poems about love

THE MOCKERY OF LIFE
God! What a mockery is this life of ours!
Cast forth in blood and pain from our mother's womb,
Most like an excrement, and weeping showers
Of senseless tears: unreasoning, naked, dumb,
The symbol of all weakness and the sum:
Our very life a sufferance.--Presently,
Grown stronger, we must fight for standing--room
Upon the earth, and the bare liberty
To breathe and move. We crave the right to toil.
We push, we strive, we jostle with the rest.
We learn new courage, stifle our old fears,

TO ONE TO WHOM HE HAD BEEN UNJUST
If I was angry once that you refused
The bread I asked and offered me a stone,
Deeming the rights of bounty thus abused
And my poor beggary but trampled on,
Believe me now I would that wrong atone
With such submission as a heart can show,
Asking no bread of life but that alone
Your dear heart proffered and my pride let go.
Give me your help, your pity, what you will,
Your pardon for a sin, your act of grace
For a rebellion vanquished and undone,

FROM THE FRENCH OF ANVERS
My heart has its secret, my soul its mystery,
A love which is eternal begotten in a day.
The ill is long past healing. Why should I speak to--day?
For none have ears to hear, and, least of all, she.
Alas I shall have lived unseen tho' ever near,
For ever at her side, for ever too alone.
I shall have lived my life unknowing and unknown,
Asking naught, daring naught, receiving naught from her.
And she, whom Heaven made kind and chaste and fair,
Shall go undoubting on, the while upon her way

ON READING THE MEMOIRS OF M. D'ARTAGNAN
Why was I born in this degenerate age?
Or rather why, a thousand times, with soul
Of such degenerate stuff that a mute rage
Is all its reason, tears the only toll
It takes on life, and impotence its goal?
Why was I born to this sad heritage
Of fierce desires which cannot fate control,
Of idle hopes life never can assuage?
Why was I born thus weak?--Oh to have been
A merry fool, at jest with destiny;
A free hand ready and a heart as free;
A ruffler in the camps of Mazarin!

THE SAME CONTINUED
Again Love left you. With appealing eyes
You watched him go, and lips apart to speak.
He left you, and once more the sun did rise
And the sun set, and week trod close on week
And month on month, till you had reached the goal
Of forty years, and life's full waters grew
To bitterness and flooded all your soul,
Making you loathe old things and pine for new.
And you into the wilderness had fled,
And in your desolation loud did cry,
``Oh for a hand to turn these stones to bread!''

THE SAME CONTINUED
Your youth flowed on, a river chaste and fair,
Till thirty years were written to your name.
A wife, a mother, these the titles were
Which conquered for you the world's fairest fame.
In all things you were wise but in this one,
That of your wisdom you yourself did doubt.
Youth spent like age, no joy beneath the sun.
Your glass of beauty vainly running out.
Then suddenly again, ere well you knew,
Love looked upon you tenderly, yet sad:
``Are these wise follies, then, enough for you?''

THE THREE AGES OF WOMAN
Love, in thy youth, a stranger, knelt to thee,
With cheeks all red and golden locks all curled,
And cried, ``Sweet child, if thou wilt worship me,
Thou shalt possess the kingdoms of the world.''
But you looked down and said, ``I know you not,
Nor want I other kingdom than my soul.''
Till Love in shame, convicted of his plot,
Left you and turned him to some other goal.
And this discomfiture which you had seen
Long served you for your homily and boast,
While, of your beauty and yourself the queen,

TO ONE WHO SPOKE ILL OF HIM
What is your quarrel with me, in love's name,
Fair queen of wrath? What evil have I done,
What treason to the thought of our dear shame
Subscribed or plotted? Is my heart less one
In its obedience to your stern decrees
Than on the day when first you said ``I please,''
And with your lips ordained our union?
Am I not now, as then, upon my knees?
You bade me love you, and the deed was done,
And when you cried ``Enough'' I stopped, and when
You bade me go I went, and when you said

SIBYLLINE BOOKS
When first, a boy, at your fair knees I kneeled,
'Twas with a worthy offering. In my hand
My young life's book I held, a volume sealed,
Which none but you, I deemed, might understand.
And you I did entreat to loose the band
And read therein your own soul's destiny.
But, Tarquin--like, you turned from my demand,
Too proudly fair to find your fate in me.
When now I come, alas, what hands have turned
Those virgin pages! Some are torn away,
And some defaced, and some with passion burned,

HE APPEALS AGAINST HIS BOND
In my distress Love made me sign a bond,
A cruel bond. 'Twas by necessity
Wrung from a foolish heart, alas, too fond,
Too blindly fond, its error to foresee.
And now my soul's estate, in jeopardy,
Lies to a pledge it never can redeem.
Love's loan was love, one hour of ecstasy,
His penalty eternal loss of him.
--See, I am penniless, the forfeit paid,
And go a beggar forth from thy dear sight,
My pound of more than flesh too strictly weighed
And cut too near the heart. Fair Israelite,