romantic poems

She was a wet nurse, but I was afraid.
Night and day, “My child,” she sobbed,
“I'm all bones,” and saying, “If I die,”
with love fiercer than mother's,
held me tight.—As if to say, “I'll be sad.”

She was a wet nurse, but how afraid I was.
Devotion, a moment before death;
her tearless, aged eyes
with love fiercer than mother's
stared at me—bluish white.

She was a wet nurse, but I can't forget her.
Aggrieved, confused with doubts,
she huddled up like water when I cried,

When the rose becomes incarnate in the lips, of woman, sweet
Will the night's arms be to dream in and the morn's embrace to meet:
When the sea's soul pours its pureness through the eyes of woman, then
Will the angel flash forth godlike through the answering eyes of men.

Woe to man who sees too clearly all love's mystic inner deeps,
For eternal pain pursues him when he wakes or when he sleeps;
Anguish changeless, everlasting,—for he knows love's heaven too well
And he seeks on earth to find it, and he finds not heaven, but hell.

O Earth! Earth! Earth heare thou my voice, and be
Loving, and gentle for to cover me;
Banish'd from thee I live; ne'r to return,
Unlesse thou giv'st my small Remains an Urne.

It is already Autumn, and not in my heart only,
The leaves are on the ground,
Green leaves untimely browned,
The leaves bereft of Summer, my heart of Love left lonely.

Swift, in the masque of seasons, the moment of each mummer,
And even so fugitive
Love's hour, Love's hour to live:
Yet, leaves, ye have had your rapture, and thou, poor heart, thy Summer!

As a most happy mother feels the stir
Of that new life which quickens with her life,
And knows that virtue has gone forth from her
To doubly sanctify the name of wife;
Yet, for her joy's sake, and because her pride
Is too unutterably sanctified,
And all the heaven of heavens within her breast
Too dearly and too intimately possessed,
Speaks not a word, but folds her new delight
With a rapt silence, comforting as night;
So, when I felt the quickening life that came
To bid my life's long-slumbering currents move,

Once I smiled when I saw you, when I saw you smile I was glad,
And the joy of my heart was as foam that the sea-wind shakes from the sea;
But the smile of your eyes grows strange, and the smile that my lips have had
Trembles back to my heart, and my heart trembles in me.

Once you laughed when you met me, when you met me your voice was gay
As the voice of a bird in the dawn of the day on a sun-shiny tree;
But the sound of your voice grows strange, and the words that you do not say
Thrill from your heart to mine, and my heart trembles in me.

Child, in those gravely-smiling eyes,
What memory sits apart and hears
A litany of low replies,
Love's music, in a lover's ears?

Love in your heart, a guest unsought,
Unfeared, and never known for Love,
Softer than music to the thought,
Sings in an unknown tongue of love.

Once wandering in Flora's bowers
To gather wreaths of fragrant flowers,
I found love's god asleep
Among the roses; in my wine
I plunged him—of the draught divine
I drank a potion deep.
Now in my limbs I feel the sting
Of his light pinions fluttering.

The gods said Love is blind. The earth was young
With foolish, youthful laughter when iTheard;
It caught and spoke the letter of the words,
And from that time till now hath said and sung,
“Oh, Love is blind! The falsest face and tongue
Can cheat him, once his passion's thrill is stirred:
He is so blind, poor Love!”
Strange none demurred
At this, nor saw how hollow false it rang,
When all men know that sightless men can tell
Unnumbered things which vision cannot find.
Powers of the air are leagued to guide them well;

What do I love him for? His lustrous eyes
Of mirrored sea-change, deep as yonder wave:
Or yet the wonder of his spirits rise
When laughter woos him from reflection grave.
Or is it for the tender suppliant way
He has in seeking me at close of day
To put his head upon my breast and say
A thousand times he loves me? Is it for
His ardent lips or gentle hand's caress,
Or yet his midnight locks that I adore?
Not for these charms I love him,—nor not less
Were he to lack them: nay, I worship more
The Inner-Being in its loveliness!