poems about love

Behold the Saviour of mankind
Nailed to the shameful tree!
How vast the love that him inclined
To bleed and die for thee!

Hark, how he groans! while nature shakes,
And earth's strong pillars bend;
The temple's veil in sunder breaks,
The solid marbles rend.

'Tis done! the precious ransom's paid,
'Receive my soul,' he cries!
See where he bows his sacred head!
He bows his head, and dies!

But soon he'll break death's envious chain,
And in full glory shine:
O Lamb of God! was ever pain,

Come let's adore the King of love,
And King of sufferings too:
For love it was that brought him down,
And set him here in wo.
Love drew him from his Paradise,
Where flow'rs that fade not grow:
And planted Him in our poor dust,
Among us weeds below.
Here for a time this heav'nly Plant
Fairly grew up and thriv'd:
Diffus'd its sweetnes all about,
And all in sweetnes liv'd.
But envious frosts, and furious storms
So long so fiercely chide:
This tender Flow'r at last bow'd down

Come, ye that love the Lord,
And let your joys be known;
Join in a song with sweet accord,
While ye surround his throne:
Let those refuse to sing
Who never knew our God;
But servants of the heavenly King
May speak their joys abroad.

The God that rules on high,
That all the earth surveys
That rides upon the stormy sky,
And calms the roaring seas-
This awful God is ours,
Our Father and our love;
He will send down his heavenly powers,
To carry us above.

Sinners, obey the gospel-word!
Haste to the supper of my Lord!
Be wise to know your gracious day;
All things are ready, come away!

Ready the Father is to own
And kiss his late-returning son;
Ready your loving Saviour stands,
And spreads for you his bleeding hands.

Ready the Spirit of his love
Just now the stony to remove,
To apply, and witness with the blood,
And wash and seal the sons of God.

Ready for you the angels wait,
To triumph in your blest estate;

O love, thou art victor in fight: thou mak'st all things afraid;
Thou couchest thee softly at night on the cheeks of a maid;
Thou passest the bounds of the sea, and the folds of the fields;
To thee the immortal, to thee the ephemeral yields;
Thou maddenest them that possess thee; thou turnest astray
The souls of the just, to oppress them, out of the way;
Thou hast kindled amongst us pride, and the quarrel of kin;
Thou art lord, by the eyes of a bride, and the love-light therein;

Come close to me, dear Annie, while I bind a lover's knot.
A tale of burning love between a kettle and a pot.
The pot was stalwart iron and the kettle trusty tin,
And though their sides were black with smoke they bubbled love within.

Forget that kettle, Jamie, and that pot of boiling broth,
I know a dismal story of a candle and a moth.
For while your pot is boiling and while your kettle sings
My moth makes love to candle flame and burns away his wings.

Your moth, I envy, Annie, that died by candle flame,

The old man fumbles with his keys,
The waiter appears embarrassed.

‘I don’t want to talk about love any more,
But sing it on the pebble of your tongue.’

She listens, counts petals of a sunflower on the table between them, and listens.

‘I want to sing so the stone rests, knows
Nothing of the world but that love creates us

From a moment, that the world only exists
The fraction before it sings.’

She listens and counts petals just so many grains of sunlight trapped.

She loves blood-red poppies for a garden to walk in.
In a loose white gown she walks
and a new child tugs at cords in her body.
Her head to the west at evening when the dew is creeping,
A shudder of gladness runs in her bones and torsal fiber:
She loves blood-red poppies for a garden to walk in.

One comes to love the little saints,
As years go by.
One learns to love the little saints.
'O hear me sigh,
St. Anthony,
Find this for me,
I wish you'd try.'
There must be many garden gods,
A gardener sees.
There'd have to be an orchard god. 'Divinities,
Take honour due.
The long year through
Protect these trees.'
The Mother and the Holy Child
Are friends to me.
I pray, 'I am my mother's child.
I trust you'll see
That days are bright
And all goes right

As Daphne did from tuneful Phoebus fly,
Still must his Sons expect an equal Fate!
For cruel Beauty doom'd in vain to sigh,
And find their Tenderness repaid with Hate.