romantic poems

All joy to mortals, joy and mirth
Eternal Io's sing;
The gods of love descend to earth,
Their darts have lost the sting.
The youth shall now complain no more
On Sylvia's needless scorn,
But she shall love, if he adore,
And melt when he shall burn.

The nymph no longer shall be shy,
But leave the jilting road;
And Daphne now no more shall fly
The wounded panting God;
But all shall be serene and fair,
No sad complaints of love
Shall fill the gentle whispering air,
No echoing sighs the grove.

The Parlour of a Public House. Two young men, Morris and Hamish.

HAMISH . Come, why so moody, Morris? Either talk,
Or drink, at least.
MORRIS . I'm wondering about Love.
HAMISH . Ho, are you there, my boy? Who may it be?
MORRIS . I'm not in love; but altogether posed
I am by lovers.
HAMISH . They're a simple folk:
I'm one.
MORRIS . It's you I'm mainly thinking of.
HAMISH . Why, that's an honour, surely.
MORRIS . Now if I loved

What shall we do for Love these days?
How shall we make an altar-blaze
To smite the horny eyes of men
With the renown of our Heaven,
And to the unbelievers prove
Our service to our dear god, Love?
What torches shall we lift above
The crowd that pushes through the mire,
To amaze the dark heads with strange fire?
I should think I were much to blame,
If never I held some fragrant flame
Above the noises of the world,
And openly 'mid men's hurrying stares,
Worshipped before the sacred fears

We are thine, O Love, being in thee and made of thee,
As thou, Love, were the deep thought
And we the speech of the thought; yea, spoken are we,
Thy fires of thought out-spoken:

But burn'd not through us thy imagining
Like fierce mood in a song caught,
We were as clamour'd words a fool may fling,
Loose words, of meaning broken.

For what more like the brainless speech of a fool, —
The lives travelling dark fears,
And as a boy throws pebbles in a pool
Thrown down abysmal places?

Ad amicam, a cuius amore discedere non potest

Long have I borne much, mad thy faults me make:
Dishonest love, my wearied breast forsake!
Now have I freed myself, and fled the chain,
And what I have borne, shame to bear again.
We vanquish, and tread tamed Love under feet,
Victorious wreaths at length my temples greet.
Suffer, and harden: good grows by this grief,
Oft bitter juice brings to the sick relief.
I have sustained so oft thrust from the door,
To lay my body on the hard moist floor.

Ad Macrum, quod de amoribus scribat

To tragic verse while thou Achilles train'st,
And new-sworn soldiers' maiden arms retain'st,
We, Macer, sit in Venus' slothful shade,
And tender love hath great things hateful made.
Often at length, my wench depart I bid,
She in my lap sits still as erst she did.
I said, " It irks me"; half to weeping framed,
" Aye me," she cries, " to love why art ashamed?"
Then wreathes about my neck her winding arms,
And thousand kisses gives, that work my harms.

Quod amet mulieres, cuiuscunque formae sint

I mean not to defend the scapes of any,
Or justify my vices being many.
For I confess, if that might merit favour,
Here I display my lewd and loose behaviour.
I loathe, yet after that I loathe I run;
O how the burden irks, that we should shun.
I cannot rule myself, but where love please
Am driven like a ship upon rough seas.
No one face likes me best, all faces move,
A hundred reasons make me ever love.
If any eye me with a modest look,

Ad amicam

I ask but right: let her that caught me late
Either love, or cause that I may never hate.
I ask too much: would she but let me love her;
Love knows with such like prayers I daily move her.
Accept him that will serve thee all his youth,
Accept him that will love with spotless truth.
If lofty titles cannot make me thine,
That am descended but of knightly line
(Soon may you plough the little land I have;
I gladly grant my parents given to save),
Apollo, Bacchus and the Muses may,

I know a spot where Love delights to dream,
Because he finds his fancies happen true.
Within its fence no myrtle ever grew
That failed in wealth of flower; no sunny beam
Has used its vantage vainly. You might deem
Yourself a happy plant and blossom too,
Or be a bird and sing as thrushes do,
So sweet in that fair place doth nature seem.
A matted vine invests the rocks above,
And tries to kiss a runlet leaping through
With endless laughter. Hither at noon comes Love,
And woos the god who is not hard to woo,

‘ WE LOVE THE SHRILL TRUMPET ’

We love the shrill trumpet, we love the drum's rattle,
They call us to sport, and they call us to battle;
And old Scotland shall laugh at the threats of a stranger,
While our comrades in pastime are comrades in danger.

If there 's mirth in our house, 't is our neighbor that shares it—
If peril approach, 't is our neighbor that dares it;
And when we lead off to the pipe and the tabor,
The fair hand we press is the hand of a neighbor.