love poem

When, poor in all but hope and love,
I clasped thee to my faithful heart;
For wealth and fame I vowed to rove,
That we might meet no more to part!
Years have gone by — long weary years
Of toil, to win thee comfort now —
Of ardent hopes — of sickening fears —
And wealth is mine — but where art thou ?

Fame's dazzling dreams, for thy dear sake,
Those brighter than before to me;
I clung to all I deemed could make
My burning heart more worthy thee.
Years have gone by — the laurel droops

They loved one another! young Edward and his wife,
And in their cottage-home they dwelt, apart from sin and strife.
Each evening Edward weary came from a day of honest toil,
And Mary made the fire blaze, and smiled a cheerful smile.
Oh! what was wealth or pomp to them, the gaudy glittering show,
Of jewels blazing on the breast, where heaves a heart of woe!
The merry laugh, the placid sleep, were theirs they hated sloth,
And all the little that they had, belonged alike to both,
For they loved another!

I.

O When shall my glad Soul releast
From these uneasy Chains of Clay,
To the bright Regions of the Blest
Wing with a Lover's Speed her Way?

II.

Where ravish'd with His blissful Sight,
I my Redeemer may adore,
And in the pure Abodes of Light,
May live and love, and sin no more!

Still is the earth. If my heart were as still
As the slow-breathing earth to the wide clear sky,
If I were as free of my labouring will
As the deep-growing earth and the calm-giving sky,
My heart I should fill at the lift of a sigh
With the love and the wisdom the earth lives by.

Like great white cumulous clouds hung in the sky
Her full breasts lie:
Their pendulous beauty richly droops above
A hemisphere of love
Wherein the wealth of unknown continents
Her heart augments.

Let the young lovers sport and play and kiss;
Their souls brood not on loveliness like this.
Let the young eye laugh merrily with spring;
Mine hath its joy in this ripe autumning.
What burden borne of fruit-encumbering boughs
Compares with this her lovely form avows?
What swelling ship, laden with fabulous gold,

When " Friendship, Love, and Truth " abound
Among a band of Brothers ,
The cup of joy goes gaily round,
Each shares the bliss of others:
Sweet roses grace the thorny way
Along this vale of sorrow;
The flowers that shed their leaves to-day
Shall bloom again to-morrow:
How grand in age, how fair in youth,
Are holy " F RIENDSHIP , L OVE , and T RUTH ! "

On halcyon wings our moments pass,
Life's cruel cares beguiling;
Old T IME lays down his scythe and glass,
In gay good humour smiling:

You have a son. Your work of art.
Fruit of your love. Cause of your pain.
Child of your thought. Blood of your heart.
Travail of spirit, body, brain.

And there he lies upon your breast,
Most helpless of all living things;
What he loves, is what you love best —
How will it be when he grows wings?

Only from you to take and take
Is all your love of him demands;
Of such dependence can you make
Love that on higher footing stands?

O, close the cord that holds you still:

Through Liddersdale as lately I went,
I musing on did passe;
I heard a maid was discontent,
she sighd, and said, Alas!
All maids that ever deceived was
beare a part of these my woes,
For once I was a bonny lasse,
when I milkt my dadyes ewes.
With, O the broome, the bonny broome,
the broome of Cowdon Knowes!
Faine would I be in the North Countrey,
to milke my dadyes ewes.

" Geordie Lukely is my name,
And many a one doth ken me; O
Many an ill deed I hae done,
But now death will owrecome me. O

" I neither murdered nor yet have I slain,
I never murdered any;
But I stole fyfteen o the king's bay horse,
And I sold them in Bohemia.

" Where would I get a pretty little boy,
That would fain win gold and money,
That would carry this letter to Stirling town,
And give it to my lady?"

" Here am I, a pretty little boy,
That wud fain win gold and money;

Come lay me soft, and draw me near,
And lay thy white hand over me,
For I am starving in the cold,
And thou art bound to cover me.

O cover me in my distress,
And help me in my miserie,
For I do wake when I should sleep,
All for the love of my dearie.

My rents they are but very small
For to maintain my love withall,
But with my labour and my pain
I will maintain my love with them.

O Arthur's Seat shall be my bed,
And the sheets shall never be fil'd for me,