poems about love

Tell me what within her eyes
Makes the forgotten Spring arise,
And all the day, if kind she looks,
Flow to a tune like tinkling brooks;
Tell me why, if but her voice
Falls on men’s ears, their souls rejoice;
Tell me why, if only she
Doth come into the companie
All spirits straight enkindled are,
As if a moon lit up a star.


Tell me this that’s writ above,
And I will tell you why I love.


Tell me why the foolish wind
Is to her tresses ever kind,
And ouly blows them in such wise

I.

Oh, saw ye my own true love, I praye,
My own true love so sweete?
For the flowers have lightly toss'd awaye
The prynte of her faery feete.
Now, how can we telle if she passed us bye?
Is she darke or fayre to see?
Like sloes are her eyes, or blue as the skies?
Is't braided her haire or free?

II.

Oh, never by outward looke or signe,
My true love shall ye knowe;
There be many as fayre, and many as fyne,
And many as brighte to showe.
But if ye coude looke with angel's eyes,

Priscilla, Auntie's promised me
A brand-new Paris doll;
And though I love you, yet you see
I cannot keep you all.

Nursey declares I really must
Throw one of you away;
And you're the oldest, so I trust
You will not care to stay.

You've lost an arm, your dress is torn,
Your wig is all awry;
Priscilla, you are so forlorn,
We'll have to say good-by.

And yet--oh, don't! my dolly dear,
Don't look so sad, I pray!
You precious dolly, come right here,
You shan't be thrown away!

Ask me not, Dear, what thing it is
That makes me love you so;
What graces, what sweet qualities,
That from your spirit flow:
For I have but this old reply,
That you are you, that I am I.

My heart leaps when you look on me,
And thrills to hear your voice.
Lies, then, in these the mystery
That makes my soul rejoice?
I only know, I love you true;
Since I am I, and you are you.

While from our looks, fair nymph, you guess
The secret passions of our mind;
My heavy eyes, you say, confess
A heart to love and grief inclined.

There needs, alas! but little art
To have this fatal secret found;
With the same ease you threw the dart,
'Tis certain you can show the wound.

How can I see you, and not love,
While you as opening cast are fair?
While cold as northern blasts you prove,
How can I love, and not despair?

The wretch in double fetters bound

Lovely kind, and kindly loving,
Such a mind were worth the moving;
Truly fair, and fairly true-
Where are all these, but in you?

Wisely kind, and kindly wise;
Blessed life, where such love lies!
Wise, and kind, and fair, and true-
Lovely live all these in you.

Sweetly dear, and dearly sweet;
Blessed, where these blessings meet!
Sweet, fair, wise, kind, blessed, true-
Blessed be all these in you!

Busy, with an idea for a code, I write
signals hurrying from left to right,
or right to left, by obscure routes,
for my own reasons; taking a word like writes
down tiers of tries until its secret rites
make sense; or until, suddenly, RATS
can amazingly and funnily become STAR
and right to left that small star
is mine, for my own liking, to stare
its five lucky pins inside out, to store
forever kindly, as if it were a star
I touched and a miracle I really wrote.

He

Lift up the veils that darken the delicate moon
of thy glory and grace,
Withhold not, O love, from the night
of my longing the joy of thy luminous face,
Give me a spear of the scented keora
guarding thy pinioned curls,
Or a silken thread from the fringes
that trouble the dream of thy glimmering pearls;
Faint grows my soul with thy tresses' perfume
and the song of thy anklets' caprice,
Revive me, I pray, with the magical nectar
that dwells in the flower of thy kiss.

She

Painter in Paphos and Cythera famed
Depict, I pray, the absent Iris' face.
Thou hast not seen the lovely nymph I've named;
The better for thy peace.--Then will I trace
For thy instruction her transcendent grace.
Begin with lily white and blushing rose,
Take then the Loves and Graces... But what good
Words, idle words? for Beauty's Goddess could
By Iris be replaced, nor one suppose
The secret fraud--their grace so equal shows.
Thou at Cythera couldst, at Paphos too,
Of the same Iris Venus form anew.

Love, lift me up upon thy golden wings
From this base world unto thy heavens hight,
Where I may see those admirable things
Which there thou workest by thy soveraine might,
Farre above feeble reach of earthly sight,
That I thereof an heavenly hymne may sing
Unto the God of Love, high heavens king.

Many lewd layes (ah! woe is me the more!)
In praise of that mad fit which fooles call Love,
I have in th'heat of youth made heretofore,
That in light wits did loose affection move;
But all those follies now I do reprove,