poems about love

I saw a cloud at break of day
On the Wind's high shoulders borne;
It looked like a meteor's dazzling ray,
In the azure vault forlorn:
I marvelled how a cloud so strange,
Should on Aurora's summit range.

I gazed until it rose above
The light of my quivering eye;
It journeyed to those realms of love,
Where the sun rolls blazing by:
It moved not as clouds are wont to do,
But swift to those mansions of bliss it flew.

I knew not what it then conveyed,
As it sped on its arrow-wing;

Oh, thou wilt never know how fond a love
This heart could have felt for thee;
Or ever dream how love and friendship strove,
Through long, long hours for mastery;
How passion often urged, but pride restrained,
Or how thy coldness grieved, but kindness pained.

How hours have soothed the feelings, then that were
The torture of my lonely life—
But ever yet will often fall a tear,
O'er wildest hopes and thoughts then rife;
Where'er recalled by passing word or tone,
Fond memory mirrors all those visions flown.

I have tried to keep a little of myself for other uses,
But love denies my reserve: I must have all, says love.
I bargained sharply with love and love kept away,
I wondered this of love and that of love and love was still alienated.
I looked for love in the open day and in dark places and love baffled my desire,
But when I stopped looking and simply loved love came hurrying—
Came to me from hell hot with fire,
Came to me from heaven calm with justice.

I could not cheat love:
When I reminded love of my sins love smiled and loved on,

Turne all thy thoughts to eyes,
Turne all thy haires to eares,
Change all thy friends to spies,
And all thy joyes to feares:
True Love will yet be free,
In spite of Jealousie.

Turne darknesse into day,
Conjectures into truth,
Beleeve what th' envious say,
Let age interpret youth:
True love will yet be free,
In spite of Jealousie.

Wrest every word and looke,
Racke ev'ry hidden thought,
Or fish with golden hooke,
True love cannot be caught:
For that will still be free,
In spite of Jealousie.

But if my lines may not be held excused,
Nor yet my love find favour in your eyes;
But that your eyes as judges shall be used,
Even of the fault which from themselves doth rise,
Yet this my humble suit do not despise;
Let me be judged as I stand accused:
If but my fault my doom do equalize,
Whate'er it be, it shall not be refused.
And since my love already is expressed,
And that I cannot stand upon denial,
I freely put myself upon my trial;
Let justice judge me as I have confessed:

There never yet was honest man
That ever drove the trade of love;
It is impossible, nor can
Integrity our ends promove:
For Kings and Lovers are alike in this
That their chief art in reigne dissembling is.

Here we are lov'd, and there we love,
Good nature now and passion strive
Which of the two should be above,
And laws unto the other give.
So we false fire with art sometime discover,
And the true fire with the same art do cover.

What Rack can Fancy find so high?
Here we must Court, and here ingage,

Sought by the world, and hath the world disdained,
Is she, my heart, for whom thou dost endure;
Unto whose grace sith kings have not obtained,
Sweet is thy choice, though loss of life be sour;
Yet to the man, whose youth such pains must prove,
No better end than that which comes by love.

Steer then thy course unto the port of death,
(Sith thy hard hap no better hap may find,)
Where, when thou shalt unlade thy latest breath,
Envy herself shall swim, to save thy mind;
Whose body sunk in search to gain that shore

My thoughts are winged with hopes, my hopes with love.
Mount, love, unto the moon in clearest night,
And say, as she doth in the heavens move,
In earth so wanes and waxeth my delight.
And whisper this but softly in her ears:
Hope oft doth hang the head, and Trust shed tears.

And you, my thoughts, that some mistrust do carry,
If for mistrust my mistress do you blame,
Say, though you alter, yet you do not vary,
As she doth change and yet remain the same.
Distrust doth enter hearts but not infect,

NO man love's fiery passion can approve
As either yielding profit or promotion,
I like, a calm and lukewarm zeal in love,
Although I do not like it in devotion.
Besides, man needs not love unless he please;
No destiny can force his disposition.
How then can any die of that disease
Whereof himself may turn his own physician?
Some one, perhaps, in long consumption dried,
And after falling into love, may die;
But I dare pawn my life he ne'er had died
Had been healthy at the heart as I.
Some others, rather than incur the slander

None loves me, Father, with thy love,
None else can meet such needs as mine;
O grant me, as thou shalt approve,
All that befits a child of thine;
From every doubt and fear release,
And give me confidence and peace!

Give me a faith shall never fail,
Faith that shall always work by love;
And then, whatever foes assail,
They shall but higher courage move
More boldly for the truth to strive,
And more by faith in thee to live.

A heart that, when my days are glad,
May never from thy way decline,