of winter;
Snowy roads his feet have pressed;
Inhospitably I wait,
Trembling, still I hesitate.

With his wings he veils his face,
And a glory half divine
Like a nimbus seems to shine
Round him, making bright the place.
Cold the night, and yet I stand,
On the latch a halting hand.

What if I should bid him come,
And with him should enter Woe?
For 't is whispered, well we know,
That the pair together roam;

If I had chosen, my tears had all been dews;
I would have drawn a bird's or blossom's breath,
Nor outmoaned yonder dove. I did not choose—
And here is Life for me, and there is Death.

Ay, here is Life. Bloom for me, violet;
Whisper me, Love, all things that are not true;
Sing, nightingale and lark, till Iforget—
For here is Life, and I have need of you.

So, there is Death. Fade, violet, from the land;
Cease from your singing, nightingale and lark;
Forsake me, Love, for I without your hand

My love
Is like the grasses
Hidden in the deep mountain:
Though its abundance increases,
There is none that knows.

“If there were any power in human love,”
Or in th' intensest longing of the heart,
Then should the oceans and the lands that part
Ye from my sight all unprevailing prove,
Then should the yearning of my bosom bring
Ye here, through space and distance infinite;
And life 'gainst love should be a baffled thing,
And circumstance 'gainst will lose all its might.
Shall not a childless mother's misery
Conjure the earth with such a potent spell—
A charm so desperate—as to compel
Nature to yield to her great agony?

I long to speak the deepest words I have to say to you;
but I dare not, for fear you should laugh.
That is why I laugh at myself and shatter my secret in jest.
I make light of my pain, afraid you should do so.

I long to tell you the truest words I have to say to you;
but I dare not, being afraid that you would not believe them.
That is why I disguise them in untruth,
saying the contrary of what I mean.
I make my pain appear absurd, afraid that you should do so.

I long to use the most precious words I have for you;

Although P'yongyang is my capital,
Although I love the repaired city,
Instead of parting I'd rather stop spinning
If you love me I'll follow you with tears.

Were the pearls to fall on the rock,
Would the thread be broken?
If I parted from you a thousand years,
Would my heart be changed?

Not knowing how wide the river is,
You pushed the boat off, boatman.
Not knowing how loose your wife is,
You had my love board the ferry, boatman.

The flower beyond the Taedong River,
When he has crossed the shore

Love has crept out of her sealèd heart
As a field-bee, black and amber,
Breaks from the winter-cell, to clamber
Up the warm grass where the sunbeams start.

Mischief has come in her dawning eyes,
And a glint of coloured iris brings
Such as lies along the folded wings
Of the bee before he flies.

Who, with a ruffling, careful breath,
Has opened the wings of the wild young sprite?
Has fluttered her spirit to stumbling flight
In her eyes, as a young bee stumbleth?

Love makes the burden of her voice.

Once I was young, and fancy was my all,
My love, my joy, my grief, my hope, my fear,
And ever ready as an infant's tear,
Whate'er in Fancy's kingdom might befal,
Some quaint device had Fancy still at call,
With seemly verse to greet the coming cheer;
Such grief to soothe, such airy hope to rear,
To sing the birth-song, or the funeral,
Of such light love, it was a pleasant task;
But ill accord the quirks of wayward glee,
That wears affliction for a wanton mask,
With woes that bear not Fancy's livery;

Lord God, I have been guilty in my life,
Yet worshiped Beauty, and aspire to make
A work that shall have love and faith, heart-break,
Passion and joy and triumph after strife,
And all the glow wherewith the sky is rife.

And I implore thee, Master, for the sake
Of this, the longing of my soul, to give
Thy potent aid: since thou art pain and bliss
And faith and love and everything that is.
Look down upon my work and let it live
And be for ever lovely; and for this
Great boon of thine, I swear to do Thy will

The meteor's arc of quiet; a voiceless rain;
The mist's mute communing with a stagnant moat;
The sigh of a flower that has neglected lain;
That bell's unuttered note:

A hidden self rebels, its slumber broken;
Love secret as crystal forms within the womb;
The heart may as faithfully beat, the vow unspoken;
All sounds to silence come.