romantic poems

Tir'd with vain hopes, and with complaints as vain,
Of anxious love's alternate joy and pain,
Inconstant fortune's favour and her hate,
And unperforming friendships of the great;
Here both contented and resign'd, I lye;
Here learn to live; nor wish, nor fear to die.

Ask me no more but love,
— See, the west is all roses! —
Darkness comes down from above;
No more — the hour closes;

Ask me no more but love,
I have no other might.
Sun of my dusk, dream of my dawn, I come to you
Sure as the stars to-night!

TO STELLA

Ev'ning, now, from purple wings,
Sheds the grateful gifts she brings;
Brilliant drops bedeck the mead,
Cooling breezes shake the reed;
Shake the reed, and curl the stream,
Silver'd o'er with Cynthia 's beam.
Near, the chequer'd, lonely grove
Hears, and keeps thy secrets, Love.—
Stella ! thither let us stray,
Lightly o'er the dewy way;
Phœbus drives his burning car
Hence, my lovely Stella , far;
In his stead, the Queen of Night
Round us pours a lambent light;

I had you for a servant, once, Dick Brome;
And you performed a servant's faithful parts:
Now, you are got into a nearer room,
Of fellowship, professing my old arts.
And you do do them well, with good applause,
Which you have justly gained from the stage,
By observation of those comic laws
Which I, your master, first did teach the age.
You learned it well; and, for it, served your time,
A prenticeship: which few do nowadays.
Now each court hobby-horse will wince in rhyme;
Both learned, and unlearned, all write plays.

In many ways does the full heart reveal
The presence of the love it would conceal;
But in far more th' estranged heart lets know
The absence of the love, which yet it fain would shew.
[before May 1827]

Lady. If Love be dead —
Poet. And I aver it!
Lady. Tell me, Bard! where Love lies buried?
Poet. Love lies buried where 'twas born:
Oh, gentle dame! think it no scorn
If, in my fancy, I presume
To call thy bosom poor Love's Tomb.
And on that tomb to read the line: —
" Here lies a Love that once seem'd mine,
But caught a chill, as I divine,
And died at length of a Decline."

Made worthy by excess of Love
A wretch thro' power of Happiness,
And poor from wealth, I dare not use.

This separation is, alas!
Too great a punishment to bear:
O take my Life, or let me pass
That Life, that happy Life, with her!

The dazzling charm of outward Form,
The power of Gold, the pride of Birth,
Have taken Woman's heart by storm,
Supplied the place of inward worth.

Is not true Love of higher price,
Than outward Form, tho' fair to see,
Wealth's glitt'ring fairy-dome of Ice,

Two wedded Hearts, if e'er were such,
Imprison'd in adjoining cells
Across whose thin partition wall
The Builder left one narrow rent,
And there most content in discontent
A Joy with itself at strife,
Die into an intenser Life/

Another Version

The Builder left one narrow rent,
Two wedded Hearts, if e'er were such,
Contented most in discontent
There cling, and try in vain to touch!
O Joy with thy own Joy at Strife,
That yearning for the Realm above
Would'st die into intenser Life,

The singing Kettle & the purring Cat,
The gentle Breathing of the cradled Babe,
The silence of the Mother's love-bright Eye,
And tender Smile answ'ring its smile of Sleep.

Come, come, thou bleak December Wind,
And blow the dry Leaves from the Tree!
Flash, like a Love-thought, thro' me, Death
And take a Life, that wearies me.