romantic poems

How comely is our motherland,
With joy for every eye!
O'er sunlit vales her mountains stand,
Her prairies kiss the sky.
From many an autumn-bordered lake
Her fair streams seek the shore.
We love her for her beauty's sake,
But most for something more.

What vigor in her throb and tread!
How dauntless is her mind!
She plants that continents be fed,
And never looks behind.
The magic of her lamp and tower
O'ermates Aladdin's lore.
We love her for her bounteous power,
But most for something more.

To love none , all to doubt , to fawn, to flatter,
 To form new faces , and transform true hearts ,
To offer service, and forget the matter,
 Are courtier's principles and practis'd arts.

See thou, my joy, my care,
How many a wondrous thing
In me thou art perfecting
Through beauties beyond compare:

So utterly thine eyes,
Thy laughter and thy grace,
Thy brow, thy hair, thy face
Fashioned in angel's guise,

Do burn me, since the day
When first I knew thereof,
Longing with passion of love
To win them in love's sweet way,

That but for the saving tears
My life is bedewed withal,
Long since beyond recall
'Twere wasted by heat that sears.

As the young stag, when lusty Spring supreme
O'er Winter's biting cold at last prevails,
To crop the honeyed leafage seeks new trails
And leaves his dear retreat at dawn's first gleam;

Alone, secure, afar (as he may deem)
From bay of hounds, or hunters' echoing hails,
Now on the mountain-slopes, now in the vales,
Now by the waters of a secret stream,

He wantons freely, at his own sweet will,
Knowing no fear of net or bow, until,
Pierced with one dart, he lies dead in his pride —

To think one thought a hundred hundred ways,
'Neath two loved eyes to lay your heart quite bare,
To drink the bitter liquor of despair
And eat forever ashes of lost days—

In spirit and flesh to know youth's bloom decays,
To die of pain, yet swear no pain is there,
The more you sue, to move the less your fair,
Yet make her wish, the law your life obeys—

Anger that passes, faith that cannot move;
Far dearer than yourself your foe to love;
To build a thousand vain imaginings,

P ERRAULT the Frenchman needs would prove
The ancients knew not how to love ;
Yet spite of all that he has said,
'Tis sure they wo'd , and won and wed ;
The case beyond dispute is clear,
Or else, how came the MODERNS here?

Maker of love and longing!
Thou fountain of our tears!
When in one night come thronging
The memories of years,
God of the fallen sparrow!
God of the mateless dove!
Give to her lonely sorrow
The solace of Thy love.

Soft-waving sheet of water! When a boy,
My heart responded to thy look of joy;
'Twas my delight to sit upon thy shore,
And hear thy billows breaking at my feet;
Not, like the ocean's, with incessant roar,
But, like a sea-shell, low-voiced, hushed and sweet.
'Twas my delight from the uprising hill —
The great sun sinking in the crimson west —
To gaze across thy scarcely-ruffled breast,
On those dark pines that rise in grandeur still,
As high, as graceful, and as richly green,
As when in youth I loved the lovely scene.

As I lay in the early sun,
Stretched in the grass, I thought upon
My true love, my dear love,
Who has my heart for ever,
Who is my happiness when we meet,
My sorrow when we sever.
She is all fire when I do burn,
Gentle when I moody turn,
Brave when I am sad and heavy
And all laughter when I am merry.
And so I lay and dreamed and dreamed,
And so the day wheeled on,
While all the birds with thoughts like mine
Were singing to the sun.

I

Love the Conqueror came to me, —
He whom I did long deride, —
Gave humility for pride,
April voicing
My rejoicing
I — who fancied I was free —
Glad to be with garlands tied!

II

Love the Awakener came to me;
Called my sleeping soul to strife,
Offered gift of fuller life
(Wish, the measure
Of my pleasure);
And the bud that knew no bee
Burst, a rose with beauty rife.

III

Love the Tester came to me;
For the paean gave the dirge,