love poems for her

Six hundred years ago, in Dante's time,
Before his cheek was furrowed by deep rhyme —
When Europe, fed afresh from Eastern story,
Was like a garden tangled with the glory
Of flowers hand-planted and of flowers air-sown,
Climbing and trailing, budding and full-blown,
Where purple bells are tossed amid pink stars,
And springing blades, green troops in innocent wars,
Crowd every shady spot of teeming earth,
Making invisible motion visible birth —
Six hundred years ago, Palermo town
Kept holiday. A deed of great renown,

I

In vain, dear Youth, you say you love,
And yet my Marks of Passion blame;
Since Jealousie alone can prove,
The surest Witness of my Flame:
And she who without that, a Love can vow,
Believe me, Shepherd , does not merit you.

II

Then give me leave to doubt, that Fire
I kindle, may another warm:
A Face that cannot move Desire,

My Amoret , since you must know,
The Grief you say my Eyes do show:
Survey my Heart, where you shall find,
More Love then for your self confin'd.
And though you chide, you'l Pity too,
A Passion which even Rivals you.

Amyntas on a Holy-day
As fine as any Lord of May ,
Amongst the Nimphs, and jolly Swaines,
That feed their Flocks upon the Plaines:
Met in a Grove beneath whose shade,
A Match of Dancing they had made.

His Cassock was of Green, as trim
As Grass upon a River brim;

Reading a poet's musing in his rhyme
Of feverish love, kindled by its own dearth,
That dies of surfeit, comes again to birth
In brief fantastic intervals of time;
I thought how love that draws a steadier breath,
Glows in the mind, sets pulsing in the blood,
Is not the frail creation of a mood,
Is plain as life, unqualified as death.

This love long seasoned, tried against the storm,
Not furnished with the trappings of romance,
Will still have power to quicken and grow warm
Beyond the momentary circumstance;

II

I T flows thro' all of time from heart to heart,
This solemn wonder fresh with naked strength,
This source of life where every mouth at length
Must drink and feel the old impulsions start.
It is the whole that moves through every part,
The aspiration dim of things unborn,
The prophecy of life's essential dawn,
That tears the everlasting night apart.

I

Sadder and more divine than human tears
Born on the eyes to utter what is dumb,
This simple silence when the heart grows numb
Among the dead desires of perished years.
Such silence quivers with the song it bears,
Unsung within a fabric of old pain,
Till in the dust of tired passions, plain
Through wreaths of light, the naked truth appears.
Then poised upon the moment thou canst lay

Why do I o'er my paper once more bend?
Ask not too closely, dearest one, I pray:
For, to speak truth, I've nothing now to say;
Yet to thy hands at length 'twill come, dear friend.

Since I can come not with it, what I send
My undivided heart shall now convey,
With all its joys, hopes, pleasures, pains, to-day:
All this hath no beginning, hath no end.

Henceforward I may ne'er to thee confide
How, far as thought, wish, fancy, will, can reach,
My faithful heart with thine is surely blended.

Drink , oh youth, joy's purest ray
From thy loved one's eyes all day,
And her image paint at night!
Better rule no lover knows,
Yet true rapture greater grows,
When far sever'd from her sight.

Powers eternal, distance, time,
Like the might of stars sublime,
Gently rock the blood to rest.
O'er my senses softness steals,
Yet my bosom lighter feels,
And I daily am more blest.

Though I can forget her ne'er,
Yet my mind is free from care,
I can calmly live and move;
Unperceived infatuation

MY love lay there,
In the shadow of my hair,
As my glossy raven tresses downward flow;
And dark as midnight's cloud,
They fell o'er him like a shroud:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

With a comb of gold each night
I combed my tresses bright;
But the sportive zephyr tossed them to and fro;
So I pressed them in a heap,
For my love whereon to sleep:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

He said he loved to gaze
On my tresses' flowing maze,
And the midnight of my dark Moorish eyes;

THE LOVE SIN .

None , unless the saints above,
Knew the secret of their love;
For with calm and stately grace
Isolde held ber queenly place,
Tho' the courtiers' hundred eyes
Sought the lovers to surprise.
Or to read the mysteries
Of a love — so rumour said —
By a magic philtre fed
Which for ever in their veins
Burn'd with love's consuming pains.

Yet their hands would twine unseen,
In a clasp 'twere hard to sever;