love poems

What is love once disgrac'd,
But a wanton thought ill plac'd?
Which doth blemish whom it paineth,
And dishonors whom it deigneth,
Seen in higher powers most,
Though some fools do fondly boast
That whoso is high of kin
Sanctifies his lover's sin.
Jove could not hide Io's scape,
Nor conceal Calisto's rape.
Both did fault, and both were fam'd,
Light of loves, whom lust had sham'd.
Let not women trust to men:
They can flatter now and then,
And tell them many wanton tales,
Which do breed their after-bales.

Live with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
And all the craggy mountains yields.

There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, by whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

There will I make thee a bed of roses,
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;

My flocks feed not, my ewes breed not,
— My rams speed not, all is amiss.
Love is dying, faith's defying,
— Heart's denying causer of this.
All my merry jigs are quite forgot,
All my lady's love is lost, God wot.
Where her faith was firmly fixed in love,
There a nay is placed without remove.
— One seely cross wrought all my loss —
— O frowning fortune, cursed fickle dame!
— For now I see inconstancy
— More in women than in men remain.

In black mourn I, all fears scorn I,

Fair was the morn when the fair queen of love,

Paler for sorrow than her milk-white dove,
For Adon's sake, a youngster proud and wild,
Her stand she takes upon a steep-up hill.
Anon Adonis comes with horn and hounds.
She, seely queen, with more than love's good will
Forbade the boy he should not pass those grounds.
" Once," quoth she, " did I see a fair sweet youth
Here in these brakes deep-wounded with a boar,
Deep in the thigh, a spectacle of ruth.
See in my thigh," quoth she, " here was the sore."

VIII.

O Love! within those golden vales,
Those genial airs where thou wast born;
Where Nature, listening thy soft tales,
Leans on the rosy breast of Morn:

Where the sweet Smiles, the Graces dwell,
And tender sighs the heart remove,
In silent eloquence to tell
Thy tale, O soul-subduing Love!

Ah! wherefore should grim Rage be nigh,

This is true Love, by that true Cupid got,
Which danceth galliards in your amorous eyes,
But to your frozen heart approacheth not;
Only your heart he dares not enterprize,
And yet through every other part he flies,
And everywhere he nimbly danceth now,
That in yourself, yourself perceive not how.

For your sweet beauty, daintily transfused
With due proportion throughout every part,
What is it but a dance where Love hath used
His finer cunning and more curious art;
Where all the elements themselves impart,

I have borne the anguish of love, which ask me not to describe:
I have tasted the poison of absence, which ask me not to relate.

Far through the world have I roved, and at length I have chosen
A sweet creature, a ravisher of hearts, whose name ask me not to disclose.

The flowings of my tears bedew her footsteps
In such a manner as ask me not to utter.

On yesterday night from her own mouth with my own ears I heard
Such words, as pray ask me not to repeat.

Why dost thou bite thy lip at me? What dost thou hint?

Love scorns degrees; the low he lifteth high,
The high he draweth down to that fair plain
Whereon, in his divine equality,
Two loving hearts may meet, nor meet in vain;
'Gainst such sweet levelling Custom cries amain,
But o'er its harshest utterance one bland sigh,
Breathed passion-wise, doth mount victorious still,
For Love, earth's lord, must have his lordly will.

The love of men for each other — so tender, heroic, constant;
That has come all down the ages, in every clime, in every nation,
Always so true, so well assured of itself, overleaping barriers of age, of rank, of distance,
Flag of the camp of Freedom;
The love of women for each other — so rapt, intense, so confiding-close, so burning-passionate,
To unheard deeds of sacrifice, of daring and devotion, prompting;
And (not less) the love of men for women, and of women for men — on a newer greater scale than it has hitherto been conceived;

Some say Love,
Foolish Love,
Doth rule and govern all the gods:
I say Love,
Inconstant Love,
Sets men's senses far at odds.
Some swear Love,
Smooth-fac'd Love,
Is sweetest sweet that men can have:
I say Love,
Sour Love,
Makes virtue yield as beauty's slave:
A bitter sweet, a folly worst of all,
That forceth wisdom to be folly's thrall.

Love is sweet.
Wherein sweet?
In fading pleasures that do pain?
Beauty sweet,
Is that sweet,
That yieldeth sorrow for a gain?