romantic poems

You promised me, a year ago,
When autumn bleach'd the mistletoe,
That you and I should be as one;
But now another autumn's gone —
Its solemn knell is in the blast,
And love's bright sun is overcast;
Yet flowers will bloom and birds will sing,
And e'en the winter claim the spring.

By A Cottage Near A Wood
Where The Small Birds Build & Sing
In My Dreaming Hours I've Stood
To Review The Lovely Spring
There Once Dwelt A Lovely Maiden
Whose Name I Sought In Vain
Some Called Her Lovely Lucey
& Others Honest Jane

Bye That Cottage Near A Wood
I Have Often Stood Alone
In A Sad Or Happy Mood
& Wished She Was My Own
The Small Birds Flitted Round Me
But Nature Pleased in Vain
For The Dark & Lovely Maiden
I Never Saw Again.

Bye The Cottage Near The Wood

One Night plump Sue and Coachman Ned
A Bargain struck in haste to wed;
A Crown was stak'd, the Pair consented
To lose their Pledge, who first repented.
Time, for the Matrimonial Farce,
To-morrow, comes — — Ned hangs an A — se.
Of bad the best poor Suky makes,
And angry claims his forfeit Stakes.
Ned frankly paid it as agreed,
Of a worse Bargain to be freed;
Quoth he — Thou'rt welcome on my Life ,
A cheap Divorcement from a Wife!
— The crafty Quean, who feign'd a while,
Soon answer'd with a jeering Smile,

Advise your Friend, grave Man of Art!
I find a strange unusual Smart:
'Tis here — fierce Symptoms at my Heart.
Discover .

'Tis Pleasure, Pain, a mixt Degree —
My Pulse examine, here's your Fee.
What think you can my Sickness be?
A Lover .

A Lover! 'tis my Case, too sure!
O ease me strait, I'll not endure;
Prescribe, I'll follow close the Cure.

Come hearken good friends to this story so true
Of a lord of high degree;
Concerning the love of this bonny young prince,
The King of his own countree.

His true love so fair from a far distant shore,
No lands and no gold had she;
But he swore by the seal of the ring on his hand
That faithful he'd ever be.

His brothers were wrath, and his mother she wept,
Saying, " Son, take warning from me!
The one that you love is of humble birth
And a Queen she could never be. "

A pretty fair miss all in the garden,
A journeyole soldier passing by.
He did stop and kindly address her
By saying, " Kind miss, will you marry me? "

" No, kind sir, a man of honor,
A man of honor you may be.
Would you impose upon a lady
Whose bride to you is not to be? "

" I have a sweetheart cross the ocean,
He has been gone for seven long year,
And if he's dead, I hope he is happy,
Or in some battle being slain.

" And if he is to some fair girl married,

She alone knew, of victors first and best,
To fold the vanquished to her pardoning breast:
To gather 'neath her wings, in one great brood,
The tribes of Man, by might, then love, subdued,
Mother, not Queen, calling those sons by birth
Whom she had conquered — linking ends of Earth.

If I create wealth beyond the dream of past ages and increase not love, my heat is the flush of fever and my success will deal death.
Though I have foresight to locate the fountains of riches, and power to pre-empt them, and skill to tap them, and have no loving vision for humanity, I am blind.
Though I give of my profits to the poor and make princely endowments for those who toil for me, if I have no human fellowship of love with them, my life is barren and doomed.

Come, love, help me move all the mirrors out of my workshop,
All the sore spots out of my heart!
You only can give me what I need;
A steel girder faith to build on,
The feel of tomorrow in my land.
Andante of a happy city's hundred thousand feet,
Keeping step in a grand procession,
Telling the world they walk in peace and freedom,
Broadcasting a forever and ever armistice day.

Friend, if the mute and shrouded dead
Are touched at all by tears,
By love long fled and friendship sped
And the unreturning years,

O then, to her that early died,
O doubt not, bridegroom, to thy bride
Thy love is sweet and sweeteneth
The very bitterness of death.