A LECTURE UPON THE SHADOW.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight. I love thee freely as men strive for right; I love thee purely, as they turn from praise. I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life!—and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.
To One who would make a Confession.
On! leave the past to bury its own dead.
The past is naught to us, the present all.
A Lecture upon the Shadow.
STAND Still, and I will read to thee
A lecture, Love, in love's philosophy.
These three hours that we have spent
Walking here, two shadows went
Along with us, which we ourselves produced:
But, now the sun is just above our head,
We do those shadows tread,
And to brave clearness all things are reduced.
So whilst our infant loves did grow,
Disguises did and shadows flow
From us and from our cares; but now it is not so.
That love hath not attained the high'st degree,
Which is still diligent lest others see;
Except our loves at this noon stay,
What need of last year's leaves to strew Love's bed? We shall new shadows make the other way.
What need of ghost to grace a festival?
I would not, if I could, those days recall,
Those days not ours. For us the feast is spread,
The lamps are lit, and music plays withal.
Then let us love and leave the rest unsaid.
This island is our home. Around it roar
Great gulfs and oceans, channels, straits, and seas.
What matter in what wreck we reached the shore,
So we both reached it? We can mock at these.
Oh! leave the past, if past indeed there be;
I would not know it; I would know but thec.
WILFRED SCAWEN BLUNT.
As the first were made to blind
Others, these which come behind
Will work upon ourselves, and blind our eyes,
If our loves faint, and westwardly. decline,
To me thou falsely thine,
And I to thee mine actions shall disguise.
The morning shadows wear away,
But these grow longer all the day;
But, oh! love's day is short, if love decay.
Love is a growing or full constant light,
And his short minute, after noon, is night.
JOHN DONNE.
To One Excusing his Poverty.
AH! love, impute it not to me a sin
That my poor soul thus beggared comes to thee. My soul a pilgrim was, in search of thine,
And met these accidents by land and sea. The world was hard, and took its usury, Its toll for each new night in each new inn; And every road had robber bands to fee; And all, even kindness, must be paid in coin. Behold my scrip is empty, my heart bare.
I give thee nothing who my all would give.
My pilgrimage is finished, and I fare
Bare to my death, unless with thee I live.
Ah! give, love, and forgive that I am poor.
Ah! take me to thy arms and ask no more.
WILFRED SCAWEN BLUNT.
Phillida and Corydon.
In the merrie moneth of Maye,
In a morne by break of daye,
With a troupe of damsells playing,
Forth I yode forsooth a-maying;
Where anon by a wood side,
Whenas Maye was in his pride,
I espied all alone
Phillida and Corydon.
Much adoe there was, God wot;
He wold love, and she wold not.
She sayd never man was trewe;
He sayes none was false to you.
Tell Me, my Heart.
WHEN Delia on the plain appears,
Awed by a thousand tender fears,
I would approach, but dare not move:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?
Whene'er she speaks, my ravished ear
No other voice but hers can hear,
No other wit but hers approve :
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?
If she some other youth commend,
Though I was once his fondest friend,
His instant enemy I prove:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?
When she is absent, I no more
Delight in all that pleased before,
The clearest spring, the shadiest grove:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?
When, fond of power, of beauty vain,
Her nets she spread for every swain,
I strove to hate, but vainly strove:
Tell me, my heart, if this be love?
Wiscourse with Cupid.
NOBLEST Charis, you that are
Both my fortune and my star!
And do govern more my blood,
Than the various moon the flood!
Hear what late discourse of you
Love and I have had; and true.
'Mongst my muses finding me,
Where he chanced your name to see
Set, and to this softer strain :
"Sure," said he, "if I have brain,
This here sung can be no other
By description, but my mother!
So hath Homer praised her hair;
So Anacreon drawn the air
Of her face, and made to rise,
Just about her sparkling eyes,
Both her brows, bent like my bow.
By her looks I do her know,
Which you call my shafts. And see!
Such my mother's blushes be,
As the bath your verse discloses
In her cheeks of milk and roses;
Such as oft I wanton in.
And above her even chin,
Have you placed the bank of kisses
Where, you say, men gather blisses,
Ripened with a breath more sweet,
Than when flowers and west winds meet.
Nay, her white and polished neck,
With the lace that doth it deck,
Is my mother's! hearts of slain
Lovers, made into a chain!
And between each rising breast
Lies the valley called my nest,
Where I sit and proyne my wings
After flight; and put new strings
To my shafts! Her very name,
With my mother's is the same."
"I confess all," I replied,
"And the glass hangs by her side,
And the girdle 'bout her waist,
All is Venus; save unchaste.
But, alas! thou seest the least
Of her good, who is the best
Of her sex; but couldst thou, Love,
Call to mind the forms that strove
For the apple, and those three
Make in one, the same were she.
For this beauty still doth hide
Something more than thou hast spied.
Outward grace weak Love beguiles:
She is Venus when she smiles,
But she's Juno when she walks,
And Minerva when she talks."
DRINK to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup,
And I'll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.
Say thou lov'st me while thou live,
I to thee my love will give,
Never dreaming to deceive
While that life endures:
Nay, and after death, in sooth,
I to thee will keep my truth
As now, in my May of youth,
This my love assures.
Constant love is moderate ever,
And it will through life perséver;
Give me that, with true endeavor
I will it restore;
A suit of durance let it be
For all weathers; that for me,
For the land or for the sea,
Lasting evermore.
Winter's cold or Summer's heat,
Autumn's tempests on it beat,
It can never know defeat,
Never can rebel:
Such the love that I would gain,
Such the love, I tell thee plain,
Thou must give, or woo in vain
Love Me Little, Love Me Long.
LOVE me little, love me long,
Is the burden of my song.
Love that is too hot and strong
Burneth soon to waste.
Still I would not have thee cold,
Not too backward or too bold;
Love that lasteth till 'tis old
Fadeth not in haste.
If thou lovest me too much,
"Twill not prove as true as touch;
Love me little, more than such,
For I fear the end.
I'm with little well content,
And a little from thee sent
Is enough, with true intent,
To be steadfast friend.
Shall I Tell?
SHALL I tell you whom I love?
Hearken then a while to me;
And if such a woman move
As I now shall versify,
Be assured 'tis she or none,
That I love, and love alone.
Nature did her so much right
As she scorns the help of art.
In as many virtues dight
As e'er yet embraced a heart. So much good so truly tried, Some for less were deified.
Wit she hath, without desire
To make known how much she hath; And her anger flames no higher
Than may fitly sweeten wrath. Full of pity as may be,
Though perhaps not so to me.
Where to live near,
And planted there,
Is to live, and still live new ;
Where to gain a favor is
More than light, perpetual bliss,Make me live by serving you!
Dear, again back recall
To this light
A stranger to himself and all;
Both the wonder and the story
Shall be yours, and eke the glory; I am your servant, and your thrall.
Speak, Love!
DEAREST, do not delay me,
Since, thou knowest, I must be gone; Wind and tide, 'tis thought, do stay me; But 'tis wind that must be blown
From that breath, whose native smell
Indian odors far excel.
IF love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf,
Our lives would grow together
In sad or singing weather,
Blown fields or flowerful closes,
Green pleasure or gray grief; If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf.
If I were what the words are,
And love were like the tune, With double sound and single Delight our lips would mingle, With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon; If I were what the words are, And love were like the tune.
If you were life, my darling,
And I, your love, were death, We'd shine and snow together Ere March made sweet the weather With daffodil and starling,
And hours of fruitful breath;
If you were life, my darling,
And I, your love, were death.
If you were thrall to sorrow,
And I were page to joy,
We'd play for lives and seasons,
With loving looks and treasons,
And tears of night and morrow,
And laughs of maid and boy;
If you were thrall to sorrow,
And I were page to joy.
If you were April's lady,
And I were lord in May, We'd throw with leaves for hours, And draw for days with flowers,
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