Love

I ne'er was struck before that hour
With love so sudden and so sweet.
Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower
And stole my heart away complete.
My face turned pale as deadly pale,
My legs refused to walk away,
And when she looked "what could I ail?"
My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face
And took my sight away.
The trees and bushes round the place
Seemed midnight at noonday.
I could not see a single thing,
Words from my eyes did start;
They spoke as chords do from the string
And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter's choice?
Is love's bed always snow?
She seemed to hear my silent voice
And love's appeal to know.
I never saw so sweet a face
As that I stood before:
My hea...

Love gives us copious potions of delight,
    Of pain and ecstasy, and peace and care;
Love leads us upward, to the mountain height,
    And, like an angel, stands beside us there;
Then thrusts us, demon-like, in some abyss:
    Where, in the darkness of despair, we grope,
Till, suddenly, Love greets us with a kiss
    And guides us back to flowery fields of hope.

Love makes all wisdom seem but poorest folly,
    And yet the simplest mind with Love grows wise,
The gayest heart he teaches melancholy,
    Yet glorifies the erstwhile brooding eyes.
Love lives on change, and yet at change Love mocks,
    For Love's whole life is one great paradox.

Some act of Love's bound to reherse,
I thought to bind him, in my verse:
Which when he felt, Away (quoth he)
Can Poets hope to fetter me?
It is enough, they once did get
Mars, and my Mother, in their net:
I weare not these my wings in vaine.
With which he fled me: and againe,
Into my rimes could ne're be got
By any art. Then wonder not,
That since, my numbers are so cold,
When Love is fled, and I grow old.

I

How warm this woodland wild Recess!
Love surely hath been breathing here;
And this sweet bed of heath, my dear!
Swells up, then sinks with faint caress,
As if to have you yet more near.

II

Eight springs have flown, since last I lay
On sea-ward Quantock's heathy hills,
Where quiet sounds from hidden rills
Float hear and there, like things astray,
And high o'er head the sky-lark shrills.

III

No voice as yet had made the air
Be music with your name; yet why
That asking look? that yearning sigh?
That sense of promise every where?
Belovéd! flew your spirit by?

IV

As when a mother doth explore
The rose-mark on her long-lost child,
I met, I loved you, maiden mild!
As whom I long had loved befor...

Upon a day, a merry day,
When summer in her best,
Like Sunday belles, prepares for play,
And joins each merry guest,
A maid, as wild as is a bird
That never knew a cage,
Went out her parents' kine to herd,
And Jocky, as her page,

Must needs go join her merry toils;

A silly shepherd he,
And little thought the aching broils
That in his heart would be;
For he as yet knew nought of love,
And nought of love knew she;
Yet without learning love can move
The wildest to agree.

The wind, enamoured of the maid,
Around her drapery swims,
And moulds in luscious masquerade
Her lovely shape and limbs.
Smith's "Venus stealing Cupid's bow"
In marble hides as fine;
But hers were life and soul, whose glow
Makes meaner things d...

Illius est nobis lege colendus amor

On her own terms, O lover, must thou take
The heart's beloved: be she kind, 'tis well,
Cruel, expect no more; not for thy sake
But for the fire in thee that melts her snows
For a brief spell
She loves thee - "loves" thee!    Though thy heart should break,
Though thou shouldst lie athirst for her in hell,
    She could not pity thee: who of the Rose,
Or of the Moon, asks pity, or return
    Of love for love? and she is even as those.
Beauty is she, thou Love, and thou must learn,
O lover, this:
Thine is she for the music thou canst pour
    Through her white limbs, the madness, the deep dream;
Thine, while thy kiss
    Can sweep her flaming with thee down the stream
That is not thou nor she but merely bliss;...

The Spring of life is o'er with me,
And love and all gone by;
Like broken bough upon yon tree,
I'm left to fade and die.
Stern ruin seized my home and me,
And desolate's my cot:
Ruins of halls, the blasted tree,
Are emblems of my lot.

I lived and loved, I woo'd and won,
Her love was all to me,
But blight fell o'er that youthful one,
And like a blasted tree
I withered, till I all forgot
But Mary's smile on me;
She never lived where love was not,
And I from bonds was free.

The Spring it clothed the fields with pride,
When first we met together;
And then unknown to all beside
We loved in sunny weather;
We met where oaks grew overhead,
And whitethorns hung with may;
Wild thyme beneath her feet was spread,
And cows in ...

Love, though it is not chill and cold,
But burning like eternal fire,
Is yet not of approaches bold,
Which gay dramatic tastes admire.
Oh timid love, more fond than free,
In daring song is ill pourtrayed,
Where, as in war, the devotee
By valour wins each captive maid;--

Where hearts are prest to hearts in glee,
As they could tell each other's mind;
Where ruby lips are kissed as free,
As flowers are by the summer wind.
No! gentle love, that timid dream,
With hopes and fears at foil and play,
Works like a skiff against the stream,
And thinking most finds least to say.

It lives in blushes and in sighs,
In hopes for which no words are found;
Thoughts dare not speak but in the eyes,
The tongue is left without a sound.
The pert and fo...

Dreaming of love, the ardent mind of youth
    Conceives it one with passion's brief delights,
With keen desire and rapture.    But, in truth,
    These are but milestones to sublime heights
After the highways, swept by strong emotions,
    Where wild winds blow and blazing sun rays beat,
After the billows of tempestuous oceans,
    Fair mountain summits wait the lover's feet.

The path is narrow, but the view is wide,
    And beauteous the outlook towards the west
Happy are they who walk there side by side,
    Leaving below the valleys of unrest,
And on the radiant altitudes above
Know the serene intensity of love.

"Entre deux amants il y a toujours l'an qui baise et l'autre qui tend la joue."


I says he loves me well, and I
Believe it; in my hands, to make
Or mar, his life lies utterly,
Nor can I the strong plea deny.
Which claims my love for his love's sake.

He says there is no face so fair
As mine; when I draw near, his eyes
Light up; each ripple of my hair
He loves; the very clunk I wear
He touches fondly where it lies.

And roses, roses all the way,
Upon my path fall, strewed by him;
His tenderness by night, by day,
Keeps faithful watch to heap alway
My cup of pleasure to the brim.

The other women, full of spite,
Count me the happiest woman born
To be so worshipped; I delight
To flaunt his homage in their sight,--
For ...

Come when the nights are bright with stars
Or when the moon is mellow;
Come when the sun his golden bars
Drops on the hay-field yellow.
Come in the twilight soft and gray,
Come in the night or come in the day,
Come, O love, whene'er you may,
And you are welcome, welcome.

You are sweet, O Love, dear Love,
You are soft as the nesting dove.
Come to my heart and bring it rest
As the bird flies home to its welcome nest.

Come when my heart is full of grief
Or when my heart is merry;
Come with the falling of the leaf
Or with the redd'ning cherry.
Come when the year's first blossom blows,
Come when the summer gleams and glows,
Come with the winter's drifting snows,
And you are welcome, welcome.

Smoothing soft the nestling head
Of a maiden fancy-led,
Thus a grave-eyed woman said:

"Richest gifts are those we make,
Dearer than the love we take
That we give for love's own sake.

"Well I know the heart's unrest;
Mine has been the common quest,
To be loved and therefore blest.

"Favors undeserved were mine;
At my feet as on a shrine
Love has laid its gifts divine.

"Sweet the offerings seemed, and yet
With their sweetness came regret,
And a sense of unpaid debt.

"Heart of mine unsatisfied,
Was it vanity or pride
That a deeper joy denied?

"Hands that ope but to receive
Empty close; they only live
Richly who can richly give.

"Still," she sighed, with moistening eyes,
"Love is sweet in any g...

1.
The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the Ocean,
The winds of Heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one spirit meet and mingle.
Why not I with thine? -

2.
See the mountains kiss high Heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What is all this sweet work worth
If thou kiss not me?

Some poets sing of sweethearts dead,
    Some sing of true loves far away;
Some sing of those that others wed,
    And some of idols turned to clay.
    I sing a pensive roundelay
To sweethearts of a doubtful lot,
    The passions vanished in a day,
The little loves that I've forgot.

For, as the happy years have sped,
    And golden dreams have changed to gray,
How oft the flame of love was fed
    By glance, or smile, from Maud or May,
    When wayward Cupid was at play;
Mere fancies, formed of who knows what,
    But still my debt I ne'er can pay,
The little loves that I've forgot.

O joyous hours forever fled!
    O sudden hopes that would not stay!
Held only by the slender thread
    Of memory that's all astray.
    Their ver...

Love me. I care not what the circling years
To me may do.
If, but in spite of time and tears,
You prove but true.

Love me--albeit grief shall dim mine eyes,
And tears bedew,
I shall not e'en complain, for then my skies
Shall still be blue.

Love me, and though the winter snow shall pile,
And leave me chill,
Thy passion's warmth shall make for me, meanwhile,
A sun-kissed hill.

And when the days have lengthened into years,
And I grow old,
Oh, spite of pains and griefs and cares and fears,
Grow thou not cold.

Then hand and hand we shall pass up the hill,
I say not down;
That twain go up, of love, who 've loved their fill,--
To gain love's crown.

Love me, and let my life take up thine own,
As sun the dew.
...

    One day, when Love and Summer both were young,
        Love in a garden found my lady weeping;
    Whereat, when he to kiss her would have sprung,
        I stayed his childish leaping.

    "Forbear," said I, "she is not thine to-day;
        Subdue thyself in silence to await her;
    If thou dare call her from Death's side away
        Thou art no Love, but traitor.

    Yet did he run, and she his kiss received,
        "She is twice mine," he cried, "since she is troubled;
    I knew but half, and now I see her grieved
        My part in her is doubled."

Who says I wrong thee, my half-opened rose?
Little he knows of thee or me, or love. -
I am so tender of thy fragile youth,
Yea, in my hours of wildest ecstasy,
Keeping close-bitted each careering sense.
Only I give mine eyes unmeasured law
To feed them where they will, and their delight
Was curbed at first, until thy tender shame
Died in the bearing of thy first born joy.

I am not cruel, my half-opened rose,
Though in the sunshine of my own desire
I have uncurled thy petals to the light
And fed the tendrils of thy dawning sense
With delicate caresses, till they leave
Thee tremulous with the newness of thy joy,
Sharing thy lover's fire with innocent flame.

Others will wrong thee, that I well foresee,
Being a man, knowing my fellow men,

Deem not my love is only for the bloom,
The honey and the marble, that is You;
Tis so, Belovéd, common loves consume
Their treasury, and vanish like the dew.
Nay, but my love's a thing that's far more true;
For little loves a little hour hath room,
But not for us their brief and trivial doom,
In a far richer soil our loving grew,
From deeper wells of being it upsprings;
Nor shall the wildest kiss that makes one mouth,
    Draining all nectar from the flowered world,
Slake its divine unfathomable drouth;
    And, when your wings against my heart lie furled,
With what a tenderness it dreams and sings!