Classic Poem

Thou knowest not what “hopeless love” may be?
How shouldst thou know, being worthy of all love?
How might thy merit ever tower above
In hopeless inaccessibility?
Free art thou as the wind that loves the sea,
The little hills and every trembling grove,
But like the wind, 'tis thine as well to rove
High heaven in calm and sure serenity.

Faint for thy breath a woodland pool lies still,
And cloistered round with leafage grows forlorn;
Rank weeds upon her marges do her ill,
Who once by thy swift couriers was borne
An April cloud, fashioned for thy delight
Now she in “hopeless love” wears out her night.