# Reading > Poems, Poets, and Poetry >  The Best Love Poems of All Time

## Admin

I'd like to compile a list of the best love poems of all time.

This is one of my favorites:

http://www.online-literature.com/donne/371/



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## Koa

(how long has this topic been here? i had never seen it)

The one that comes to my mind now is by Emily Dickinson, and it starts with:

_I cannot live-with you
It would be life
and life is over there
behind the shelf 
the sexton keeps the key to_

or this is what i remember by heart... I dont know if it's on this site...I cna write it all when i have time, or look for a link.

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## Downer

A nice bit of cummings is hard to beat:

http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/eecummings/mayifeel.shtml

Downer

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## MadammeCal

Hello All, I just love this site. And it is so great that so many are inspired by the deepest emotions of others. Some words penetrate to the core of my being, its so amazing that something so powerful are only appreciated by so few.

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## Phoenix_Tears

i believe my favourite love poem would be one written by this guy( nicknamed Phoenix_Arises, odd huh? but i swear its not me) i stumbled upon it a drakkan.com in poetry. i only remember one line, 

"I'll gladly take you up to heaven
Because that is where all angels belong"

i printed it and its somewhere i n my numerous folders...hmm i think i might drag it out someday.
-Phoen-X

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## gatsbysghost

Jim Morrison Wilderness vol. 2

I am troubled immeasurably 
by your eyes
I am struck by the feather 
of your soft reply

Broken glass 
speaks quick disdain
and conceals what your
heart trys to explain.

Simple and short but still a good one from the lizard king.

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## tree

> I'd like to compile a list of the best love poems of all time.
> i like them
> This is one of my favorites:
> 
> http://www.online-literature.com/donne/371/

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## Shea

This is one of my favorite songs to play on my harp, but its more my favorite because of the words and the story behind it. The Irish poet Thomas Moore (1779-1852) wrote this song for his wife after she contracted a disfiguring skin disease and feared he would no longer care for her.

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms
Which I gaze on so fondly today, 
Were to change by tomorrow, and fleet in my arms
Like fairy gifts fading away;
Thou wouldst still be adored
As this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will.
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervour and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear.
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets, 
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turned when he rose.

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## Lothwen

This is one of my favourite poems written by one of my favourite poetesses (of course it is translation, but the "official", not mine  :Biggrin:  )

Nothin Twice - Wislawa Szymborska

Nothing can ever happen twice. 
In consequence, the sorry fact is 
that we arrive here improvised 
and leave without the chance to practice. 

Even if there is no one dumber, 
if you're the planet's biggest dunce, 
you can't repeat the class in summer: 
this course is only offered once. 

No day copies yesterday, 
no two nights will teach what bliss is 
in precisely the same way, 
with exactly the same kisses. 

One day, perhaps, some idle tongue 
mentions your name by accident: 
I feel as if a rose were flung 
into the room, all hue and scent. 

The next day, though you're here with me, 
I can't help looking at the clock: 
A rose? A rose? What could that be? 
Is it a flower or a rock? 

Why do we treat the fleeting day 
with so much needless fear and sorrow? 
It's in its nature not to stay: 
Today is always gone tomorrow. 

With smiles and kisses, we prefer 
to seek accord beneath our star, 
although we're different (we concur) 
just as two drops of water are.

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## putty

I agree that Donne's Valediction poem is one of the best loved with its wonderful figure of the compass. I think Keats' "Ode to a Nightingale" should also make the list.

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## putty

I misread "love" for "loved" in suggesting Keats' Ode. With an apology I want to add that Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress" should be on the list of best "love" poems.[/i]

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## Zoe

This poem is one of the most widly love poems in the world, written about her husband Robert Browning. 

"How do i love thee, let me count the ways" 
"if god choose, i shall but love thee better after death"

just 2 lovely lines - looking the rest up on the net is worth it - i love it.

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## AbdoRinbo

At the end of the poem, you realize Rimbaud was referring to the waking dawn, not a fleeing lover. A beautiful personification of a different kind of love, in my opinion. 

'I embraced the summer dawn.

Nothing yet stirred on the face of the palaces. The water was dead. The shadows still camped in the woodland road. I walked, waking quick warm breaths; and stones looked on, and wings rose without sound.

The first venture was, in a path already filled with fresh, pale gleams, a flower who told me her name.

I laughed at the blond watterfall that tousled through the pines: on silver summer I recognized the goddess.

Then, one by one, I lifted up her veils. In the lane, waving my arms. Across the plain, where I notified the ****. In the city, she fled among the steeples and the domes; and running like a beggar on the marble quays, I chased her.

Above the road near a laurel wood, I wrapped her up in her gathered veils, and I felt a little her immense body. Dawn and the child fell down at the edge of the wood.

Waking, it was noon.'

[The original French]

'J'ai embrassé l'aube d'été.

Rien ne bougeait encore au front des palais. L'eau était mortre. Les camps d'ombres ne quittaient pas la route du bois. J'ai marché, réveillant les haleines vives et tièdes; et les pierries regardèrent, et les ailes se levèrent sans bruit.

La première enterprise fut, dans le sentier déjà empli de frais et blêmes éclats, une fleur qui me dit son nom.

Je ris au wasserfall blond qui s'échevela à travers les sapins: à la cime argentée je reconnus la déesse.

Alors je levai un à les voiles. Dans l'allée, en agitant les bras. Par la plaine, où je l'ai dénoncée au coq. A la grand'ville elle fuyait parmi les clochers et les dômes, et, courant comme un mendiant sur les quais de marbre, je la chassais.

En haut de la route, près d'un bois de lauriers. Je l'ai entourée avec ses voiles amassés, et j'ai senti un peu son immense corps. L'aube et l'enfant tombèrent au bas du bois.

Au réveil, il était midi.'

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## penscrimson

Easy...this request. One of the greatest 'love' poems of all time, you ask? Search no further than Bob Dylan's 'Blood On The Tracks' album. Cue up to 'Simple Twist Of Fate'. For those of you who will or can not...here it is.

They sat together in the park
As the evening sky grew dark
She looked at him and he felt a spark tingle to his bones
'twas then he felt alone and wished that he'd gone straight
And watched out for a simple twist of fate.

They walked along by the old canal
A little confused, I remember well
And stopped into a strange hotel with a neon burning bright
He felt the heat of the night hit him like a freight train
Moving with a simple twist of fate.

A saxophone someplace far off played
As she was walking by the arcade
As the light bust through the beat-up shade where he was wakin up
She dropped a coin into the cup of a blind man at the gate
And forgot about a simple twist of fate.

He woke up, the room was bare
He didn't see her anywhere.
He told himself he didn't care, pushed the window open wide
Felt an emptiness inside to which he just could not relate
Brought on by a simple twist of fate.

He hears the ticking of the clocks
And walks along with a parrot that talks.
Hunts her down by the waterfront docks where the sailors all come in.
Maybe she'll pick him out again, how long must he wait
Once more for a simple twist of fate.

People tell me it's a sin
to know and feel too much within
I still believe she was my twin, but I lost the ring
She was born in spring, but I was born too late
Blame it on a simple twist of fate.

Bob Dylan
(Born Robert Zimmerman)

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## b

This will be my shortest reply ever:

Dante

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## Stillborn

Everyone has a different opinion about the "best poem". I know that the poems i like at the moment reflect things going on in my life. Dead ends, betrayed by my lover, misplaced trust, And total depression.

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## Isagel

Perhaps not a poem, but poetic and the most beautiful thing written about love that I can find :

I Corinthians 13 (Revised Standard Version)

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 

Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. 

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.

So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

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## Carmella

*Annabell Lee* 

IT was many and many a year ago, 
In a kingdom by the sea, 
That a maiden there lived whom you may know 
By the name of Annabel Lee. 
And this maiden she lived with no other thought 
Than to love and be loved by me. 

I was a child and she was a child 
In this kingdom by the sea: 
But we loved with a love that was more than love 
I and my Annabel Lee, 
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of heaven 
Coveted her and me. 

And this was the reason that, long ago, 
In this kingdom by the sea, 
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling 
My beautiful Annabel Lee, 
So that her high-born kinsmen came 
And bore her away from me, 
To shut her up in a sepulchre 
In this kingdom by the sea. 
The angels, not half so happy in heaven, 
Went envying her and me 
Yes! that was the reason (as all men know, 
In this kingdom by the sea) 
That the wind came out of the cloud one night, 
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. 

But our love it was stronger by far than the love 
Of those who were older than we 
Of many far wiser than we 
And neither the angels in heaven above, 
Nor the demons down under the sea, 
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: 

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; 
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes 
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee; 
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side 
Of my darlingmy darlingmy life and my bride, 
In the sepulchre there by the sea, 
In her tomb by the sounding sea. 

This is one of my all time favourite poems by Edgar Allan Poe. I have lost count of the number of times I find myself reading it. It is most definitely a love poem, albeit a rather tragic one.

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## Isagel

A swedish poet called Karin Boye has written alot of beautiful poems about love. Her way of using swedish makes the words sing. Unfortunately english somehow kills them. This one is one of the few that survives translation, if somewhat bruised in the process. It´s translated by Jenny Nunn and I found it at http://www.karinboye.se/verk/dikter/dikter-engelska/ :

How Can I Tell ...
How can I tell if your voice is beautiful.
I only know, that it penetrates me
and makes me shake like a leaf
and tears me to shreds and splits me.

What do I know about your skin and limbs.
It makes me tremble that they are yours,
so for me there is no sleep or rest,
till they are mine.

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## AbdoRinbo

I'll try and translate it into Logban.

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## Isagel

Sorry. I guess it´s some kind of joke but I don´t get it. 
Logban?

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## Isagel

Never mind, now I know what Logban is (used ten minutes of work time to find clues) Like esperanto? 
But why Logban? Will it sound better?

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## Sindhu

I've got three favourite love poems all very different from each other:

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come. 

Let airplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves. 

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong. 

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood,
For nothing now can ever come to any good. 
-Auden.

*Non Sum Qualis Eram Bonae Sub Regno Cynarae*
Last night, ah, yesternight, betwixt her lips and mine
There fell thy shadow, Cynara! thy breath was shed
Upon my soul between the kisses and the wine;
And I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea, I was desolate and bowed my head:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion. 

All night upon mine heart I felt her warm heart beat,
Night-long within mine arms in love and sleep she lay;
Surely the kisses of her bought red mouth were sweet;
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
When I awoke and found the dawn was gray;
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion. 

I have forgot much, Cynara! gone with the wind,
Flung roses, roses riotously with the throng,
Dancing, to put thy pale, lost lilies out of mind;
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea, all the time, because the dance was long;
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion. 

I cried for madder music and for stronger wine,
But when the feast is finished and the lamps expire,
Then falls thy shadow, Cynara! the night is thine;
And I was desolate and sick of an old passion,
Yea hungry for the lips of my desire:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.
-Ernest Dowson

It lies not in our power to love, or hate, 
For will in us is over-rulde by fate. 
When two are stript long ere the course begin, 
We wish that one should lose, the other win. 
And one especially doo we affect, 
Of two gold Ingots like in each respect, 
The reason no man knowes, let it suffise, 
What we behold is censur'd by our eyes. 
Where both deliberat, the love is slight, 
Who ever lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight? 
-Marlowe.

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## lazy cat

This is one of my most favourite poems,I do have more ,but they are in Greek and I wouldn't dare to try and translate them... I Like For You to be Still"
By Pablo Neruda

I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
and you hear me from far away and my voice does not touch you.
It seems as though your eyes had flown away
and it seems that a kiss had sealed your mouth.

As all things are filled with my soul
you emerge from the things, filled with my soul.
You are like my soul, a butterfly of dream,
and you are like the word Melancholy.

I like for you to be still, and you seem far away.
It sounds as though you were lamenting, a butterfly cooing like a dove.
And you hear me from far away, and my voice does not reach you:
Let me come to be still in your silence.

And let me talk to you with your silence
that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You are like the night, with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star, as remote and candid.

I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
distant and full of sorrow as though you had died.
One word then, one smile, is enough.
And I am happy, happy that it's not true.

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## AbdoRinbo

Logban's purpose would be to create a universal language that isn't rooted in Latin (instead, it will be rooted in all languages). Its purpose is to deconstruct the language of western imperialism, and some other shít.

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## apstudent

Anything that starts with Roses are Red. My favorite being:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I love you.

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## sloegin

And I bet you believe all the canon bulls*ht, they teach you.

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## Isagel

> _Originally posted by lazy cat_ 
> 
> And let me talk to you with your silence
> that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
> [/B]


That was wonderful! I´ve never read a love poem like it. Now I have to read something more by Neruda. Thank you.

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## AbdoRinbo

I can't imagine he'd find much time for poetry readings between PT and reloading his M16. 

He's one of God's soldiers, you know.

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## sloegin

God's soldiers are funny. The days of Gallows Hill. Ah, those where the days...

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## AbdoRinbo

Back in those days the shtick never went cold.

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## sloegin

There was always something worth while to get your tunic in a bunch. Better than TV. And more entertaining to boot.

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## AbdoRinbo

Posts are disappearing in a precarious way. Perhaps it means something?

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## sloegin

There must be a golem at work.

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## AbdoRinbo

I'll consult the _Sefer Yetzira_.

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## AbdoRinbo

Nope, nothing.

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## sloegin

Loew and behold, I was almost postive that's what it was. Perhaps it was a garden gnome from Montmartre?

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## AbdoRinbo

Heh, do you ever listen to coast-to-coast AM with Art Bell? This lady called in a few weeks ago and claimed that her garden gnomes were walking her land (which was supposed to symbolize the suffering of the native americans somehow). Next day it was alien abduction. Yesterday it was the transmigration of the soul, &c., &c. 

Someone has a new theory every night.

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## sloegin

Nah. What time's it on?

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## AbdoRinbo

It is on at midnight in Detroit. It usually goes until two or three in the morning, maybe later.

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## sloegin

I'll look for it.

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## AbdoRinbo

Lately Art Bell has not been hosting; incidentally, his daughter was kidnapped. What fùcking luck. Anyway, they got this new guy, George Norry, on as host who is out there. I mean, in the ether. You really should check it out if you get a chance.

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## sloegin

I'll check it out, in about half an hour.

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## sloegin

I'm listening to it now. The host doesn't seem, to be that far out there. The guest is another story.

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## AbdoRinbo

It's funny thoug when he talks about his childhood and his psychic/out-of-body experiences. Total slapstick.

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## sloegin

I bet. W.C. Fields, is still the king.

Do you know who Ram Dhas(sp?) is?

_Sefer Yetzira_, reminds me of a movie called, the symbol for pi.

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## AbdoRinbo

Aranofsky's _Pi_? That's an awesome film.

Who is Ram Dhas?

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## sloegin

Yeah, that's the flick. The crazy hassidics in it.

He was some big wig at Harvard in the late 50's. Then he gave the students LSD. Got booted out. Moved to India. Came back here, changed his name and started writing craZy stuff.

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## AbdoRinbo

Like what stuff?

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## sloegin

Hang on a sec.

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## sloegin

_Be Here Now_, without digging more.

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## sloegin

It's Ram Dass. His name was Dr. Richard Alpert.

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## AbdoRinbo

Was he Hindu or Zen?

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## AbdoRinbo

Because I'm thinking of Krishnamurti for some reason. Ram Dass does sound familiar.

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## sloegin

He's like Dali on acid.

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## sloegin

I'm thinking Buddhist/Zen, but I'm not positive. I'd consider it more of a pot-luck.

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## james_schwartz

~ponders this...~ hmm...Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalot"...

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## Stanislaw

The Lady of Shallot is a good one. The song is also pretty good. Does anyone know who sang it?

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## nicholasburrus

I'll try em

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## sloegin

Don't hurt yourself.

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## David J

What about Whitman's Song of Myself?

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## poeboy

" She walks in beauty like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies, and all that's best of dark and bright meet in her aspect and her eyes...." Sigh!
One of my favorite poems of all time.

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## Demona

One of my favourite abstracts about love would be by Demon in Lermontov's poem - _The Demon._
I have found the English version of it and i shall post the beginning...but i must say that it isn't even as near good as the original....
but...here goes: 

_Demon_

By the first day of the creation
And by its latest day I swear,
By God's law and its violation
The triumph of eternal truth,
The bitter shame of sin I bear;
By the brief glory of this dream
I swear, and by our meeting here
And by the threat of separation;
I swear by all the spirit hosts
Whom Fate has set at my command,
On swords divine I take my oath
As wielded by my enemies
The impassive, sleepless angel band;
I swear by you, your life, your death,
Your last, long look and your first tear,
The gentle drawing of your breath,
The silken torrents of your hair;
I swear by suffering and bliss,
I swear even by this love of ours,-
I have renounced all vengefulness
I have renounced the pride of years;

etc....it's pretty long...

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## zerotule

george gascoigne- ?1525-1577
also these poems=
"the strange passion of lover",
"the crystal glass and the glass of steel",


"a lover`s lullaby"

sing lullaby, as women do,
wherewith they bring their babies to
rest;
and lullaby can i sing to
as womanly as can the best
with lullaby they still the child
and, if i be not much beguiled,
full many a wanton babe have i,
which must be stilled with lullaby.

first, lullaby my youthfull years!
it is now time to go to bed,
for crooked age and hoary hairs
have won the haven within my head.
with lullaby then, youth, be still,
with lullaby content thy will.
since courage quails and comes behind,
go sleep, and so beguile thy mind!

next, lullaby my gazing eyes,
which wonted were to glance aspace,
for every glass may now suffice
to show the furrows in my face!
with lullaby then wink a while;
with lulaby yours looks beguile;
let no fair face, nor beauty bright,
entice you eft with vain delight.

and lullaby my wanton will!
let reason`s rule now rein thy thought;
since all too late i find my skill
how dear i have thy fancies bought,
with lullaby now take thine ease,
with lullaby thy doubts appease,
for trust to this, if thou be still
my body shall obey thy will.

Eke lullaby my loving boy-
my little robin, take thy rest!
since age is cold and nothing coy,
keep close thy coin, for so is best.
with lullaby be thou content,
with lullaby thy lusts relent!
let others pay which have more pence;
thou are too poor for such expense.

thus lullaby my youth, mine eyes,
my will, my ware, and all thet was!
i can no more delays devise;
but welcome pain, let pleasure pass!
with lulaby now take your leave,
with lullaby your dreams deceive,
and when you rise with waking eye,
remember then this lullaby.

Hundredth Sundry Flowers, about 1572
from a small leatherbound book called [the biblots/an elizabethan garland].
jm

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## zerotule

by John Greenleaf Whittier 

just a bit from this long poem-story


http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb....xtra/mogg.html



Theres a sudden light in the Indians glance, 
A moments trace of powerful feeling  
Of love or triumph, or both perchance, 
Over his proud, calm features stealing. 
The words of my father are very good  
He shall have the land, and water, and wood, 
And he who harms the Sagamore John 
Shall feel the knife of MOGG MEGONE  
But the fawn of the Yengeese shall sleep on my breast, 
And the bird of the clearing shall sing in my nest. 

But, father! and the Indians hand 
Falls gently on the white mans arm, 
And, with a smile as shrewdly bland 
As the deep voice is slow and calm: 
Where is my fathers singing-bird  
The sunny eye and sunset hair? 
I know I have my fathers word, 
And that his word is good and fair; 
But, will my father tell me where 
Megone shall go and look for his bride?  
For he sees her not by her fathers side. 

The dark, stern eye of Bonython 
Flashes over the features of MOGG MEGONE, 
In one of those glances which search within  
But the stolid calm of the Indian alone 
Remains where the trace of emotion had been. 
Does the Sachem doubt? Let him go with me, 
And the eyes of the Sachem his bride shall see. 

Cautious and slow, with pauses oft, 
And watchful eyes and whispers soft, 
The twain are stealing through the wood, 
Leaving the downward-rushing flood, 
Whose deep and hollow roar behind, 
Grows fainter on the evening wind. 

A cottage hidden in the wood  
Red through its seams a light is glowing, 
On rock and bough and tree-trunk rude, 
A narrow lustre throwing. 
Whos there? a clear, firm voice demands  
Hold, Ruth  t is I  the Sagamore! 
Quick, at the summons, hasty hands 
Unclose the bolted door; 
And on the outlaws daughter shine 
The flashes of the kindled pine. 

Tall and erect the maiden stands, 
Like some young priestess of the wood, 
Some creature born of Solitude, 
And bearing still the wild and rude, 
Yet noble trace of Natures hands  
Her dark-brown cheek has caught its stain 
More from the sunshine than the rain; 
Yet, where her long fair hair is parting, 
A pure white brow into light is starting; 
And, where the folds of her mantle sever, 
Are a neck and bosom as white as ever 
The foam-wreaths rise on the leaping river. 
But, in the convulsive quiver and grip 
Of the muscles around her bloodless lip, 
There is something painful and sad to see 
And her eye has a glance more sternly wild 
Than even that of a forest-child, 
In it fearless and untamed freedom should be. 

Oh! seldom, in hall or court, are seen 
So queenly a form and so noble a mien, 
As freely and smiling she welcomes them there  
Her outlawed sire and MOGG MEGONE; 
Pray, father, how does thy hunting fare? 
And, Sachem, say  does Scamman wear, 
In spite of thy promise, a scalp of his own? 
Careless and light is the maidens tone; 
But a fearful meaning lurks within 
Her glance, as it questions the eye of Megone -- 
An awful meaning of guilt and sin!  
The Indian hath opened his blanket, and there 
Hangs a human scalp by its long damp hair! 

Now, God have mercy!  that maidens fingers 
Are touching the scalp where the blood still lingers  
Turning up to the light its soft brown hair! 
What an evil triumph her eye reveals! 
What a baleful smile on her pale face steals  
Is the soul of a fiend in a form so fair? 
Nay  traces of feeling are visible now, 
In that quivering lip and that writhing brow! 
But who shall measure the thoughts within, 
Of hatred and love, of passion and sin? 
Does not the eye of her mind go back 
On the gloom and guilt of her stormy track?  
The traitors lip by her kisses met  
The traitors hand by her fine tears wet  
The trustless hopes on his promise built  
The gust of passion  the hell of guilt! 
The warm embrace, when her tresses fair 
Mingled themselves with that scalps brown hair  
And idly and fondly her small hand played 
In dalliance sweet with its light and shade! 
And, what are those tears which her wild eyes dim, 
But tears of sorrow and love for him?  
For him, who drugged her cup with shame  
With a curse for her heart, and a blight for her name? 
For him, whom her vengeance hath tracked so long, 
Feeding its torch with the thought of wrong?

----------


## Helga

I have to say that one of my favourite love poems is Anabel Lee by Edgar Alan Poe it starts like this:

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.


It's very sad and very beutyful, if you haven't read it you should.

----------


## nothingman87

There's a simple answer to this inquiry:
DANTE 
Also, believe it or not my favorite romantic poet is Mr. Edgar Allan Poe. Try, Annabel Lee and Serenade.

----------


## Isagel

Rainer Maria Rilke:
"A good marriage is that in which each appoints the other guardian of his solitude. Once the realisation is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole and against a wide sky. Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other."

----------


## verybaddmom

I know that John Donne has been mentioned with regards to "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" but do not forget "Sonne Rising". nothing quite like making the bed of love the center of the world...

----------


## hal9000

> _Originally posted by Isagel_ 
> *Rainer Maria Rilke:
> "A good marriage is that in which each appoints the other guardian of his solitude. Once the realisation is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole and against a wide sky. Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other."*


Thanks for this; it's well worth saving and remembering.

----------


## Isagel

I´m glad that you liked it.

Gibran wrote something similar in The Prophet, I thought you might like it:

Marriage



Then Almitra spoke again and said, "And what of Marriage, master?" 

And he answered saying: 

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore. 

You shall be together when white wings of death scatter your days. 

Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God. 

But let there be spaces in your togetherness, 

And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. 

Love one another but make not a bond of love: 

Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. 

Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup. 

Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. 

Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, 

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. 

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping. 

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. 

And stand together, yet not too near together: 

For the pillars of the temple stand apart, 

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.

----------


## hal9000

Very nice. Gibran's, _The Prophet,_ was very popular sometime back. 

In other words, (and not to make light of the insight and romantic imagery) don't buy matching jogging suits.  :Biggrin:

----------


## Isagel

I´m a bit ambivalent towards the The Prophet. It´s is beautifully written, but some of the ideas I´m not sure I like at all. But this part I really do like. 

(Mmm - I wonder - is it OK to read the same books? :-) )

----------


## kilted exile

Love me not for comely grace


LOVE not me for comely grace, 
For my pleasing eye or face, 
Nor for any outward part, 
No, nor for my constant heart, 
For those may fail, or turn to ill, 5 
So thou and I shall sever: 
Keep therefore a true woman's eye, 
And love me still, but know not why 
So hast thou the same reason still 
To doat upon me ever! 10

----------


## Miranda

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediment.Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:-

No, It is an ever fixed mark
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out ev'n to the edge of doom:-

If this be error, and upon me proved
I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 

W Shakespeare

----------


## emily655321

I've always loved "Faustine" by Algernon Charles Swinburne. A small, sickly guy who loved partying, paganism and free love -- a Lord Byron wannabe born half a century too late. It seems either people love him or hate him, because no one else I know likes him. But I think he's a lot of fun.  :Biggrin:  This poem is too long, and possibly too racy, to post here so here's a link:

http://eir.library.utoronto.ca/rpo/d.../poem2082.html

----------


## Xiketa

Neruda wrote some of the best love poems without any doubt. I'm spanish so maybe it is easy for me to enjoy Neruda's poetry but you must read "Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche". I have found it in english but it's not the same... I like to read poetry in the original language, it's better but I guess you would not understand it in spanish  :Smile: 

SADDEST POEM
I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.

Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."

The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.

To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass.

What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.

That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.

As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.

The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.

I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.

Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.

Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.

Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her.

----------


## amuse

por favor, Xiketa, quiero leerla en espanol, si la tiene. gracias.

----------


## Xiketa

Yes, of course I have it!  :Smile:  

PUEDO ESCRIBIR LOS VERSOS MÁS TRISTES ESTA NOCHE

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.

Escribir, por ejemplo: "La noche está estrellada,
y tiritan, azules, los astros, a lo lejos."

El viento de la noche gira en el cielo y canta.

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Yo la quise, y a veces ella también me quiso.

En las noches como esta la tuve entre mis brazos.
La besé tantas veces bajo el cielo infinito.

Ella me quiso, a veces yo también la quería.
Cómo no haber amado sus grandes ojos fijos.

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche.
Pensar que no la tengo. Sentir que la he perdido.

Oir la noche inmensa, más inmensa sin ella.
Y el verso cae al alma como al pasto el rocío.

Qué importa que mi amor no pudiera guardarla.
La noche esta estrellada y ella no está conmigo.

Eso es todo. A lo lejos alguien canta. A lo lejos.
Mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.

Como para acercarla mi mirada la busca.
Mi corazón la busca, y ella no está conmigo.

La misma noche que hace blanquear los mismos árboles.
Nosotros, los de entonces, ya no somos los mismos.

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero cuánto la quise.
Mi voz buscaba el viento para tocar su oído.

De otro. Será de otro. Como antes de mis besos.
Su voz, su cuerpo claro. Sus ojos infinitos.

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero tal vez la quiero.
Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido.

Porque en noches como esta la tuve entre mis brazos,
mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido.

Aunque este sea el ultimo dolor que ella me causa,
y estos sean los ultimos versos que yo le escribo.

----------


## aabashenya

One of the best love poets of all time, in my opinion, is the French poet Guillaume Apollinaire. "Company Commander" is one of my favorite love poems:

"My mouth will flame the sulphurs of the Pit 
You will find my mouth a hell of sweetness and seduction 
My mouth's angels will hold sway in your heart 
My mouth's soldiers will take you by storm 
The priests of my mouth will cense your beauty 
Your soul will shake like a terrain in an earthquake 
Your eyes will be charged will all the love that humanity has stored up in its eyes since the beginning 
My mouth will be an army against you a stumbling awkward army 
Tricky as a magician with his sleight of changing shapes 
The choirs and orchestra of my mouth will tell you my love 
It murmurs to you now from far away 
While I stand here eyes fastened to my watch waiting for the exact moment to go over the top" 

~ Company Commander (Chef de section), Guillaume Apollinaire

And as always, e.e. cummings and Dickinson are favorites as well. Also, check out Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, and Langston Hughes. 

Yours,
Raven

Love is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
The exponent of breath.

~ Emily Dickinson

----------


## Monica

My favourite one is by Paul Eluard, but somehow I don't know its title, I can't find it anywhere. I can only write it in Polish:

Z czołem na szybie jak w smutku bezsenni
Niebo którego noc przebyłem
Małe równiny w moich otwartych dłoniach
W ich podwójnym horyzoncie biernym obojętnym
Z czołem na szybie jak w smutku bezsenni

Szukam Cię poza oczekiwaniem
Szukam Cie poza sobą
I już nie wiem tak Cię kocham
Kto z nas dwojga jest nieobecny

----------


## Monica

I've found another one by Paul Eluard. This time fortunately in English.

The Beloved

She is standing on my eyelids
And her hair is wound in mine,
She has the form of my hands,
She has the colour of my eyes,
She is swallowed by my shadow
Like a stone against the sky.


Her eyes are always open
And will not let me sleep.
Her dreams in broad daylight
Make the suns evaporate
Make me laugh, cry and laugh,
Speak with nothing to say.

----------


## amuse

:Smile:  beautiful.

----------


## anabanana

My favorite love poem by Henrry VIII annd is called greensleeves, I do´t remember it well, but I think it is like:

Greensleeves was my delight
greensleeves was my heart of gold
Greensleeves was my heart of joy
and who but my lady greensleeves?

----------


## mono

The most romantic poem in history proves difficult to decide, but Shakespeare's sonnet LXXV should make the list.

So are you to my thoughts as food to life,
Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground;
And for the peace of you I hold such strife
As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found;
Now proud as an enjoyer and anon
Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure,
Now counting best to be with you alone,
Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure;
Sometime all full with feasting on your sight
And by and by clean starved for a look;
Possessing or pursuing no delight,
Save what is had or must from you be took.
Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day,
Or gluttoning on all, or all away.

----------


## WingedSpirit

My favorate is <<when u r old>> by William Butler Yeats:

WHEN you are old and gray and full of sleep 
And nodding by the fire, take down this book, 
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look 
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep; 

How many loved your moments of glad grace, 
And loved your beauty with love false or true; 
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you, 
And loved the sorrows of your changing face. 

And bending down beside the glowing bars, 
Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled 
And paced upon the mountains overhead, 
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

----------


## vango

"Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! "
Matthew Arnold: Dover Beach
they may be the sadest lines in the history. in this untrue world, the only thing that is true is true love. but is love always be true?

----------


## Miranda

Vango,
Shakespeare says 'love is not love which alters when it alterations finds'. In other words, if love ends then it wasn't true love to begin with because love is everlasting. 

Miranda

----------


## vango

Hi, Miranda. Maybe you and Shakespeare are right. But before the feeling (since it is not love in your sense, i can only think of this word) ends, we take it as love. And when one is in..., he doesn't know (till he dies) if it will end some day. Anyway, Anything may happen. So no one can tell if he is in the true love? Only others can after his death?

----------


## bjortan

> My favorate is <<when u r old>> by William Butler Yeats:
> 
> WHEN you are old and gray and full of sleep...



I can't help it, but this reminds me of another far less pretty verse:

Since I still appreciate you
Let's find love while we may
Because I know I'll hate you
When you are old and gray

So say you love me here and now
I'll make the most of that
Say you love and trust me
For I know you'll disgust me
When you're old and getting fat

An awful debility, a lessened utility
A loss of mobility is a strong possibility
In all probability I'll lose my virility
And you your fertility and desirability
And this liability of total sterility
Will lead to hostility and a sense of futility
So let's act with agility while we still have facility
For we'll soon reach senility and lose the ability

Your teeth will start to go, dear
Your waist will start to spread
In twenty years or so, dear
I'll wish that you were dead

I'll never love you then at all
The way I do today
So please remember
When I leave in December:
I told you so in May!

(Tom Lehrer)

----------


## Farfalla

I've always thought Neruda's love and sex poems were the best... but only in their original spanish. Alot of the lyrical effect is lost when its translated.

But still, "I Have Gone Marking" ( "He ido marcando") is definatly one of the best love poems ever written.

the best lines are the last ones:

Cuando he llagado al verice mas atrvido y frio 
mi corazon se cierra como una flor nocturna.

translation:

When i have reached the most awesome and the coldest summit
my heart closes like a nocturnal flower.

----------


## mono

I posted a Shakespeare sonnet here earlier, LXXV, I think, but I thought to share the below that I just read:

My lady carries love within her eyes;
All that she looks on is made a pleasanter;
Upon her path men turn to gaze at her;
He whom she greeteth feels his heart to rise,
And droops his troubled visage, full of sighs,
And of his evil heart is then aware:
Hate loves, and pride becomes a worshipper.
O women, help to praise her in somewise.
Humbleness, and the hope that hopeth well,
By speech of hers into the mind are brought,
And who beholds is blessed oftenwhiles.
The look she hath when she a little smiles
Cannot be said, nor holden in the thought;
'Tis such a new and gracious miracle.

Dante Alighieri
Translated by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

----------


## Scheherazade

There are so many beautiful love poems and I agree with many of those which are posted on here. However, my favorite love poem is by E.E. Cummings. I love his poetry althought I am first to admit that I can barely appreciate and praise them as they should be.  :Rolleyes:  

I would like to hear what you think of this poem as everytime I read it, I am in awe and cannot stop my heart pounding in my chest. So strong to me the feelings and sentiments he expresses in this poem.  :Blush:  




somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look will easily unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

----------


## mono

Yet another post:

Sonnet LXXV

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Again I wrote it with a second hand,
jBut came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
'Vain man,' said she, 'thou do'st in vain assay,
A mortal thing so to immortalize,
For I myself shall like to this decay.
And eek my name be wiped out likewise.'
'Not so,' quoth I, 'let baser things devise
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write your glorious name,
Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.'

Sir Edmund Spenser

----------


## WingedSpirit

just got one ancient Chinese poem:

by Wen Tinjun

The feelings of the separation
What there is to say
But that the heart is 
An endless river of stars

----------


## Jester

Some of the best love songs are the best poetry personally my two favorites are "leaving on a jet plane" and "Why don't you and I" the latter one is by CHad Kroeger and Santana

----------


## BSturdy

Morning Sleep

When ye morning riseth redde
Rise not thou, but keepe thy bedde,
When ye dawne is dull and graye
Sleepe is still ye better way, 
Beastes arise betimes - but then
They are beastes, and we are men.

Is ye weather fayre and fine?
It shall give thee dreams divine;
Doth it poure with pelting rayne?
'Tis a hint to doze agayne.
Is it niether drye nor wette?
Waite until ye weather's sette.

Wouldst thou walke unscaveng'd streetes,
Catch from shaken mattes ye sweetes,
Straye forlorne though chillie roomes,
Stumble over casuall broomes,
Scowling house-maydes round thee scan?
These befall ye earlie man.

Morning sleepe avoydeth broyles, 
Wasteth not in greedye toyles;
Doth not suffer care nor greefe,
Giveth aking bones releefe.
Of all ye crimes beneath ye sunne,
Say, which in morning sleepe was done?

Anon.

Maybe it's a burlesque, but I love it literally: Can be used as a love poem
In conjunction with a certain Ian Dury track

----------


## Scheherazade

Which part of the UK are you from originally BSturdy?  :Smile:

----------


## BSturdy

The Bard is hard to beat. Not really a poem exactly but, anyway:

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.
The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand,
And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!
For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

----------


## pepper39

my room is empty...
my self
self-inflicted scars, by myself.

Spinning out of control...
once again I'll go away and hold on
to my pride where I lock it up inside
my room...
my self

it's all empty now 
you've drained me of my dignity
self-infliction of wounds poured over 
a sauce of *%#@.

easily I fall down on to you from 90 stories
over and over...

Patience is time.
time is ugly, ugly, like me...
easily flying by, 90 stories down onto you.

green eyes, brown possessive cold stares 
my life is over and i'm going down with it ending up 
in a nightmare of my sanity pushing til' the end of my 
chain, chain of love and anger.

full of myself...
once again we come back to you, back again...
we come back to you!

dw

----------


## Scheherazade

BSturdy> Yes, it seems like Romeo has said it all  :Smile: 

Pepper39> Is that your own poetry?

----------


## midwest

This is a good one, short for Donne yet that doesn't make it easier to work through.

Stay, O sweet, and do not rise;
The light that shines comes from thine eyes;
The day breaks not, it is my heart,
Because that you and I must part.
Stay, or else my joys will die.
And perish in their infancy.


Originally I think this is about a dream he had of his wife that had passed on, but let me know what you think!

----------


## Hope`

My favourite is Wordsworth's - *She Was a Phantom of Delight*...


_She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament;
Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an Image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and waylay.

I saw her upon nearer view,
A Spirit, yet a Woman too!
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin-liberty;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food,
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A Being breathing thoughtful breath,
A Traveller between life and death;
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill;
A perfect Woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a Spirit still, and bright
With something of angelic light._

----------


## Rechka

I thought this poem was beautiful when I read it and I'm normally not a fan of "love poems". 

*Amor condusse noi ad una morte*

Love is an anguish, a question, 
a luminous doubt suspended; 
it is a desire to know the whole of you 
and a fear of finally knowing it. 

To love is to reconstruct, when you are away, 
your steps, your silences, your words, 
and to pretend to follow your thoughts 
when unmoving at last by me side, you fall silent. 

Love is a secret rage, 
an icy and diabolic pride. 

To love is not to sleep when in my bed 
you dream between my circling arms, 
and to hate the dream in which, beneath your brow, 
you abandon yourself, perhaps in other arms. 

To love is to listen at your breast, 
until my greedy ear is glutted, 
to the noise of your blood and the tide 
of your measured breath. 

To love is to absorb your young sap 
and join our mouths in one river-bed 
until the breeze of your breath 
impregnates my entrails forever. 

Love is a mute, green envy, 
a subtle and shining greed. 

To love is to provoke the sweet moment 
in which your skin seekd my awakened skin, 
to gratify the nocturnal appetite 
and to die once more the same death 
provisional, heart-rending, dark. 

Love is a thirst, like that of a wound 
that burns without being consumed or healing, 
and the hunger of a tormented mouth 
that begs for more and more and is not sated. 

Love is an unaccustomed luxury 
and a voracious gluttony, always empty. 

But to love is also to close our eyes, 
to let sleep invade our bodies 
like a river of darkness and oblivion, 
and to sail without a course, drifting; 
because love, in the end, is indolence.

----------


## SwiftSleigh7

> Some of the best love songs are the best poetry personally my two favorites are "leaving on a jet plane" and "Why don't you and I" the latter one is by CHad Kroeger and Santana


I agree with Leaving on a Jet Plane! It's so sweet!

One of the best love poems is this one... although I don't know who wrote it: 

Absence

Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle
Everything I do is stitched with its colour

Tell me what you think of this one?

----------


## mono

I have posted in this thread multiple times, but, well, this seems the life of a "sucker" for both art and love. I cannot possibly choose my *favorite* love poem, but I read this poem today, and felt an urge to share.

Lay your sleeping head, my love,
Human on my faithless arm;
Time and fevers burn away
Individual beauty from
Thoughtful children, and the grave
Proves the child ephemeral;
But in my arms till break of day
Let the living creature lie,
Mortal, guilty, but to me
The entirely beautiful.

Soul and body have no bounds;
To lovers as they lie upon
Her tolerant enchanted slope
In their ordinary swoon,
Grave the vision Venus sends
Of supernatural sympathy,
Universal love and hope;
While an abstract insight wakes
Among the glaciers and the rocks
The hermit's sensual ecstasy.

Certainy, fidelity
On the stroke of midnight pass
Like vibrations of a bell
And fashionable madmen raise
Their pedantic boring cry;
Every farthing of the cost,
All the dreaded cards foretell,
Shall be paid, but from this night
Not a whisper, not a thought,
Not a kiss nor look be lost.

Beauty, midnight, vision dies;
Let the winds of dawn that blow
Softly round your dreaming head
Such a day of sweetness show
Eye and knocking heart may bless,
Find the mortal world enough;
Noons of dryness see you fed
By the involuntary powers,
Nights of insult let you pass
Watched by every human love.

W.H. Auden (1907-1973)

----------


## SwiftSleigh7

mono: You act as if you were the only one here. IF YOU FALL for Auden's drivel then you are aptly self-described. I would prefer "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" although I would not be so boorish as to quote it in its entirety. Dialogue, not mono-logue is what I desire. But please, don't be offended by my pale fire! I'm really an easy guy to get to know. If you'd care to, that is.

1 Corinthians 13 is, of course, the best poem on love available. I can guess what's coming next, of course!

----------


## Rifka

Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress"

----------


## SwiftSleigh7

:FRlol:  


> Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress"


Since when is a poem on seduction an example of love!

It always amazes me how easily people confuse lust with love.

To His Coy Mistress is an elaborate ploy to make the "mistress" 
give in to his sexual desires--simply put, he wants to have his way with her.

This is NOT a love poem.

----------


## mono

> I would prefer "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" although I would not be so boorish as to quote it in its entirety.


Good suggestion. Some of T.S. Eliot's work I find a little difficult to understand, _The Wasteland_, for example, but _The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock_ I have adored since my first read:

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, `` What is it? ''
Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening.
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains.
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys.
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me.
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, ``Do I dare?'' and, ``Do I dare?''
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair--
[They will say: ``How his hair is growing thin!'']
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin--
[They will say: ``But how his arms and legs are thin!'']
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all--
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all--
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? . . .

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep. . . tired . . . or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet--and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: `` I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all''--
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: ``That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.''

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor--
And this, and so much more?--
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow, or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
``That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.''
. . . . .
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous--
Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old . . . I grow old . . .
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

T.S. Eliot

---



> Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress"


I loved this one too - a classic of which I can never grow weary, though I can understand SwiftSleigh7's interpretation.

To His Coy Mistress

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.

But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.

Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Andrew Marvell

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## SwiftSleigh7

Phyllis Gotlieb (1926-)

First Person Demonstrative


1 I'd rather 
2 heave half a brick than say 
3 I love you, though I do 
4 I'd rather 
5 crawl in a hole than call you 
6 darling, though you are 
7 I'd rather 
8 wrench off an arm than hug you though 
9 it's what I long to do 
10 I'd rather 
11 gather a posy of poison ivy than 
12 ask if you love me 


13 so if my 
14 hair doesn't stand on end it's because 
15 I never tease it 
16 and if my 
17 heart isn't in my mouth it's because 
18 it knows its place 
19 and if I 
20 don't take a bite of your ear it's because 
21 gristle gripes my guts 
22 and if you 
23 miss the message better get new 
24 glasses and read it twice 


This is one of the best modern love poems I can remember
I love how its understated irony mingles with the flavor of sarcasm to create an aftertaste of satire that teases as much as it satiates.

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## Monica

It's a great one, Swift!  :Smile:  I've not heard anything about the author yet, so I'll have to google. The last 3 lines are hilarious and sad at the same time.

----------


## Monica

Paul Eluard "I Cannot Be Known"

I cannot be known
Better than you know me 

Your eyes in which we sleep
We together
Have made for my man's gleam
A better fate than for the common nights 

Your eyes in which I travel
Have given to signs along the roads
A meaning alien to the earth 

In your eyes who reveal to us
Our endless solitude 

Are no longer what they thought themselves to be 

You cannot be known
Better than I know you.

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## lavendar1

_Short and oh! so sweet:_

"A Deep-Sworn Vow"

Others because you did not keep
That deep-sworn vow have been friends of mine;
Yet always when I look death in the face,
When I clamber to the heights of sleep,
Or when I grow excited with wine,
Suddenly I meet your face.


"When You Are Old"

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look 
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim Soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;
And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur a little sadly, how Love fled 
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

_I suppose unrequited (or almost unrequited) love has always been a catalyst for poetry._

----------


## Basil

Yeats is great:

_I carry from my mother's womb
A fanatic heart._

By the way, how's the Brit-Lit coming along?  :Smile:

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## lavendar1

Re: the Brit-Lit -- I'm proceeding and persevering. Right now we're "doing Dickens," or more precisely, _Great Expectations_. I've a renewed appreciation for Mr. Dickens (it had been years since I'd last read any of his work); his abilities in character development and narrative technique are remarkable. But then I suppose that's why he's still being read. Some of the students have difficulty following the long descriptive passages. To counter the problem, we read excerpts and I try to get alot of discussion going. I think we'll wrap it all up with a Victorian-style tea party. Then...it's on to _Ivanhoe_. I might try a little _Sir Gawain and the Green Knight_. Anyway, thanks for asking.

I just thought of another favorite love poem -- The Old Testament's "Song of Songs." If you want to read a wonderful translation, try the one by Ariel Bloch and Chana Bloch:

_Bind me as a seal upon your heart,_ 
_a sign upon your arm,_ 

_for love is as fierce as death_ 
_its jealousy bitter as the grave_ 
_Even its sparks are a raging fire,_ 
_a devouring flame._ 

_Great seas cannot extinguish love,_ 
_no river can sweep it away._

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## mono

Another good one, classic:

The Passionate Shepherd to his Love

Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove,
That valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.

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

And I will make thee beds of roses,
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle:

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold:

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs;
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my love.

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning;
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.

Christopher Marlowe

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## Rachy

I have to admit I don't really like poetry, but there is one poem that I love and will always stay with me called, "What were they like?" by Denise Levertov:

1. Did the people of Vietnam
use lanterns of stone?


2. Did they hold ceremonies
to reverence the opening of buds?


3. Were they inclined to quiet laughter?


4. Did they use bone and ivory,
and silver, for ornament?


5. Had they an epic poem?


6. Did they distinguish between speech and singing?




1. Sir, their light hearts turned to stone.
It is not remembered whether in gardens the lanterns illumined pleasant ways.


2. Perhaps they gathered once to delight in blossom,but after the children were killed, there were no more buds.


3. Sir, laughter is bitter to the burned mouth.


4. A dream ago, perhaps. Ornament is for joy.
All the bones were charred.


5. It is not remembered. Remember,
most were peasants; their life
was in rice and bamboo.
When peaceful clouds were reflected in the paddies
And the water buffalo stepped surely along terraces, 
maybe fathers told their sons old tales.
When bombs smashed those mirrors
there was time only to scream.


6. There is an echo yet
Of their speech which was like a song. 
It was reported their singing resembled
the flight of moths in moonlight.
Who can say? It is silent now.



Denise Levertov

----------


## Bandini

It's not that you don't like poetry - it's jsut that you haven't found anything you like yet! Keep looking.  :Wink:

----------


## Veritas

This is mine :-)

Oh Beloved,
take me.
Liberate my soul.
Fill me with your love and
release me from the two worlds.

If I set my heart on anything but you
let fire burn me from inside.

Oh Beloved,
take away what I want.
Take away what I do.
Take away what I need.
Take away everything
that takes me from you.
[Rumi]

----------


## songfuse

*YOU*
God is love,
Love is creation,
As you were created,
Out of this act called love.

Among the forests,of serpentire'and simple dreams.
Flavoring the sense that has so art troubled you thus'
Painted,deserted,calling for aid,
Become,
Whole...born.
Awake,see what is anew befroth untouched breathing freely.
Sit comfortable,uncomfortably shallowed vessle,
That which so everently houses you.
Warm summer rain,bashing down smooth youth's brow
Purchase the whimper,the winter,your very first cold.
All the things,the shiny,the red ball,or green dress.
Now is loss ever so gently,YOU.

*Songfuse*

----------


## mmcdonald

my favorite love poem at the moment:

The More Loving One

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

Auden

----------


## Bandini

For Jane:With All the Love I Had, Which Was Not Enough:- 



I pick up the skirt, 

I pick up the sparkling beads 

in black, 

this thing that moved once 

around flesh, 

and I call God a liar, 

I say anything that moved 

like that 

or knew 

my name 

could never die 

in the common verity of dying, 

and I pick 

up her lovely 

dress, 

all her loveliness gone, 

and I speak to all the gods, 

Jewish gods, Christ-gods, 

chips of blinking things, 

idols, pills, bread, 

fathoms, risks, 

knowledgeable surrender, 

rats in the gravy of 2 gone quite mad 

without a chance, 

hummingbird knowledge, hummingbird chance, 

I lean upon this, 

I lean on all of this 

and I know: 

her dress upon my arm: 

but 

they will not 

give her back to me. 


Bukowski.

Brings tears to my eyes everytime.

----------


## arlecchino

Hello, I like the idea of this poll. Though it will always be a very subjective sort of thing, and so much the better for it, for it shows how someone can be touched by a piece of work written, possible, hundreds of years ago and a thousand miles away. Really enjoyed reading some poetry that I've never encountered before, some that I'm surprised to see/not see here. (The Lovesong Of J. Alfred Prufrock, I feel, is less of a 'love' poem, in the romantic sense of the word than say 'La Figlia che Piange') but my favourite is He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven by W.B. Yeats.

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, 
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The Blue, the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

I enjoy this poem partly becuase it is technically perfect; see the skill he has over so few lines, how expertly crafted it is, how although he uses the same words for the rhymes it feels perfectly natural, without any strong (that is to say undeliberate, for all short poetry, most notably sonnets, are very self-consciously artificial) sense of artificiality, as if he's improvising this to a lover. It is also lyrically beautiful. Those few lines sound so sweet that if you say them aloud, you'd better make sure you brush yur teeth afterwards. But not only is it stylistically perfect. There is real substance created in those few lines, feelings that all who have been in love have felt, the desire to connect on a more than earthly level with a partner. I think it has much in common with the Metaphysical Poets.

----------


## lavendar1

I think you're right. Absoulutely (I meant that spelling) beautiful...

----------


## arlecchino

> I think you're right. Absoulutely (I meant that spelling) beautiful...


I take it by that you don't like it, then? Why not?

----------


## lavendar1

You've misunderstood -- I do like the poem. In fact, in an earlier thread, I posted several of Yeats' poems, "When You Are Old" and "A Deep Sworn Vow" as favorites.

While I'm no scholar of poetry, I know what pleases my ear and my heart. And Mr. Yeats verse gets "the nod..." What I mean to say is that his poetry gets my approval.

----------


## arlecchino

Sorry for the misunderstanding. I also like your choices. There are plenty of other poems Yeats' wrote that are great love poems; he could have a category to himself.

----------


## amuse

you know, that's a wonderful idea, sub-sections for poets like we have for authors.

Rachy, i missed your earlier "What Were They Like" post. i emphatically think it's great.

----------


## Rachy

It just effected me because I'm very anti-war and at the time that we were reading I was doing Vietnam coursework for history! I love it!

----------


## blp

Sorry if this is repeated. I think I've read all the pages, but can't be sure

A slumber did my spirit seal
I knew no human fears
She seemed a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years

No motion has she now nor force
She neither hears nor sees
Rolled round in earth's diurnal course
With rocks and stones and trees

Wordsworth

----------


## mono

A lesser known love poem by Andrew Marvell (1621-1678):

The Definition Of Love

My love is of a birth as rare
As 'tis for object strange and high:
It was begotten by Despair
Upon impossibility.

Magnanimous Despair alone
Could show me so divine a thing,
Where feeble Hope could ne'er have flown
But vainly flapped its tinsel wing.

And yet I quickly might arrive
Where my extended soul is fixed,
But Fate does iron wedges drive,
And always crowds itself betwixt.

For Fate with jealousy eye does see
Two perfect loves, nor lets them close:
Their union would her ruin be,
And her tyrannic power depose.

And therefore her decrees of steel
Us as the distant poles have placed,
(Though love's whole world on us doth wheel)
Not by themselves to be embraced,

Unless the giddy heaven fall,
And earth some new convulsion tear,
And, us to join, the world should all
Be cramped into a planisphere.

As lines, so loves oblique may well
Themselves in every angle greet;
But ours, so truly parallel,
Though infinite, can never meet.

Therefore the love which us doth bind,
But fate so enviously debars,
Is the conjunction of the mind,
And opposition of the stars.

----------


## Monica

A Description of Love - Sir Walter Raleigh

Now what is Love, I pray thee, tell?
It is that fountain and that well
Where pleasure and repentance dwell;
It is perhaps the sauncing bell
That tolls all into heaven or hell:
And this is Love, as I hear tell.

Yet what is Love, I pray thee, say?
It is work on holy-day,
It is December matched with May,
When lusty bloods in fresh array
Hear ten months after of the play:
And this is Love, as I hear say.

Yet what is Love, I pray thee sain?
It is sunshine mixed with rain;
It is a toothache, or like pain,
It is a game where none hath gain;
The lass saith no, yet would full fain:
And this is Love, as I hear sain.

Yet what is Love, I pray thee say?
It is a yea, it is a nay
A pretty kind of sporting fray,
It is a thing will soon away.
Then take the vantage while you may:
And this is Love, as I hear say.

Yet what is Love, I pray thee show?
A thing that creeps, it cannot go,
A prize that passeth to and fro,
A thing for one, a thing for mo,
And he that proves shall find it so;
And this is Love, sweet friend, I trow.

Lovely  :Biggrin:

----------


## IrishCanadian

Easy! She Walks In Beauty Like The Night by Byron. It should be easy to find. If not then shakespeare's sonnets never stear wrong. But Byron has it for me.

----------


## Monica

Shakespeare is maestro, isn't he  :Wink:  

Sonnet LXXV

So are you to my thoughts as food to life,
Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground;
And for the peace of you I hold such strife
As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found;
Now proud as an enjoyer and anon
Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure,
Now counting best to be with you alone,
Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure;
Sometime all full with feasting on your sight
And by and by clean starved for a look;
Possessing or pursuing no delight,
Save what is had or must from you be took.
Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day,
Or gluttoning on all, or all away.

----------


## mono

> Easy! She Walks In Beauty Like The Night by Byron. It should be easy to find. If not then shakespeare's sonnets never stear wrong. But Byron has it for me.


I, personally, love this poem too. I think most people call it, however, "She Walks In Beauty."  :Smile: 

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!



> Shakespeare is maestro, isn't he
> 
> Sonnet LXXV


Probably my favorite sonnet by The Bard also, Monica. Thanks.  :Wink:

----------


## Maxos

Leopardi's poem: "A se stesso"

Or poserai per sempre,
Stanco mio cor. Perì l'inganno estremo,
Ch'eterno io mi credei. Perì. Ben sento,
In noi di cari inganni,
Non che la speme, il desiderio è spento.
Posa per sempre. Assai
Palpitasti. Non val cosa nessuna 
I moti tuoi, né di sospiri è degna
La terra. Amaro e noia
La vita, altro mai nulla; e fango è il mondo.
T'acqueta omai. Dispera
L'ultima volta. Al gener nostro il fato
Non donò che il morire. Omai disprezza
Te, la natura, il brutto
Poter che, ascoso, a comun danno impera,
E l'infinita vanità del tutto.

That's a translation I found on the net:

To Himself (XXVIII)

Now youll rest forever
my weary heart. The last illusion has died
I thought eternal. Died. I feel, in truth,
not only hope, but desire
for dear illusion has vanished.
Rest forever. Youve laboured
enough. Not a single thing is worth
your beating: the earths not worthy
of your sighs. Bitter and tedious,
life is, nothing more: and the world is mud.
Be silent now. Despair
for the last time. To our race Fate
gave only death. Now scorn Nature,
that brute force
that secretly governs the common hurt,
and the infinite emptiness of all.

----------


## Koa

> Leopardi's poem: "A se stesso"


!!! Incredible! I was talking about this very poem a couple of nights ago! A r(ather unknown) masterpiece of that genius of pessimist poetry who is Leopardi! (cosmic pessmism lol, but then, Maxos, probably only me and you know what I'm talking about  :Wink: )

*reading it again* I adore this poem.

The 'Assai/Palpitasti' bit is amazing... And looking at the translation, it gives me one more reason to be extremely upset when I think of translation in general..

Amaro e noia
La vita, altro mai nulla; e fango il mondo.
(Bitter and tedious,
life is, nothing more: and the world is mud)

I had found this poem 4 or 5 years ago but the other night when it came to my mind it took 5 minutes to find it on my old schoolbook...It really impressed me a lot.

All the run on lines here are so perfectly placed...The rhythm is wonderful,

----------


## Maxos

The poem is indeed one of the poet's greatest masterpieces, critics like Monteverdi, underlined the reasons to consider it as an anticipation of twentieth century poetry.

We can notice a total lack of adjectives connoting qualities, for they belong to the language of "vago ed indefinito" (vague and indefinite) and the poet is tired with Nature's (an poetry's, as a result) evil jokes, he does not want to be tricked any longer by their pleasant and attractive forms, we do point out that the style of the sole prince of italian poetry (Petrarch), is characterised by a large use of a small set of adjectives which are juxtapposed to connote precisely but softly (without Dante's "semantic whirlpools") the meaning of words.

Koa correctly focusses on lines 9 and 10, here Leopardi reaches the climax of his modernity, getting rid even of the verbs.
Although the translation betrays the poet's purposes; in fact it sounds like that (without obeying to English syntax):

Bitterness and Boredom/Life. Nothing else ever. And mud the world.

Further on let's have a look to that "callida iunctura" which "brutto/poter" is:
The translator's choice: "brute", is completely unfit to the situation, I would probably have used "ugly", for this is the current meaning of the word, the poet wants us to look at Nature as an abandoned child looks at his violent and cruel stepmother, Nature's power forces us to be born, grow up, suffer, cry, and this all without any sense or possibility for us to escape "the net" (montalian imagery), considering that, the only word the poet finds out to explain it is one of the most simple (and childish as well) words of italian language: "brutto".

My dear Koa, may I ask you where you are from? Just because I noticed your close acquaintance to the subject.

I don't know whether my English is good enough to talk about poetry, anyway I did my best.

----------


## GruesomeBugman

well, a song might not really count, but who can say music isn't poetry?

that given, I'd have to say Unchained Melody by the Righteous brothers is a pretty good one.

----------


## Monica

> well, a song might not really count, but who can say music isn't poetry?
> 
> that given, I'd have to say Unchained Melody by the Righteous brothers is a pretty good one.



Music is poetry  :Nod:  And Unchained Melody is really nice


Oh, my love, my darling, 
I've hungered for your touch a long, 
lonely time. Time goes by so slowly 
and time can do so much. 
Are you still mine? 

I need your love. 
I need your love. 
God speed your love to me. 

Lonely rivers flow to the sea, to the sea, 
to the open arms of the sea. 
Lonely rivers sigh, wait for me, 
wait for me. 
I'll be coming home, wait for me. 

Oh, my love, my darling, 
I've hungered for your touch a long 
lonely time. Time, goes by so slowly, 
and time can do so much, 
Are you still mine? 

I need your love. 
I need your love. 
God speed your love, to me.


U2 made a good cover of this one.

----------


## amuse

George Benson does _the_ most amazing version of this song.  :Nod:

----------


## Monica

I'll have to find it because I looooooooove this song  :Smile:

----------


## metaxy99

i've been avoiding this thread - you know, thinking it was full of sappy love poetry - but there are some really good ones in here!

my two cents: 

ORIGINS AND HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Adrienne Rich, 1972-1974

I

Night-life. Letters, journals, bourbon
sloshed in the glass. Poems crucified on the wall,
dissected, their bird-wings severed
like trophies. No one lives in this room
without living through some kind of crisis.

No one lives in this room
without confronting the whiteness of the wall
behind the poems, planks of books,
photographs of dead heroines.
Without contemplating last and late
the true natures of poetry. The drive
to connect. The dream of a common language.

Thinking of lovers, their blind faith, their
experienced crucifixions,
my envy is not simple. I have dreamed of going to bed
as walking into water ringed by a snowy wood
white as cold sheets thinking, I'll freeze in there.
My bare feet are numbed already by the snow
but the water
is mild, I sink and float
like a warm amphibious animal
that has broken the net, has run
through fields of snow leaving no print;
this water rushes off the scent -
You are clear now
of the hunter, the trapper
the wardens of the mind -

yet the warm animal dreams on
of another animal
swimming under the snow-flecked surface of the pool,
and wakes, and sleeps again.

No one sleeps in this room without the dream of a common language.


II

It was simple to meet you, simple to take your eyes
into mine, saying: these are eyes I have known
from the first....It was simple to touch you
against the hacked background, the grain of what we
had been, the choices, years....It was even simple
to take each other's lives in our hands, as bodies.

What is not simple: to wake from drowning
from where the ocean beat inside us like an afterbirth
into this common, acute particularity
these two selves who walked half a lifetime untouching -
to wake to something deceptively simple: a glass
sweated with dew, a ring of the telephone, a scream
of someone beaten up far down the street
causing each of us to listen to her own inward scream

knowing the mind of the mugger and the mugged
as any woman must who stands to survive in this city,
this century, this life....
each of us having loved the flesh in its clenched or loosened beauty
better than trees or music (yet loving those too
as if they were flesh - and they are - but the flesh
of beings unfathomed as yet in our roughly literal life).


III

It's simple now to wake from sleep with a stranger,
dress, go out, drink coffee,
enter a life again. It isn't simple
to wake from sleep into the neighborhood
of one neither strange nor familiar
whom we have chosen to trust. Trusting, untrusting,
we lowered ourselves into this, let ourselves
downward hand over hand as on a rope that quivered
over the unsearched....We did this. Conceived
of each other, conceived each other in a darkness
which I remember as drenched in light.
I want to call this, life.

But I can't call it life until we start to move
beyond this secret circle of fire
where our bodies are giant shadows flung on a wall
where the night becomes our inner darkness, and sleeps
like a dumb beast, head on her paws, in the corner.

----------


## mono

> ORIGINS AND HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS
> 
> Adrienne Rich, 1972-1974


Thanks, metaxy, I have always loved this one, too.  :Smile:   :Thumbs Up:

----------


## amuse

Monica, there's an additional verse:

Lonely mountains gaze
at the stars, at the stars,
Waiting for the dawn of the day.
All alone, I gaze
at the stars, at the stars,
Dreaming of my love far away.

Oh, my love, my darling,
I've hungered for your touch
a long, lonely time.
And time goes by so slowly
and time can do so much,
are you still mine?
I need your love,
I need your love,
God speed your love to me!

----------


## Koa

> My dear Koa, may I ask you where you are from? Just because I noticed your close acquaintance to the subject.
> 
> I don't know whether my English is good enough to talk about poetry, anyway I did my best.


Of course I'm Italian as well...noone else would be slightly acquainted with the subject, especially regarding this poem which was in a corner of my schoolbook at the time...

And your English is better than mine...really (even if mine is really good  :Wink:   :Biggrin: )

----------


## metaxy99

i just realized something. all this love poetry, and no sappho?!
how about 2 short ones:

44
Without warning

As a whirlwind
swoops an oak 
Love shakes my heart


45
If you will come

I shall put out 
new pillows for
you to rest on

----------


## happyjing365

This one by Yeats
When You Are Old
.... one will love the pilgrim soul in you

lingering and almost desperate love,knowing that his beloved wouldn't accept him at the moment

----------


## lesterva5870

Donne's "Air and Angels" and Browning's "How Do I Love Thee?" and perhaps even Shelley's "When the Lamp is Shattered".

----------


## Bix12

Ah, Sappho. Her poems are some of the rarest on the planet. I was just reading that they found another one of her _complete_ poems...very cool. That brings the total number of complete _existing_ Sappho poems to 4.

I just picked up 'The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats' in paperback. It's the first paperback edition of the authorized canon of Yeats's poetry. 382 poems! 


WHITE MAGIC

_George Sterling (1869-1926)_

KEEP ye her brow with starshine crost 
And bind with ghostly light her hair, 
O powers benign, lest I accost 
Song's peaceless angel unaware! 

One eve her whisper came to earth, 
As eastward woke a thorny star, 
To tell me of her kingdom's worth 
And what her liberations are: 

She hath the Edens in her gift 
And songs of sovereignties unborn; 
In realms agone her turrets lift, 
Wrought from the purples of the morn. 

Where swings to foam the dusky sea, 
She waits with sapphires in her hand 
Whose light shall make thy spirit be 
Lost in a still, enchanted land. 

Musing, she hears the subtle tunes 
From chords where faery fingers stray-- 
A rain of pearl from crumbling moons 
Less clear and delicate than they. 

The strain we lost and could not find 
Think we her haunted heart forgets? 
She weaves it with a troubled wind 
And twilight music that regrets. 

Often she stands, unseen, aloof, 
To watch beside an ocean's brink 
The gorgeous, evanescent woof 
Cast from the loom of suns that sink. 

Often, in eyries of the West, 
She waits a lover from afar-- 
Frailties of blossom on her breast 
And o'er her brow the evening star. 

She stands to greet him unaware, 
Who cannot find her if he seek: 
A sigh, a scent of heavenly hair-- 
And oh, her breath is on his cheek!

----------


## mono

> Ah, Sappho. Her poems are some of the rarest on the planet. I was just reading that they found another one of her _complete_ poems...very cool. That brings the total number of complete _existing_ Sappho poems to 4.


I also love Sappho; having picked up a translated collection of her works a number of months ago, I paged through the whole book in a shockingly short time. If you would like to take a look, amuse, simon, and I pieced together a thread, sharing some of our favorite works:
http://www.online-literature.com/for...ead.php?t=3095

----------


## red leaves

I love this one by Sarah Teasdale

I said,"I have shut my heart"
As one shuts an open door,
That Love may starve therein
And trouble me no more."

BUt over the roofs there came
the wet new wind of May,
And a tune blew up from the curb
Where the street-pianos play.

My room was white with the sun 
And Love cried out in me,
"I am strong,I will break your heart
Unless you set me free."

----------


## blp

> there is one poem that I love and will always stay with me called, "What were they like?" by Denise Levertov:


Thanks for this. It's great. Here's another great (perhaps THE other great) Vietnam Poem

To Whom It May Concern
_by Adrian Mitchell_


I was run over by the truth one day.
Ever since the accident I've walked this way
So stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

Heard the alarm clock screaming with pain,
Couldn't find myself so I went back to sleep again
So fill my ears with silver
Stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

Every time I shut my eyes all I see is flames.
Made a marble phone book and I carved all the names
So coat my eyes with butter
Fill my ears with silver
Stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

I smell something burning, hope it's just my brains.
They're only dropping peppermints and daisy-chains
So stuff my nose with garlic
Coat my eyes with butter
Fill my ears with silver
Stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

Where were you at the time of the crime?
Down by the Cenotaph drinking slime
So chain my tongue with whisky
Stuff my nose with garlic
Coat my eyes with butter
Fill my ears with silver
Stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

You put your bombers in, you put your conscience out,
You take the human being and you twist it all about
So scrub my skin with women
Chain my tongue with whisky
Stuff my nose with garlic
Coat my eyes with butter
Fill my ears with silver
Stick my legs in plaster
Tell me lies about Vietnam.

----------


## lavendar1

_Sonnets From the Portuguese_ 

When our two souls stand up erect and strong,
Face to face, sillent, drawing aigh and nigher,
Until the lengthening wings break into fire
At either curved point - what bitter wrong
Can the earth do to us, that we should not long
Be here contented? Think. In mounting higher,
The angels would press on us, and aspire
To drop some golden orb of perfect song
Into our deep, dear silence. Let us stay
Rather on earth, Beloved - where the unfit
Contrarious moods of men recoil away
And isolate pure spirits, and permit 
A place to stand and love in for a day,
With darkness and the death-hour rounding it.

_Elizabeth Barrett Browning_

----------


## Aurora Ariel

***************************

----------


## rachel

I have always loved and admired Thomas Moore with all my heart. To stand against such a tide and still be pristine, pure and even filled with compassion and love for those of dark heart and soul, well to me such a life is like the very stars of heaven that bring light and warmth somehow, however faint to a black and cold place.
That poem to his wife reminds me of Tolkien's love for his Edith and how just before her death they would still steal away to the woods like Beren and Luthien. Such people make me weep even when they say nothing at all. Their very breath seem hallowed.

----------


## Nocturnal

Sonnet 116
by William Shakespeare

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 
Admit impediments. Love is not love 
Which alters when it alteration finds, 
Or bends with the remover to remove: 
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark 
That looks on tempests and is never shaken; 
It is the star to every wandering bark, 
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. 
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 
Within his bending sickle's compass come: 
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 
But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 
If this be error and upon me proved, 
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

----------


## PistisSophia

Auden: Lay Your Sleeping Head My Love, Human on my faithless arm........

----------


## blp

> There are so many beautiful love poems and I agree with many of those which are posted on here. However, my favorite love poem is by E.E. Cummings. I love his poetry althought I am first to admit that I can barely appreciate and praise them as they should be.  
> 
> I would like to hear what you think of this poem as everytime I read it, I am in awe and cannot stop my heart pounding in my chest. So strong to me the feelings and sentiments he expresses in this poem.  
> 
> 
> 
> 
> somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
> any experience,your eyes have their silence:
> ...


I vote for this one too.

----------


## Monica

As I wrote before, music is poetry, I think, so: (please, please, PLEASE don't get discouraged because of the fact that it's U2 again):

U2 - All I Want Is You

You say you want 
Diamonds on a ring of gold 
You say you want 
Your story to remain untold 

But all the promises we make 
From the cradle to the grave 
When all I want is you 

You say you'll give me 
A highway with no one on it 
Treasure just to look upon it 
All the riches in the night 

You say you'll give me 
Eyes in a moon of blindness 
A river in a time of dryness 
A harbour in the tempest 
But all the promises we make 
From the cradle to the grave 
When all I want is you 

You say you want 
Your love to work out right 
To last with me through the night 

You say you want 
Diamonds on a ring of gold 
Your story to remain untold 
Your love not to grow cold 

All the promises we break 
From the cradle to the grave 
When all I want is you 

You...all I want is... 
You...all I want is... 
You...all I want is... 
You...

----------


## veronic

I won't post it here because of its length, 
"The Convent Threshold" by Christina Rossetti.

http://celtic.benderweb.net/cr/cr55.html

and a shorter one..
(Sara Teasdale)

Oh you are coming, coming, coming, 
How will hungry Time put by the hours till then? -- 
But why does it anger my heart to long so 
For one man out of the world of men? 

Oh I would live in myself only 
And build my life lightly and still as a dream -- 
Are not my thoughts clearer than your thoughts 
And colored like stones in a running stream? 

Now the slow moon brightens in heaven, 
The stars are ready, the night is here -- 
Oh why must I lose myself to love you, 
My dear?

----------


## IrishCanadian

I should read dante, but Byron makes me cry.

----------


## NNoah3

I can't choose one poem as The Best Love Poem. A lot of difficult with so many poets, great poets indeed! Names like Pablo Neruda, Mario Benedetti, Antonio Machado, William Shakespeare, Amado Nervo, Gustavo Adolfo Becker, Ruben Dario, Gabriela Mistral, Jorge Luis Borges, Jose Martí, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Robert Frost, Christina Rossetti, and the list go on.
Here are two poems by Pablo Neruda

I do not love you...
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way
that this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

Spanish Version
No te amo como si fueras rosa de sal, topacio 
o flecha de claveles que propagan el fuego: 
te amo como se aman ciertas cosas oscuras, 
secretamente, entre la sombra y el alma. 
Te amo como la planta que no florece y lleva 
dentro de sí, escondida, la luz de aquellas flores, 
y gracias a tu amor vive oscuro en mi cuerpo 
el apretado aroma que ascendió de la tierra. 
Te amo sin saber cómo, ni cuándo, ni de dónde, 
te amo directamente sin problemas ni orgullo: 
así te amo porque no sé amar de otra manera, 
sino así de este modo en que no soy ni eres, 
tan cerca que tu mano sobre mi pecho es mía, 
tan cerca que se cierran tus ojos con mi sueño.


You will remember...
You will remember that leaping stream 
where sweet aromas rose and trembled, 
and sometimes a bird, wearing water 
and slowness, its winter feathers.
You will remember those gifts from the earth: 
indelible scents, gold clay, 
weeds in the thicket and crazy roots, 
magical thorns like swords. 
You'll remember the bouquet you picked, 
shadows and silent water, 
bouquet like a foam-covered stone. 
That time was like never, and like always. 
So we go there, where nothing is waiting; 
we find everything waiting there.

Spanish
Recordarás aquella quebrada caprichosa 
a donde los aromas palpitantes treparon, 
de cuando en cuando un pájaro vestido 
con agua y lentitud: traje de invierno. 
Recordarás los dones de la tierra: 
irascible fragancia, barro de oro, 
hierbas del matorral, locas raíces, 
sortílegas espinas como espadas. 
Recordarás el ramo que trajiste, 
ramo de sombra y agua con silencio, 
ramo como una piedra con espuma. 
Y aquella vez fue como nunca y siempre: 
vamos allí donde no espera nada 
y hallamos todo lo que está esperando.

----------


## subterranean

The _ I do Not Love You_ , reminds me of one of Rumi's:

* This Will Not Win Him* 

Reason says,
I will win him with my eloquence.

Love says,
I will win him with my silence.

Soul says,
How can I ever win him
When all I have is already his?

He does not want, he does not worry,
He does not seek a sublime state of euphoria -
How then can I win him
With sweet wine or gold? . . .

He is not bound by the senses -
How then can I win him
With all the riches of China?

He is an angel,
Though he appears in the form of a man.
Even angels cannot fly in his presence -
How then can I win him
By assuming a heavenly form?

He flies on the wings of God,
His food is pure light -
How then can I win him
With a loaf of baked bread?

He is neither a merchant, nor a tradesman -
How then can I win him
With a plan of great profit?

He is not blind, nor easily fooled -
How then can I win him
By lying in bed as if gravely ill?

I will go mad, pull out my hair,
Grind my face in the dirt -
How will this win him?

He sees everything -
how can I ever fool him?

He is not a seeker of fame,
A prince addicted to the praise of poets -
How then can I win him
With flowing rhymes and poetic verses?

The glory of his unseen form
Fills the whole universe
How then can I win him
With a mere promise of paradise?

I may cover the earth with roses,
I may fill the ocean with tears,
I may shake the heavens with praises -
none of this will win him.

There is only one way to win him,
this Beloved of mine -

Become his.

----------


## NNoah3

Sighs.......

----------


## subterranean

Well i just instantly thought about it...

----------


## literature2005

> Hello All, I just love this site. And it is so great that so many are inspired by the deepest emotions of others. Some words penetrate to the core of my being, its so amazing that something so powerful are only appreciated by so few.


making the world round round and round
like a lion rouring in roud of land louder

with loving once make the day goes round round and round

----------


## michela

I think that it's impossible to say what is the best love poem 'cause in my opinion there's just the best of the day, you know i mean?
Anyway there's just a sentence running through my head everyday that in my opinion explicates the best is possible the concept of love.Its by E. Bronte's W.H. here it is...
"...I am Heatcliff".
And that's all.
Poems are something strange, i mean some of them touch your mind because of the brightest words(as Dickinson's poems)some of them are just like a punch in your stomach and probably those are the real poems...unforgettable cause simple.

----------


## rachel

oh Sub, 
that is an amazing poem. I have a question in my mind though-how does she become his. Does not becoming his mean doing all of those things really, I mean in a way. because it is the sum total of all she is and feels folding into his being that makes her his. Or is it?
love is such a mystery,such an unfathomable deep, who can really know it fully?

----------


## Jannah

*Hello everyone...

it's not a poem but I couldn't find another suitable thread to put in.*  


My love for you will never die
Years from now, when life takes you away, or changes you, it will take my love along with you.
You and my love will be one,
Wherever you are, it will accompany you
On the long dark nights, my love will help you see the daylight again
With all your dreams, you may forget my love's presence
Even when you achieve them, you may forget to look back & see my love that helped you reach your place
But still... my love will help you every step of your way
When you get old and the hard days are upon you,
My heart will love you like you've never been loved before
And when you search through your memories, you will find your heart
You will find me and only me...
You will realize that you've loved me all along
That with every dream you'd go after
Your love for me would grow...
And One day, you will know that deep inside
I was your one and only dream

----------


## IrishCanadian

As I read "This iwll not win him" all I could think of was Vincent giving his ear to the woman he loved. 
Jannah, who wrote that??

----------


## Jannah

> Jannah, who wrote that??


I wrote it just yesterday.

Woops, sorry guys. didn't know that this thread is for poems of famous poets only. i'll pay attention next time!

----------


## IrishCanadian

Haha, no offence in what went through my min while reading the poem. I just looked at a VanGogh, so the whole concept of "this will win him" was so built in my head. What would you do if a guy gave you his ear eh?
Ah well.

----------


## Jannah

Lol! I know what you mean, but hey, I never heard of a guy who gave his ear to a woman. (""back to reality"")

----------


## IrishCanadian

Vincent VanGogh literally gave his ear to a woman in order to profess his love. I guess it is a truely romantic gift, no matter how creepy. He literally sacrificed his human figure for her. Anyway she turned him down.
As for a love poem nomination ... heres a popular classic that i love.

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
W.B Yeats

HAD I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

----------


## Jannah

Van Gogh literally DID THAT? Unbelievable! 
---------
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

I've always loved that one of W.B. Yeats...

----------


## bluevictim

I've always liked Pope's Eloisa to Abelard, but I'm not sure it qualifies as a love poem.

----------


## Jannah

Love Will Find Out the Way 

Anonymous 


OVER the mountains 
And over the waves, 
Under the fountains 
And under the graves; 
Under floods that are deepest, 5 
Which Neptune obey; 
Over rocks that are steepest 
Love will find out the way. 

Where there is no place 
For the glow-worm to lie; 10 
Where there is no space 
For receipt of a fly; 
Where the midge dares not venture 
Lest herself fast she lay; 
If love come, he will enter 15 
And soon find out his way. 

You may esteem him 
A child for his might; 
Or you may deem him 
A coward from his flight; 20 
But if she whom love doth honour 
Be conceald from the day, 
Set a thousand guards upon her, 
Love will find out the way. 

Some think to lose him 25 
By having him confined; 
And some do suppose him, 
Poor thing, to be blind; 
But if neer so close ye wall him, 
Do the best that you may, 30 
Blind love, if so ye call him, 
Will find out his way. 

You may train the eagle 
To stoop to your fist; 
Or you may inveigle 35 
The phoenix of the east; 
The lioness, ye may move her 
To give oer her prey; 
But youll neer stop a lover: 
He will find out his way. 40

----------


## Nisha

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven....
awwwww...That poem stunned me when I read it..I first saw it a novel I read.
The describtion is flawless & timeless...

This is an eye catching poem.
On Monsieur's Departure

I grieve and dare not show my discontent,
I love & yet am forced to seem to hate,
I do,yet dare not say I ever ment,
I seem stark mute but ijnward do prat.
I am & not,freeze & yet am burned.
Since from myself & another self I turned

My care is like my shadow in the sun,
Follows me flying,flies when I persue it,
Stands & lies by me,doth what I have done
His familiar care doth mke me rue it.
No means I find to rid him from my breast ,
Till by the end of things it be surprest.

Some gentler passion slide into my mind,
For I am soft & made of melting snow;
Or be more cruel,love and so be kind.
Let me or float or sink,be high or low.
Or let me live with some more sweet content,
Or die & so forget what love ere ment.

Itz not as passionate as the other poems..but it is attributed to Elizabeth I.
And after considering how passive women of that era was I think it is a very romantic gesture..  :Biggrin:  And besides I love a poem with a history attached to it..  :Brow:

----------


## Jannah

I grieve and dare not show my discontent,
I love & yet am forced to seem to hate,
I do,yet dare not say I ever ment,
I seem stark mute but ijnward do prat.
I am & not,freeze & yet am burned.
Since from myself & another self I turned

*I liked that first part alot... opposites, and all inside him, as if he's getting torn apart, almost.*

----------


## smilesad

I guess the question lies within the mixtures of whats going on inside ourselves when the words came,
my favourite is by Miller Mair:
I ache silently toward what I can not reach
.....................

----------


## 1sweetkate

I am new here and enjoyed everyone's posts. I too love Neruda, but my favorite love poem wasn't on here so thought I would share with you all...

TO ANTHEA, WHO MAY COMMAND HIM
ANYTHING.
by Robert Herrick

BID me to live, and I will live
Thy Protestant to be,
Or bid me love, and I will give
A loving heart to thee.

A heart as soft, a heart as kind,
A heart as sound and free
As in the whole world thou canst find,
That heart I'll give to thee.

Bid that heart stay, and it will stay
To honour thy decree :
Or bid it languish quite away,
And't shall do so for thee.

Bid me to weep, and I will weep
While I have eyes to see :
And, having none, yet I will keep
A heart to weep for thee.

Bid me despair, and I'll despair
Under that cypress-tree :
Or bid me die, and I will dare
E'en death to die for thee.

Thou art my life, my love, my heart,
The very eyes of me :
And hast command of every part
To live and die for thee.

----------


## IrishCanadian

Thats very romantic 1sweetkate. Excelent choice. I wish I was able to pic out a favorite.

----------


## james duffy

Hi, I've enjoyed all of this. My view; Its hard to beat Robert Burns' "A Red, Red Rose". Its simple but beautiful, especially set to music. (Maybe being a Scot I am biased). I won't quote it; You can find it anywhere.

Also, the notion of Bess sacrificing her life to warn her lover of impending danger in Alfred Noyes' "The Highwayman" always gets to me. On a more contemporary note, I'm sure Monica will agree "Love is Blindness".

JD

----------


## ElizabethSewall

My favorite love poem at the time: Percy Bysshe Shelley, The Indian Serenade.

I arise from dreams of thee
In the first sweet sleep of night,
When the winds are breathing low,
And the stars are shining bright.
I arise from dreams of thee,
And a spirit in my feet
Has led me -who knows how?
To thy chamber-window, Sweet!

The wandering airs they faint
On the dark, the silent stream - 
The champak odours fail
Like sweet thoughts in a dream;
The nightingale's complaint,
It dies upon her heart,
As I must die on thine,
O beloved as thou art!

Oh lift me from the grass!
I die! I faint! I fail!
Let thy love in kisses rain
On my lips and eyelids pale.
My cheek is cold and white, alas!
My heart beats loud and fast;
Oh press it close to thine again,
Where it will break at last!

By the way, I've read somewhere (I think it was in the French newspaper Ouest France) that they couldn't maintain the Protestant Cemetery, Rome, because they lacked money.
What will become of Keats' and Shelley's graves then???

----------


## IrishCanadian

> By the way, I've read somewhere (I think it was in the French newspaper Ouest France) that they couldn't maintain the Protestant Cemetery, Rome, because they lacked money.
> What will become of Keats' and Shelley's graves then???


I think that both these men have an epitaph that will last eternity. They wrote it in their life ... history never forgets saints and artists.

nguyenngoctue, who wrote that poem? Its lovely. I really reaslly like the second stanza.

----------


## rachel

I was going to say the very same thing Irish. It almost seems Tolkien like the way that Beren loved his Luthien Tinuvial

----------


## tn2743

Hi,

I like the 3rd stanza too, just as much as I like the 2nd.  :Smile:  . It was written by Oscar Wilde.

----------


## tn2743

You cried

In my dream I caught your tear
In reality I stumbled,
Letting it slip through my fingers
And down it fell,
Joyfully like your laugh,
Tenderly like your smile
And, violently, my heart writhed
As its beauty splattered on the dirty ground
And, violently, my heart writhed
As its last sparkle died
And my heart broke,
With the tear,
As you cried

T.N.

----------


## IrishCanadian

I'm glad you came to add to this thread ... this one is definitely one of my favorite places in the website ... keep posting (please).

----------


## chmpman

> T.N.


And that would be...?

----------


## tn2743

Sorry, T.N. is for Tue Nguyen  :Smile: 

chmpman, may I ask you this: Is it true that Montana mountain goats sometime, fighting over a female, would headbutt so hard that their hooves fall off? Just a rumour I heard from a friend. Thanks  :Smile:

----------


## Virgil

Hi T.N.

Welcome to lit net. I've enjoyed your posts in the poem of the week thread. I hope you stick around. I enjoy talking to people who enjoy peotry.

By the way, are you of Vietnamese ethnicity?

----------


## chmpman

> chmpman, may I ask you this: Is it true that Montana mountain goats sometime, fighting over a female, would headbutt so hard that their hooves fall off? Just a rumour I heard from a friend. Thanks


I've heard of no such rumor. Also, I've lived in Montana all my life and have never seen a mountain goat, so I claim no expertise. Some people, though, have some pretty mistaken perceptions of residents of the Big Sky State.

----------


## rachel

Tue,
you are awesome. the last poem was like a glorious stab in my heart.
And wouldn't it seem more logical that they head butted so hard their heads cracked? If that caused their hooves to fall off, poor little things, the herd would greatly diminish in a quick way because this dueling for the ladies goes on for quite a while doesn't it?

----------


## tn2743

Virgil,

Thanks for the welcome. I certainly will stick around, it's very nice to be able to share my opinions and to hear others. It gives me more confidence. And I am indeed from Vietnam  :Smile: . But I have been living in England for nearly 8 years now 

Rachel,

Thanks so much for your compliment.
I think these mountain goats have a specially developed forehead for the purpose of headbutting...like a bone shield, so they are well-protected..I think.
In our cruel world, though, there isn't much point in dueling, because we have to wait for the ladies to make their choices first  :Smile:

----------


## rachel

Not in Vernon you don't. Guys rule here and they know it. There are I think three girls to each guy.

----------


## Virgil

> Virgil,
> 
> Thanks for the welcome. I certainly will stick around, it's very nice to be able to share my opinions and to hear others. It gives me more confidence. And I am indeed from Vietnam . But I have been living in England for nearly 8 years now


Well, nice to know you. I went to school with several vietnamese fellows, and I work with several too. That's why I recognize your name as Vietnamese. Here in New York, we get to meet a little of every ethnicity. The Vietnamese fellow I work with was one of the boat refugees many years ago, when he was an teenager. His father was a political prisoner, and to this day he hates the Communists with a passion. He refuses to go back until the communists are out of power.

----------


## tn2743

Do you think that a poem only remains beautiful until the feelings with which you wrote it fade away?

----------


## Virgil

> Do you think that a poem only remains beautiful until the feelings with which you wrote it fade away?


No I don't think so. The poem is the poem, not the feelings. There is a separation even for the person who wrote it.

----------


## tn2743

...
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
What if her eyes were there, they in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night.
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!
O, that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!

Romeo

----------


## JCBookmonger

Alicante

Une orange sur la table
Ta robe sur le tapis
Et toi dans mon lit
Doux présent du présent
Fraîcheur de la nuit
Chaleur de ma vie

--Jacques Prevert


Loose translation:

An orange on the table
Your dress on my rug
And you in my bed
Soft present of the present
Freshness of the night
Warmth of my life.

----------


## Virgil

Shakespeare is the best.





> SONNET 29 
> When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, 
> I all alone beweep my outcast state 
> And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries 
> And look upon myself and curse my fate, 
> Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, 
> Featured like him, like him with friends possess'd, 
> Desiring this man's art and that man's scope, 
> With what I most enjoy contented least; 
> ...

----------


## rachel

that sounds like the story of your life dear Virgil.

----------


## ElizabethSewall

> You cried
> 
> In my dream I caught your tear
> In reality I stumbled,
> Letting it slip through my fingers
> And down it fell,
> Joyfully like your laugh,
> Tenderly like your smile
> And, violently, my heart writhed
> ...



You asked if The Indian Serenade was still my favourite poem. I must confess I wonder now that I've read yours...
It really is beautiful. Thank you for sharing it...

----------


## wodeucallme

[IF] 

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!


--Rudyard Kipling

----------


## robw

The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In another's being mingle--
Why not I with thine?

See, the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower could be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;--
What is all this sweet work worth,
If thou kiss not me?
-- Percy Bysshe Shelley

The sun has burst the sky
Because I love you
And the river its banks

The sea laps the great rocks
Because I love you
And takes no heed of the moon dragging it away
And saying coldly, 'constancy is not for you'.

The blackbird fills the air
Because I love you
With spring and lawn and shadows falling on lawns.

The people walk on the street and laugh
I love you
And far down the river ships sound their hooters
Crazy with joy because I love you
-Jenny Joseph

----------


## Helga

I love so many of the poems you have posted here, but I just wish you guys could read some of my favourite Icelandic love poems. Many of them are so beautiful that it makes me sad that so few can enjoy them. And by the way most people consider you weird if you read a lot and poems are often considered as a thing of the past or out dated...sad but true. 

Maybe I will try to find a translation on some of the poems I love, or do it my self....

----------


## Dark Lady

I've only just started getting into poetry out of choice so I can't say I have a favourite love poem yet but this is one I really liked especially since I'm not normally into the really soppy stuff.

Poem Ended by a Death

They will wash all my kisses and fingerprints off you
and my tearstains - I was more inclined to weep
in those wild garlicky days - and our happier stains,
thin scales of papery silk...F*** that for a cheap
opener; and false too - any such traces
you pumiced away yourself, those years ago
when you sent my letters back, in the week I married
that anecdotal ape. So start again. So:

They will remove the tubes and drips and dressings
which I censor from my dreams. They will, it is true,
wash you; and they will put you into a box.
After which whatever else they may do 
won't matter. This is my laconic style.
You praised it, as I praised your intricate pearled
embroideries; these links laced us together,
plain and purl across the ribs of the world...

Fleur Adcock

I wasn't sure if swearing is 'allowed' here hence the asterisks.

----------


## lavendar1

Come, my beloved,
let us go out into the fields
and lie all night among the flowering henna.

Let us go early to the vineyards
to see if the vine has budded,
if the blossoms have opened
and the pomegranate is in flower.

There I will give you my love.

The air is filled with the scent of the mandrakes
and at our doors
rare fruit of every kind, my love,
I have stored away for you. 

-- From _The Song of Songs_  
As translated by Ariel Bloch and Chana Bloch

----------


## tn2743

I know it's cliche and not really a love poem, but it is; and too beautiful not to be here:


To be, or not to be; that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous Fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die to sleep;
To sleep perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. - Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

H.

----------


## rachel

i don't care how cliche it is , I have always loved it and it means a lot to me on several levels.

----------


## lavendar1

Pity me not because the light of day
At close of day no longer walks the sky;
Pity me not for beauties passed away
From field and thicket as the year goes by;
Pity me not the waning of the moon,
Nor that the ebbing tide goes out to sea,
Nor that a man's desire is hushed so soon,
And you no longer look with love on me.
This have I known always: Love is no more
Than the wide blossom which the wind assails,
Than the great tide that treads the shifting shore,
Strewing fresh wreckage gathered in the gales:
Pity me that the heart is slow to learn
What the swift mind beholds at every turn.

-- _Edna St. Vincent Millay_

----------


## lavendar1

*Has this been posted yet? If 'yes,' it's an encore, if 'no,' it should have been:*

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.



William Shakespeare

----------


## tweety

> " She walks in beauty like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies, and all that's best of dark and bright meet in her aspect and her eyes...." Sigh!
> One of my favorite poems of all time.


dont u find the poem anabelle a bit should i say creepy

----------


## Hyacinth Girl

For those of you debating the merit of Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress", I posit Lady Mary Wortley Montague's "The Lover: A Ballad". While I enjoy her tonge-in-cheek description of an ideal lover, she does paint a lovely picture of the ideal, as well as put Marvell and other "Carpe Diem" poets in their place. THE LOVER: A BALLAD

by: Lady Mary Wortley Montague (1689-1762)

I

T length, by so much importunity pressed,
Take, Congreve, at once, the inside of my breast:
This stupid indiff'rence so often you blame,
Is not owing to nature, to fear, or to shame.
I am not so cold as a virgin in lead,
Nor is Sunday's sermon so strong in my head:
I know but too well how time flies along,
That we live but few years, and yet fewer are young.

II

But I hate to be cheated, and never will buy
Long years of repentance for moments of joy.
Oh, was there a man (but where shall I find
Good-sense and good-nature so equally joined?)
Would value his pleasure, contribute to mine;
Not meanly would boast, nor would lewdly design,
Nor over severe, yet not stupidly vain,
For I would have the power, tho' not give the pain.

III

No pedant, yet learned; nor rake-helly gay,
Or laughing, because he has nothing to say;
To all my whole sex obliging and free,
Yet ne'er be he fond of any but me;
In public preserve the decorum that's just,
And shew in his eyes he is true to his trust;
Then rarely approach, and respectfully bow,
But not fulsomely pert, or foppishly low.

IV

But when the long hours of public are past,
And we meet with champagne and a chicken at last,
May ev'ry fond pleasure that moment endear;
Be banish'd afar both discretion and fear!
Forgetting or scorning the airs of the crowd,
He may cease to be formal, and I to be proud,
Till lost in the joy, we confess that we live,
And he may be rude, and yet I may forgive.

V

And that my delight may be solidly fixed,
Let the friend and the lover be handsomely mixed,
In whose tender bosom my soul may confide,
Whose kindness can soothe me, whose counsel can guide,
From such a dear lover as here I describe,
No danger should fright me, no millions should bribe;
But till this astonishing creature I know
As I long have liv'd chaste, I will keep myself so.

VI

I never will stare with the wanton coquet,
Or be caught by a vain affectation of wit.
The toasters and songsters may try all their art,
But never shall enter the pass of my heart.
I loathe the lewd rake, the dress'd fopling despise:
Before such pursuers the nice virgin flies:
And as Ovid has sweetly in parables told,
We harden like trees, and like rivers grow cold.

 :FRlol:

----------


## Alaskanteach

well, I haven't read all 16 pages of this thread, but I really like 


Kublai Kahn for its magical qualities.

My youngest son is named after Oscar Wilde, though, so he always has a soft spot for me..

----------


## MarieAntoinette

This is one of my favorites:


George Gordon, Lord Byron 
She Walks in Beauty

1

She walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
2

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling place.
3

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

----------


## snowangel

Pablo Neruda's I Do Not Love You

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

----------


## Lycosparks

I just read through the entire thread--thank you for sharing your favorites; I have added a few to mine! I noticed John Donne has been mentioned a number of times, but to my surprise, my very favorite has not been. So here it is:

The Good-Morrow

I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved? Were we not weaned till then?
But sucked on country pleasures, childishly?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers' den?
'Twas so; but this, all pleasures fancies be.
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love, all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoveres to new worlds have shown,
Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever dies was not mixed equally,
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike that none do slacken, none can die.

----------


## thevintagepiper

> *Has this been posted yet? If 'yes,' it's an encore, if 'no,' it should have been:*
> 
> Let me not to the marriage of true minds


Indeed!! Sonnet 116 is my favorite sonnet, and definietly one of my favorite love poems...

My favorite is actually a song, For Always, from the movie A.I.


I close my eyes 
and there in the shadows I see your light
You come to me out of my dreams across
the night

You take my hand 
though you may be so many stars away
I know that our spirits and souls are one
We've circled the moon and we've touched the sun
So here we'll stay

For always, forever
Beyond here and on to eternity
For always, forever

For us there's no time and no space
No barrier love won't erase
Wherever you go
I still know
In my heart you will be
With me

From this day on I'm certain that I'll never be alone
I know what my heart must have always known
That love has a power that's all its own

And for always, forever
Now we can fly
And for always and always
We will go on beyond goodbye

For always, forever
Beyond here and on to eternity
For always and ever
You'll be a part of me

And for always, forever 
A thousand tomorrows may cross the sky
And for always and always
We will go on 
beyond goodbye


I also love The Highwayman, Annabel Lee, and The Lady of Shalott (though the Lady's love is unrequited).

----------


## relohi

I Crave Your Mouth, Your Voice, Your Hair


DON'T GO FAR OFF, NOT EVEN FOR A DAY 
Don't go far off, not even for a day, because -- 
because -- I don't know how to say it: a day is long 
and I will be waiting for you, as in an empty station 
when the trains are parked off somewhere else, asleep. 

Don't leave me, even for an hour, because 
then the little drops of anguish will all run together, 
the smoke that roams looking for a home will drift 
into me, choking my lost heart. 

Oh, may your silhouette never dissolve on the beach; 
may your eyelids never flutter into the empty distance. 
Don't leave me for a second, my dearest, 

because in that moment you'll have gone so far 
I'll wander mazily over all the earth, asking, 
Will you come back? Will you leave me here, dying? 

Pablo Neruda

----------


## mono

Wow, I had never read this one until this morning - very, very nice . . .

-----

From 'The Book of a Monastic Life'

She who reconciles the ill-matched threads 
of her life, and weaves them gratefully 
into a single cloth--
it's she who drives the loudmouths from the hall 
and clears it for a different celebration 

where the one guest is you. 
In the softness of evening 
it's you she receives. 

You are the partner of her loneliness, 
the unspeaking center of her monologues. 
With each disclosure you encompass more 
and she stretches beyond what limits her, 
to hold you.

Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy)

----------


## Monica

> I Crave Your Mouth, Your Voice, Your Hair
> 
> Pablo Neruda


Neruda is a maestro  :Biggrin:  Another one by him:

I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You


I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

----------


## MCAZEEZ

Please Contact Me On My Private Mail Ill Join U In A Little While

----------


## Anonymous Angel

> The Lady of Shallot is a good one. The song is also pretty good. Does anyone know who sang it?



Loreena McKennitt does a lovely version of *The Lady of Shalott*...it really is pretty.

----------


## subterranean

> _I Crave Your Mouth, Your Voice, Your Hair_  by Pablo Neruda


Wow..., this one really makes me blush  :Blush:   :Blush:

----------


## aeroport

This has always been a favorite of mine. It's brief and concise, and it's Pushkin. How can one go wrong?

Untitled
by Alexander Pushkin 

I have loved you; even now I may confess
Some embers of my love their fire retain;
but do not let it cause you more distress-
I do not want to sadden you again.

Hopeless and tonguetied, yet I loved you dearly,
With pangs the jealous and the timid know;
So tenderly I loved you- so sincerely;
I pray God grant another love you so.

It is, of course, translated, but I like it just the same.

----------


## Anonymous Angel

There were a lot of lovely poems in this thread! One can definitely never go wrong with Pablo Neruda, he has been among my favorites for a while now...even though I can only understand it in English. A tragedy, I'm certain, as I do wonder what it must be like to understand it in Spanish.

Sara Teasdale is another of those poets whose attention to love I've found to be precious. I think she is severely overlooked in modern times and would love to see more people read her. She has an immense passion that shows through in all of her poetry, not just those written about love. I would highly recommend her to anyone.


*********

_These are all Sara's..._


*TO-NIGHT*

The moon is a curving flower of gold,
The sky is still and blue;
The mood was made for the sky to hold,
And I for you.

The moon is a flower without a stem,
The sky is luminous;
Eternity was made for them,
To-night for us.



*ENOUGH*

It is enough for me by day
To walk the same bright earth with him;
Enough that over us by night
The same great roof of stars is dim.

I have no care to bind the wind
Or set a fetter on the sea--
It is enough to feel his love
Blow like music over me.



*TO ONE AWAY*

I heard a cry in the night,
A thousand miles it came,
Sharp as a flash of light,
My name, my name!

It was your voice I heard,
You waked and loved me so--
I send you back this word,,
I know, I know!



*THE KISS*

Before you kissed me only the winds of heaven
Had kissed me, and the tenderness of rain--
Now you have come, how can I care for kisses
Like theirs again?

I sought the sea, she sent her winds to meet me,
They surged about me singing of the south--
I turned my head away to keep still holy
Your kiss upon my mouth.

And swift sweet rains of shining April weather
Found not my lips where living kisses are;
I bowed my head lest they put out my glory
As rain puts out a star.

I am my love's and he is mine forever,
Sealed with a seal and safe forevermore--
Think you that I could let a beggar enter
Where a king stood before?



*BECAUSE*

Oh, because you never tried
To bow my will or break my pride,
And nothing of the cave-man made
You want to keep me half afraid,
Nor ever with a conquering air
You thought to take me unaware--
Take me, for I love you more
Than I ever loved before.

And since the body's maidenhood
Alone were neither rare nor good
Unless with it I gave to you
A spirit still untrammeled, too,
Take my dreams and take my mind
That were masterless as wind;
And "Master!" I shall say to you
Since you never asked me to.



*OFF ALGIERS* 

Oh give me neither love nor tears, 
Nor dreams that sear the night with fire, 
Go lightly on your pilgrimage 
Unburdened by desire. 

Forget me for a month, a year, 
But, oh, beloved, think of me 
When unexpected beauty burns 
Like sudden sunlight on the sea. 



*I AM NOT YOURS* 

I am not yours, not lost in you, 
Not lost, although I long to be 
Lost as a candle lit at noon, 
Lost as a snowflake in the sea. 

You love me, and I find you still 
A spirit beautiful and bright, 
Yet I am I, who long to be 
Lost as a light is lost in light. 

Oh plunge me deep in love-put out 
My senses, leave me deaf and blind, 
Swept by the tempest of your love, 
A taper in the rushing wind. 



*SHE WHO COULD BIND YOU* 

She who could bind you 
Could bind fire to a wall; 
She who could hold you 
Could hold a waterfall; 
She who could keep you 
Could keep the wind from blowing 
On a warm spring night 
With a low moon glowing. 



*THOSE WHO LOVE* 

Those who love the most, 
Do not talk of their love, 
Francesca, Guinevere, 
Deirdre, Iseult, Heloise, 
In the fragrant gardens of heaven 
Are silent, or speak if at all 
Of fragile, inconsequent things. 

And a woman I used to know 
Who loved one man from her youth, 
Against the strength of the fates 
Fighting in somber pride, 
Never spoke of this thing, 
But hearing his name by chance, 
A light would pass over her face. 

*********

_I've always thought this poem rather pretty, too._


*THE DANGERS OF METAPHOR*

*Metaphors are not to be trifled with. 
A single metaphor can give birth to love.-Milan Kundera* 

The day when the rainbows came, 
I was running up a steep hill toward you, 
and, looking up to find you there, said: 
That rainbow looks like a halo 
around your head. These 
were my first words to you 
and, ever since, I have held you 
against the sky, the way a man holds 
a closed letter to the light without opening it, 
and what I have seen there is something 
I might want to open, carefully, 
as if it were addressed to me. But 
there are dangers in this, this beginning 
with something as heavenly 
as a rainbow. So I wait, 
holding you up again each day 
against a bleaker sky 
and you become, this way, 
less transparent, less embellished 
by the numinous, but more real. 
Last night there were no stars anywhere 
and, today, desire's prism 
held against the sky 
yields only a pure white. In fact, 
each day now the sky falls 
a bit closer to you, merciful 
as a guillotine, 
keeping you earthbound, flawed-- 
a human thing only another human thing could love. 

-Michael Blumenthal

----------


## thevintagepiper

> Loreena McKennitt does a lovely version of *The Lady of Shalott*...it really is pretty.


I love that one-also her _Highwayman_.

----------


## Turk

Fahriye Abla (*)

The air filled with a pungent charcoal smell
And the doors closed before sunset;
From that neighborhood as languid as a laudanum
You are the only surviving trace in my memory, you
Who smiled at the vast light of her own dreams.
With your eyes, your teeth, and your white neck
What a sweet neighbor you were, Fahriye abla!

Your house was as small as a neat box;
Its balcony thickly intertwined and the shades
Of ivies at the tiny hours of the sunset
Washed over in a nearby hidden brook.
A green flowerpot stood in your window all year round
And in spring acacias blossomed in your garden
What a charming neighbor you were, Fahriye abla!

Earlier you had long hair, then short and styled;
Light-complexioned, you were as tall as an ear of corn,
Your wrists laden with ample golden bracelets
Tickled the heart of all men
And occasionally your short skirt swayed in the wind.
You sang mostly obscene love songs
What a sexy neighbor you were, Fahriye Abla!

Rumors had it that you were in love with that lad
And finally you were married to a man from Erzincan
I don't know whether you still live with your first husband
Or whether you are in Erzincan of snowy mountaintops.
Let my heart recollect the long-forgotten days
Things that live in memory do not change by time
What a nice neighbor you were, Fahriye Abla!


Ahmet Muhip Dranas

Translated by Osman Turkay (1982)

(*) Literally, ``elder sister''; often used as a term of affection or 
respect for a somewhat older girl or woman.

This poem telling a kid's platonic love to their young and beatiful neighbour. It's good but not my favorite. Although this is one of most famous poems of poet Ahmet Muhip Dranas.

----------


## Dry_Snail

*Blue Bird*

There is a blue bird in my heart that 
wants to get out
but I am too tough for him, 
I say, stay in there, 
I am not going to let anybody see you.

*Charles Bukowski*

----------


## fidelio

I like this one: 
Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

----------


## Mrs Dickens

My favourite love poem is Sonnet 116. I think that is amazing!

----------


## Sweet-Annie

This one is considered the best love poem in Spanish, it was written by Francisco de Quevedo y villegas

"Cerrar podrá mis ojos la postrera
sombra que me llevare el blanco día,
y podrá desatar esta alma mía
hora a su afán ansioso lisonjear;

mas no, de esotra parte, en la ribera
dejare la memoria, en donde ardía;
nadar sabe mi llama el agua fría
y perder el respeto a ley severa

Alma a quien todo un día prisión ha sido,
venas que humor a tanto fuego han dado,
medulas que han gloriosamente ardido,

su cuerpo dejara, no su cuidado;
serán ceniza, mas tendrán sentido;
polvo serán, mas polvo enamorado"

This one was written by Garcilaso de la Vega. Personally, I consider this one much better than the first one. 

"Escrito está en mi alma vuestro gesto, 
y cuanto yo escribir de vos deseo; 
vos sola lo escribisteis, yo lo leo 
tan solo, que aun de vos me guardo en esto. 

En esto estoy y estaré siempre puesto; 
que aunque no cabe en mí cuanto en vos veo, 
de tanto bien lo que no entiendo creo, 
tomando ya la fe por presupuesto. 

Yo no nací sino para quereros; 
mi alma os ha cortado a su medida; 
por hábito del alma mismo os quiero. 

Cuando tengo confieso yo deberos; 
*por vos nací, por vos tengo la vida, 
por vos he de morir, y por vos muero.*"


The last two verses are specially sweet.

----------


## OZEED

lyrics from Christian Rock group Tree63....
not a poem but poetic none the less, speaks about an agaphe love.
I love you perfectly 
I hung my love upon a tree
If freedom is for free
what will it take to make you see, 
you're perfectly made,imperfect in every way, you have been saved......

----------


## pandora

Shaespeare's sonnets have a special place for me.But sonnets 18 and 19 are my favorites.

SONNET 18 
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? 
Thou art more lovely and more temperate: 
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 
And summer's lease hath all too short a date: 
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; 
And every fair from fair sometime declines, 
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; 
But thy eternal summer shall not fade 
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; 
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 
When in eternal lines to time thou growest: 
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, 
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

----------


## whitetree

i love all the poems of tagore 
especially "the crescent moom"

----------


## BIGDANNY

There's a mountain and a hundred miles
between me and the jazz station, but sometimes
I can live with the static, a kind of extra-tempo
air-drum percussion, the dead singer's voice
tanged by smokes and too much gin. Some days,
all I want is no news, none of the time.

On the other hand, this afternoon it wasn't music
pulled me up, but what the field guide calls
the black-chinned hummingbird's "thin, excited chippering."
It had got itself trapped in the garage, and though
the big door was open, it stayed in the window
through which it could clearly see a world.

By the time I heard it, it was so exhausted
it let itself be cupped in my slow man's hands,
and emitted, as I closed it in, a single chip then silence.
At the edge of the woods I knelt and opened my hands.
Not even thumb-thick, its body pulsed with breath,
its wings spread across my palm, its eyelash legs

sprawled left and right, indecorously. I stroked it
as lightly as I could, as I might not my lover's breast
but the down made seemingly of air thereon, and twice.
Then it flew, a slow lilt into the distance. For a while,
even peace seemed possible, in the background
Billie Holiday singing "Strange Fruit."

----------


## abirpal

Wonderful..loved this. Still nothing to meet the Irish when it comes to a love poem.

----------


## malwethien

This is one of my favorites: By Robert Graves

She tells her love while half asleep;
In the dark hours,
With half-words whispered low:

As Earth stirs in her winter sleep
And puts out grass and flowers
Despite the snow
Despite the falling snow

----------


## cUbik

We know that one times one is one,
but an unicorn times a pear
have no idea what it is.
We know that five minus four is one
but a cloud minus a sailboat
have no idea what it is.
We know that eight
divided by eight is one,
but a mountain divided by a goat
have no idea what it is.
We know that one plus one is two,
but me and you, oh,
we have no idea what it is.

Oh, but a comforter
times a rabbit
is a red-headed one of course,
a cabbage divided by a flag 
is a pig,
a horse minus a street-car
is an angel,
a cauliflower plus an egg
is an astragalus.

Only you and me
multiplied and divided
added and subtracted
remain the same...

Vanish from my mind!
Come back in my heart!

----------


## Eulalia

There&#180;s a wonderful one, but it&#180;s in Spanish. It&#180;s called C&#225;ntico Espiritual, by San Juan de la Cruz. 

I&#180;ve found a very nice translation on this site, http://www.amancioprada.com/cant_i_texto.htm , there goes an extract:

Why piercedst thou this heart 
And heal'dst it not upon the selfsame day? 
Why usedst robbers'art 
Yet leavest thus thy prey 
And tak'st it not eternally away? 
End thou my torments here, 
Since none but thou can remedy my plight; 
And to these eyes appear, 
For thou art all their light 
And save for thee I value not their sight. 

but if any of you understands Spanish, please do read the original (http://users.ipfw.edu/JEHLE/poesia/canticoe.htm), it&#180;s just incomparable, specially if you hear it sung by Spanish singer Amancio Prada.

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## Magdalene

Hello everyone! Just signed here. I hope to meet friends and mates here. Please do write me, i want to make acquaintance of as many people here as possible

----------


## Magdalene

Don’t Let Them See You Cry

Don’t let them see you cry;
Be it in good or in bad,
Whether you’re staying or starving,
Whether in pinch or punch,
Don’t let them see you cry 
Laugh and smile as though you’ve lots.

Don’t let them see you cry;
Be it in sorrow or in shame,
Be it in scarcity or in plenty,
Whether in sighing or shouting,
Don’t let them see you cry;
Laugh and smile as though you’ve lots.

Don’t let them see you cry;
Be it in pain OR in pang,
Be it in downs or ups; be it
Rain or shine, don’t let them see you cry
Laugh and smile as though you’ve lots

----------


## adboy316

This is my favorite love poem, it's by Elizabeth Browning - greatest love poet. 

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
"I love her for her smile--her look--her way
Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day" -
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,--and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, -
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou may'st love on, through love's eternity.

----------


## JeaninGreen

I'm fond of Catullus and his love poems concerning his _amica_, Lesbia. Translations are by Guy Lee.

_Nulli se dicit mulier mea nubere malle
quam mihi, non si se Iuppiter ipse petat.
dicit - sed mulier cupido quod dicit amanti
in uento et rapida scribere oportet aqua._

My woman says there's no one she would rather wed
Than me, not even if asked by Jove himself.
Says - but what a woman says to an eager lover
One should write on the wind and the running water.

_Odi et amo. quare id faciam fortasse requiris?
nescio sed fieri sentio et excrucior._

I hate and I love. Perhaps you're asking why I do that?
I don't know, but I feel it happening, and am racked. 


And a fragment, translated by Andrew Miller, probably by Sappho:

The moon has set,
and the Pleiades; it is
midnight, and time is passing;
and I lie alone.

----------


## macg1

That's a tough question. "What do you think is the best love poem?" There
are so many, and that is what I call a super-genre of poetry.
There are many sub-genres under the topic of love.
If you break it down into two smaller categories:
Love Gone Right and Love Gone Wrong.
The two can be broken down into even smaller sub-categories.

I probably have a favorite from each of them, but for just "Love" in general;
I don't particularly have a favorite out of them all.

----------


## Niamh

John Millington Synges ' Is it a month' is a beautiful love poem and should be recognised for its romantic content.

----------


## Adolescent09

When first I looked into your eyes
each breath became a thousand sighs.
My heart drummed out a thunder beat
I glowed with joy from head to feet.
The hand of love had touched my soul,
as the bell of destiny began to toll.
The tide of love began to rise,
the world was filled with summer skies.
My sodden clouds of cold and grey
glowed with gold, then wisped away.
A brilliant rainbow arched across,
as waves of love began to toss.
The air was filled with lovebird cries,
when I first looked into your eyes.

When I first looked into your eyes,
all time and space were paralyzed
And in that instant, I was shown
a universe I had never known.
I dwell there still, in Paradise,
when I look into your eyes.

You are friendly, kind and caring
Sensitive, loyal and understanding
Humorous, fun, secure and true
Always there... yes that's you.

Special, accepting, exciting and wise
Truthful and helpful, with honest blue eyes
Confiding, forgiving, cheerful and bright
Yes that's you... not one bit of spite.

You're one of a kind, different from others
Generous, charming, but not one that smothers
Optimistic, thoughtful, happy and game
But not just another... in the long chain.

Appreciative, warm and precious like gold
Our friendship won't tarnish or ever grow old
You'll always be there, I know that is true
I'll always be here... always for you.

- Written and owned by Angela Lee Hillsley

----------


## Sojourner

Here are two that I rate among the best;

*Sonnets*
VIII 
And you as well must die, belovèd dust, 
And all your beauty stand you in no stead; 
This flawless, vital hand, this perfect head, 
This body of flame and steel, before the gust 
Of Death, or under his autumnal frost, 
Shall be as any leaf, be no less dead 
Than the first leaf that fell,this wonder fled, 
Altered, estranged, disintegrated, lost. 
Nor shall my love avail you in your hour. 
In spite of all my love, you will arise 
Upon that day and wander down the air 
Obscurely as the unattended flower, 
It mattering not how beautiful you were, 
Or how belovèd above all else that dies. 

*~Edna St. Vincent Milay
From 'Second April' 1921*


*THE TRIUMPH OF TIME*
(abridged)

...The loves and hours of the life of a man, 
They are swift and sad, being born of the sea. 
Hours that rejoice and regret for a span, 
Born with a man's breath, mortal as he; 
Loves that are lost ere they come to birth, 
Weeds of the wave, without fruit upon earth. 
I lose what I long for, save what I can, 
My love, my love, and no love for me!

It is not much that a man can save 
On the sands of life, in the straits of time, 
Who swims in sight of the great third wave 
That never a swimmer shall cross or climb. 
Some waif washed up with the strays and spars 
That ebb-tide shows to the shore and the stars; 
Weed from the water, grass from a grave, 
A broken blossom, a ruined rhyme.

There will no man do for your sake, I think, 
What I would have done for the least word said. 
I had wrung life dry for your lips to drink, 
Broken it up for your daily bread: 
Body for body and blood for blood, 
As the flow of the full sea risen to flood 
That yearns and trembles before it sink, 
I had given, and lain down for you, glad and dead.

Yea, hope at highest and all her fruit, 
And time at fullest and all his dower, 
I had given you surely, and life to boot, 
Were we once made one for a single hour. 
But now, you are twain, you are cloven apart, 
Flesh of his flesh, but heart of my heart; 
And deep in one is the bitter root, 
And sweet for one is the lifelong flower.

*ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE*

----------


## kilted exile

*Here's To Thy Health*
Here's to thy health, my bonie lass,
Gude nicht and joy be wi' thee;
I'll come nae mair to thy bower-door,
To tell thee that I lo'e thee.
O dinna think, my pretty pink,
But I can live without thee:
I vow and swear I dinna care,
How lang ye look about ye.

Thou'rt aye sae free informing me,
Thou hast nae mind to marry;
I'll be as free informing thee,
Nae time hae I to tarry:
I ken thy frien's try ilka means
Frae wedlock to delay thee;
Depending on some higher chance,
But fortune may betray thee.

I ken they scorn my low estate,
But that does never grieve me;
For I'm as free as any he;
Sma' siller will relieve me.
I'll count my health my greatest wealth,
Sae lang as I'll enjoy it;
I'll fear nae scant, I'll bode nae want,
As lang's I get employment.

But far off fowls hae feathers fair,
And, aye until ye try them,
Tho' they seem fair, still have a care;
They may prove waur than I am.
But at twal' at night, when the moon shines bright,
My dear, I'll come and see thee;
For the man that loves his mistress weel,
Nae travel makes him weary.

Rabbie

----------


## Janine

When purusing on "Poet's Corner", just now, I found this poem and thought it was great. I have long been a fan of e.e.cummings, so I really like this one:

if i believe

if i believe 
in death be sure 
of this 
it is 

because you have loved me, 
moon and sunset 
stars and flowers 
gold creshendo and silver muting 

of seatides 
i trusted not, 
one night 
when in my fingers 

drooped your shining body 
when my heart 
sang between your perfect 
breasts 

darkness and beauty of stars 
was on my mouth petals danced 
against my eyes 
and down 

the singing reaches of 
my soul 
spoke 
the green-- 

greeting pale 
departing irrevocable 
sea 
i knew thee death. 

and when 
i have offered up each fragrant 
night,when all my days 
shall have before a certain 

face become 
white 
perfume 
only, 

from the ashes 
then 
thou wilt rise and thou 
wilt come to her and brush 

the mischief from her eyes and fold 
her 
mouth the new 
flower with 

thy unimaginable 
wings,where dwells the breath 
of all persisting stars 

e.e. cummings

----------


## Sojourner

While verses from Elizabeth Barrett Browning's 'Sonnets from the Portuguese' have been cited several times on this thread - So far, not the following verse, which remains my personal favorite from that collection;

*Go From Me* 

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore
Alone upon the threshold of my door
Of individual life, I shall command
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand
Serenely in the sunshine as before,
Without the sense of that which I forbore--
Thy touch upon the palm. 
The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine
With pulses that beat double. What I do
And what I dream include thee, as the wine
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue
God for myself, He hears that name of thine,
And sees within my eyes the tears of two.

*Elizabeth Barrett Browning*


-Edna St. Vincent Millay's Sonnet V from 'Second April' should be included on this list as well;

*V* 

Once more into my arid days like dew,
Like wind from an oasis, or the sound
Of cold sweet water bubbling underground,
A treacherous messenger, the thought of you
Comes to destroy me; once more I renew
Firm faith in your abundance, whom I found
Long since to be but just one other mound
Of sand, whereon no green thing ever grew.
And once again, and wiser in no wise,
I chase your colored phantom on the air,
And sob and curse and fall and weep and rise
And stumble pitifully on to where,
Miserable and lost, with stinging eyes,
Once more I clasp,--and there is nothing there. 

*Edna St. Vincent Millay*

----------


## ennison

Here's one stanza from a Burns' poem posted elsewhere in the forums.


Yestreen when to the trembling string
The dance gaed through the lighted ha'
To thee my fancy took its wing
I sat, but neither heard nor saw:
Though this was fair and that was braw
And yon the toast of a the town,
I sighed, and said amang them a',
'Ye are na Mary Morison.'

----------


## lavendar1

Good stuff:

The elegies of Sextus Propertius - find them at:

tkline.freeserve/co.uk/Prophome.htm

----------


## THX-1138

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
T. S. Eliot

i love the last line

(Till human voices wake us, and we drown)

----------


## NDL

Now here's a real love poem.

Now sleeps the crimson petal
By 
Alfred Lord Tennyson


Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;
Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font:
The firefly wakens: waken thou with me.

Now droops the milkwhite peacock like a ghost,
And like a ghost she glimmers on to me.

Now lies the Earth all Danae to the stars,
And all thy heart lies open unto me.

Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves
A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me.

Now folds the lily all her sweetness up,
And slips into the bosom of the lake:
So fold thyself, my dearest, thou, and slip
Into my bosom and be lost in me.

----------


## ArwenUndomiel

One of my favourite poems

THE GOOD-MORROW
by John Donne

I wonder by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved ? were we not wean'd till then ? 
But suck'd on country pleasures, childishly ? 
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers' den ?
'Twas so ; but this, all pleasures fancies be ;
If ever any beauty I did see, 
Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls, 
Which watch not one another out of fear ;
For love all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone ;
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown ;
Let us possess one world ; each hath one, and is one. 

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears, 
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest ;
Where can we find two better hemispheres 
Without sharp north, without declining west ?
Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally ;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I 
Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.

----------


## Tasmanian

The verses usually clumped together as 'Lucy' by Wordsworth (although there is much debate as to whether these verses are all about the same subject or not. Nevertheless, one of the most moving love poems I've read:

She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:

A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and, oh,
The difference to me!

I travelled among unknown men
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!
Nor will I quit thy shore
A second time; for still I seem
To love thee more and more.

Among thy mountains did I feel
The joy of my desire;
And she I cherished turned her wheel
Beside an English fire.

Thy mornings showed, thy nights concealed,
The bowers where Lucy played;
And thine too is the last green field
That Lucy's eyes surveyed.

A slumber did my spirit seal; 
I had no human fears: 
She seem'd a thing that could not feel 
The touch of earthly years. 

No motion has she now, no force; 
She neither hears nor sees; 
Roll'd round in earth's diurnal course, 
With rocks, and stones, and trees.

----------


## Ledsepp

THAT is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
- Those dying generations - at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

William Butler Yeats

----------


## kemal

You Are A Must For Me 


you are a must for me, you never know 
i keep your name in my mind as a nail 
your eyes getting more bigger as they get bigger 
you are a must for me, you never know 
i am heating inside of me with you 


Trees are getting ready for autumn 
this city is that old Istanbul? 
clouds are torn aparts in darkness 
street lights are immediately flashing 
over sidewalks, the smell of rain 
you are a must for me, you are absent 


to love is sometimes a rather disgraceful fear 
man gets tired all of a sudden in an evening 
captive, with living over straight razor 
sometime, breaks his hands, his passion 
takes out a few lives in his lifetime 
whichever door he knocks sometimes 
behind him, whistle of the naught silence of loneliness 


a poor gramphon plays in Fatih 
from ancient times a Cuma* plays 
standing in the corner, i would listen non-stop 
i would bring an untouched sky to you 
weeks are crumbled in my hands 
what shall i do, what shall i hold on, where shall i go 
you are a must for me, you are absent 


maybe you are blue dotted child in june 
Ah noone knows you, noone knows 
a ship leaks from your deserted eyes 
maybe you are taking an aeroplane in Yesilkoy 
wholly got wet, your hair shudder 
maybe you are blind, broken, in a hurry 
Bad winds are carrying away your hair 


whenever i think of living a life 
maybe hard in this wolves table.. 
without a shame, though without getting our hands dirty 
whenever i think of living a life 
i start with your name, with saying Silence 
your secret seas are moving inside of me 
No, it wont happen in other ways 
you are a must for me, you never know... 

attila ilhan


does anbody read this?

----------


## Bii

> The fountains mingle with the river,
> And the rivers with the ocean;
> The winds of heaven mix forever
> With a sweet emotion;
> Nothing in the world is single;
> All things by a law divine
> In another's being mingle--
> Why not I with thine?
> 
> ...


Entirely agree - can't beat a bit of Love's Philosophy - what a great love poem!

----------


## xAleksx

I think this is a really great love poem, I used it for my English assignment (year 12!).

Christopher Marlowe - Come Live With Me And Be My Love (The Passionate Shepherd To His Love)

Come live with me and be my Love, 
And we will all the pleasures prove 
That hills and valleys, dale and field, 
And all the craggy mountains yield. 

There will we sit upon the rocks 5
And see the shepherds feed their flocks, 
By shallow rivers, to whose falls 
Melodious birds sing madrigals. 

There will I make thee beds of roses 
And a thousand fragrant posies, 10
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle 
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle. 

A gown made of the finest wool 
Which from our pretty lambs we pull, 
Fair linèd slippers for the cold, 15
With buckles of the purest gold. 

A belt of straw and ivy buds 
With coral clasps and amber studs: 
And if these pleasures may thee move, 
Come live with me and be my Love. 20

Thy silver dishes for thy meat 
As precious as the gods do eat, 
Shall on an ivory table be 
Prepared each day for thee and me. 

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing 25
For thy delight each May-morning: 
If these delights thy mind may move, 
Then live with me and be my Love.

Wouldn't any woman love a man who spoke of his love for her like Marlowe???

----------


## Lyn

When you go - Edwin Morgan

When you go,
if you go,
And I should want to die,
there's nothing I'd be saved by 
more than the time
you fell asleep in my arms
in a trust so gentle
I let the darkening room
drink up the evening, till
rest, or the new rain
lightly roused you awake.
I asked if you heard the rain in your dream
and half dreaming still you only said, I love you.

----------


## hockeychick8792

This is my favorite:

I Asked God
- John Raine -
I asked God for a flower, he gave me a bouquet
I asked God for a minute, he gave me a day
I asked God for true love, he gave me that too
I asked for an angel and he gave me you.

What do you think?

----------


## ktd222

> This is my favorite:
> 
> I Asked God
> - John Raine -
> I asked God for a flower, he gave me a bouquet
> I asked God for a minute, he gave me a day
> I asked God for true love, he gave me that too
> I asked for an angel and he gave me you.
> 
> What do you think?


It's nice. Kind of cheezy for me, though.

----------


## hockeychick8792

> It's nice. Kind of cheezy for me, though.


What kind of poems do you like then, ktd222? :Confused:

----------


## ktd222

> What kind of poems do you like then, ktd222?


There is an array of poems dealing with an array of subject matters I adore, love being one matter. I just don't like this particular one.

----------


## hockeychick8792

> There is an array of poems dealing with an array of subject matters I adore, love being one matter. I just don't like this particular one.


What ever you say ktd222 :Thumbs Up:  . Do you have any specific poets you enjoy? For example I like Edgar Allen Poe (yes it may be morbid and dark at points but i love that :Biggrin:  ) and also I like a few of Lord Byron's poems.

----------


## ktd222

> What ever you say ktd222 . Do you have any specific poets you enjoy? For example I like Edgar Allen Poe (yes it may be morbid and dark at points but i love that ) and also I like a few of Lord Byron's poems.


I've never really "read" Lord Byron's, or Poe's work. Just the past year I've been reading a lot of Wallace Steven's work. He's a genius! Before that, the authors who's work I adored, and still adore, are Elizabeth Bishop, Emily Dickinson, E.E. Cummings(to an extent, until his works give me a headache from all the weird syntax and line rearrangements), John Berryman, etc. The list could really go on forever. I guess it's not poets more than poems I enjoy...and what I see happening in poems...and what happens to me when reading particular poems.

----------


## hockeychick8792

> I've never really "read" Lord Byron's, or Poe's work. Just the past year I've been reading a lot of Wallace Steven's work. He's a genius! Before that, the authors who's work I adored, and still adore, are Elizabeth Bishop, Emily Dickinson, E.E. Cummings(to an extent, until his works give me a headache from all the weird syntax and line rearrangements), John Berryman, etc. The list could really go on forever. I guess it's not poets more than poems I enjoy...and what I see happening in poems...and what happens to me when reading particular poems.


Yeah, it is in the poems. There are a few of Emily Dickenson's poems that I like a a few I dislike. So your are right there. :Idea:  

Hey... you seem like a poet are you?
I can write poetry and I have been published a few times, but nothing big.

----------


## Dorian Gray

My favourite love poem - When we two parted by Lord Byron.

----------


## lumos

frost.

The rose is a rose,
And was always a rose.
But the theory now goes
That the apple's a rose,
And the pear is, and so's 
The plum, I suppose.
The dear only know
What will next prove a rose.
You, of course, are a rose--
But were always a rose.

----------


## ktd222

> frost.
> 
> The rose is a rose,
> And was always a rose.
> But the theory now goes
> That the apple's a rose,
> And the pear is, and so's 
> The plum, I suppose.
> The dear only know
> ...


This is nice. I like how Frost moves from fact, to speculating what else can signify a rose, to reverting back to the orginal fact of what a rose is when referring to this other person

----------


## petethered

Petes' radical Poetry Blog 

petepoetry-bullybuster.blogspot.com

Have a look at my Radical poetry site

Cheers Petethe red

*Desire*

O Whistle an' I'll come to you , my girl
O Whistle an' I'll come to you , my girl

Tho' partner and parents an a' would go mad
O whistle an' I'll come to ye, my girl.

Peter Burton 

Rabbie helped wi this one.

----------


## cuppajoe_9

> *I KNEW A WOMAN*
> 
> I knew a woman, lovely in her bones,
> When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them;
> Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one:
> The shapes a bright container can contain!
> Of her choice virutes only gods should speak,
> Or English poets who grew up on Greek
> (I'd have them sing in chorus, cheek to cheek).
> ...


I heart Theodore Roethke.

----------


## Moira

LOVE
By Pablo Neruda

Because of you, in gardens of blossoming flowers I ache from the
perfumes of spring.
I have forgotten your face, I no longer remember your hands;
how did your lips feel on mine?
Because of you, I love the white statues drowsing in the parks,
the white statues that have neither voice nor sight.
I have forgotten your voice, your happy voice; I have forgotten
your eyes.
Like a flower to its perfume, I am bound to my vague memory of
you. I live with pain that is like a wound; if you touch me, you will
do me irreparable harm.
Your caresses enfold me, like climbing vines on melancholy walls.
I have forgotten your love, yet I seem to glimpse you in every
window.
Because of you, the heady perfumes of summer pain me; because
of you, I again seek out the signs that precipitate desires: shooting
stars, falling objects.

----------


## Countess

SHE walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies; 
And all that 's best of dark and bright 
Meet in her aspect and her eyes: 
Thus mellow'd to that tender light 5 
Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 

One shade the more, one ray the less, 
Had half impair'd the nameless grace 
Which waves in every raven tress, 
Or softly lightens o'er her face; 10 
Where thoughts serenely sweet express 
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. 

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, 
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 15 
But tell of days in goodness spent, 
A mind at peace with all below, 
A heart whose love is innocent! 

-- I love LORD BYRON

----------


## Felixstowe

Unrequited love is a horrible thing to suffer from.

----------


## jon1jt

The Indian Serenade
Percy B. Shelley

I arise from dreams of thee
In the first sweet sleep or night,
When the winds are breathing low,
And the stars are shining bright.
I arise from dreams of thee,
And a spirit in my feet
Has led me-who knows how? -
To thy chamber-window, sweet!

The wandering airs they faint
On the dark, the silent stream,-
The champak odors fail
Like sweet thoughts in a dream;
The nightingale's complaint,
It dies upon her heart,
As I must die on thine,
O, beloved as thou art!

O, lift me from the grass!
I die, I faint, I fail!
Let thy love in kisses rain
On my lips and eyelids pale.
My cheek is cold and white, alas!
My heart beats loud and fast:
Oh! press it close to thine again,
Where it will break at last!

----------


## 远-方

WOW!God me!I am a new comer,but deeply got lost here for so many beautiful poems.....I am from China living in Shanghai ,a good listener and spectator,but I love english cultures so much,and especially by Shelley and Lord Byron!Also here is a popular one in China by Tagore,have perfect translation in Chinese:


The furthest distance

The furthest distance in the world 
Is not between life and death 
But when I stand in front of you 
Yet you don't know that 
I love you



The furthest distance in the world 
Is not when I stand in front of you 
Yet you can't see my love 
But when undoubtedly knowing the love from both 
Yet cannot be together 


The furthest distance in the world 
Is not being apart while being in love 
But when plainly can not resist the yearning 
Yet pretending 
You have never been in my heart 



The furthest distance in the world 
But using one's indifferent heart 
To dig an uncrossable river 
For the one who loves you!

----------


## Nova74

This is by far my favorite; I think it sharply says it all in a big rush of emotion, fast and quick, the same way that it feels when you reflect on that moment with that person.

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and its you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder thats keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

----------


## Durgamol

Maria Pawlikowska - Jasnorzewska
Love


I haven't see you for a month
And nothing. Maybe I'm paler 
a little bit sleepy, a little bit quiet,
but it looks possible to live without air!
(translated from Polish)

----------


## tan man

what is going on in this world? are you guys serious? do you really think that there can be love poems out there better,in any way, than those written by Lord Byron and Keats? the only exception can be Emily Dickinson in her seemingly homosexual poems like ;To have a Susan of my own.

----------


## tinustijger

Hey, I can't find that poem on the net, do you have a link for me tan man??

----------


## Moira

> Hey, I can't find that poem on the net, do you have a link for me tan man??


To own a Susan of my own
Emily Dickinson


To own a Susan of my own
Is of itself a Bliss
Whatever Realm I forfeit, Lord,
Continue me in this!

----------


## lotus_flower123

hi,
i am a new member.
i think that Donne's," A Valediction: Forbidden Mourning" is the most beautiful love poem ever.

----------


## Sylph

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
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*

----------


## Shalot

> The Lady of Shallot is a good one. The song is also pretty good. Does anyone know who sang it?


Well I was just digging through the archives and I found this! If we're talking about the same song it's Loreena McKinnett! 

And look someone else misspelled Shalott! And he likes Star Wars! I think Stanislaw and I must be soul mates. Or maybe we knew each other in a past life! (where has he been anyway?)

Seriously, though. This is a good poem about unrequited love. but I guess it counts as a love poem. although, it is better to read about it than to experience it.

----------


## Il Penseroso

Lola, by the Kinks


I met her in a club down in old soho
Where you drink champagne and it tastes just like Coca-cola
C-o-l-a cola
She walked up to me and she asked me to dance
I asked her her name and in a dark brown voice she said lola
L-o-l-a lola lo-lo-lo-lo lola

Well Im not the world's most physical guy
But when she squeezed me tight she nearly broke my spine
Oh my lola lo-lo-lo-lo lola
Well I'm not dumb but I cant understand
Why she walked like a woman and talked like a man
Oh my lola lo-lo-lo-lo lola lo-lo-lo-lo lola

.......

----------


## jon1jt

great tune il penser. reminded me of another oldie love poem...um, sorta.

------
I was tired of my lady, we'd been together too long.
Like a worn-out recording, of a favorite song.
So while she lay there sleeping, I read the paper in bed.
And in the personals column, there was this letter I read:

"If you like Pina Coladas, and getting caught in the rain.
If you're not into yoga, if you have half-a-brain.
If you like making love at midnight, in the dunes of the cape.
I'm the lady you've looked for, write to me, and escape."
.........

----------


## CountingSheep

My Love Is Like To Ice

My love is like to ice, and I to fire:
How comes it then that this her cold so great
Is not dissolved through my so hot desire,
But harder grows the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
Is not allayed by her heart-frozen cold,
But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,
And feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told,
That fire, which all things melts, should harden ice,
And ice, which is congeal's with senseless cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device?
Such is the power of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind.

Edmund Spenser 

annnnd

[ 130 ]
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks,
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go:
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet by heaven I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

Shakespeare

----------


## quasimodo1

The Panther 

His vision, from the constantly passing bars,
has grown so weary that it cannot hold
anything else. It seems to him there are
a thousand bars, and behind the bars, no world.

As he paces in cramped circles, over and over,
the movement of his powerful soft strides
is like a ritual dance around a center
in which a mighty will stands paralyzed.
........

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

----------


## Monica

We've been studying Shelley pretty extensively on English literature classes but I came across the following poem in one of the Twin Peaks episodes.


Love's Philosophy - Percy Shelley

The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the ocean,
The winds of heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one spirit meet and mingle -
Why not I with thine?

See the mountains kiss high heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What are all these kissings worth
If thou kiss not me?

----------


## JBI

Weep, Lovers, sith Love's very self doth weep,
And sith the cause for weeping is so great:
when now so many dames, of such estate
In worth, show with their eyes a grief so deep:
For death the churl has laid his leaden sleep
Upon a damsel who was fair of late
Defacing all our earth should celebrate,-
Yea all save virtue, which the soul doth keep
Now hearken how much love did honor her.
I myself saw him in his proper form
Bending above motionless sweet dead,
And often Gazing into Heaven; for there
The south now sits which when her life was warm
Dwelt with the joyful beauty that is fled.

Dante Alighieri,La Vita Nuova, VIII
Translation by Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

----------


## Mortis Anarchy

I Crave Your Mouth, Your Voice, Your Hair


DON'T GO FAR OFF, NOT EVEN FOR A DAY 
Don't go far off, not even for a day, because -- 
because -- I don't know how to say it: a day is long 
and I will be waiting for you, as in an empty station 
when the trains are parked off somewhere else, asleep. 

Don't leave me, even for an hour, because 
then the little drops of anguish will all run together, 
the smoke that roams looking for a home will drift 
into me, choking my lost heart. 
........

-Pablo Neruda

----------


## Midas

LOVE, that word must rank as one, if not the, most misused, abused, and therefore, misunderstood, words in the English language ( and that applies to its equivalent in any language.)

There are 'love poems' that attempt to describe love, and there are those that express it in, often overly, romantic terms.

It is easy to see from the many posts here how varied the meaning can be, or at least, how the variations of its expression can touch the differing emotions of others.

There is also a clear distinction, and one which often causes confusion, between 'love', and being 'in love'.

Just having come to this website, I thought I had better skim through the many contributions to this long thread. I was pleased to find that, I believe, two contributors, one being Monica, or was it Miranda, had included what I feel strongly is the most definitive in describing what 'true' love is, and by so doing, what it isn't.

To understand, and therefore appreciate it, fully, one needs to understand the metaphors Shakespeare uses which relate more to the familiar of his day when
seafaring (wandering bark, and 'height be taken'), and land farming (hand sickle making a compass sweep) had a more closer relevance to daily life than it does today.

How often do we hear the cliched expression in teetering relationships - 'I don't love you anymore'. Well, according to Shakespeare, and I concur, that would be an impossibility. Why? Because love is not from a tap that can be turned on and off. Love, that is real love, is eternal - period! No 'ifs and buts'.

Probably, with but a few exceptions, its nearest example is found in a mother's love for her child. Yes,. there are one or two exceptions even here, but generally, that love is there rock solid, and undying.

I make no apologies for posting it once again.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediment.
Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:-

No, It is an ever fixed mark
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out ev'n to the edge of doom:-

If this be error, and upon me proved
I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 

W Shakespeare

As I have said, I find this clearly defines 'True Love'.

As an example of expressing the romantic, I would like to share with you one that you will not find on the internet, nor in any anthology. It was written by one of my Chinese students at Taiwan University. I had been introducing the class to poetry, with great trepidation I might add, and it sparked something
in one or two of my students. This one shook me with its simplicity, and I need not tell you the writer was female, just 21 - her only English was what had been learned in school.

Lovely Words
by Iris Lee

Lovely words flow from your mouth
into my ears
then gently swamp my heart.
Willingly, and unwillingly
I struggle.
Till my lonely heart
is drowned contentedly
in your lovely words.

----------


## Brigitte

My English teacher told me that this is the only good love poem she's ever read:

Tonight I Can Write
by Pablo Neruda


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write for example, 'The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
......


She said this because this poem isn't the typical "How do I love thee? Let me count the ways" romantic gibberish... (she's not very romantic, it seems). This poem is "real." I agree.

----------


## Midas

Well Brigitte, If your teacher goes along with those sentiments in the poem, I would think she is a little indecisive, and confused about 'love'. It is certainly at variance with Shakespeare's idea of love, as it appears to turn it on and off - like so many do with their idea of love.

It illustrates our confusion with the word. It has become so misused, and abused through use over time. This is often because of the way some interchange the word love, with 'in love'. 

To me, love, between two people, if it ever existed (Shakespeare defined), would continue after being 'in love' could well have died. or faded. We love our parents, and/or our children, but we are not 'in love' with them.

Perhaps, Brigitte, in that poem, the confusion is occasioned by the writer being confused, or not understanding the difference. By that I mean that they both 'loved' each other, but their being 'in love' as in romantic displays
that people 'in love' seek as an expression, and confirmation,were not always evident and therefore created that doubt.

Just some thought to toss around.

----------


## quasimodo1

The Force that Through the Green Fuse Drives the Flower 

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.
And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose
My youth is bent by the same wintry fever.

The force that drives the water through the rocks
Drives my red blood; that dries the mouthing streams
Turns mine to wax.
And I am dumb to mouth unto my veins
How at the mountain spring the same mouth sucks.
....


-- Dylan Thomas

----------


## quasimodo1

Evening Song

LOOK off, dear Love, across the shallow sands, 
And mark yon meeting of the sun and the sea, 
How long they kiss in sight of all the lands. 
Ah! longer, longer we. 

Now in the sea's red vintage melts the sun, 
As Egypt's red pearl dissolved in rosy wine, 
And Cleopatra night drinks all. 'Tis done, 
Love, lay thine hand in mine. 

Come forth, sweet stars, and comfort heaven's heart; 
Glimmer, ye waves, round else unlighted sands. 
O night! divorce our sun and sky apart 
Never our lips, our hands. Sidney Lanier

----------


## Nottagore

> WOW!God me!I am a new comer,but deeply got lost here for so many beautiful poems.....I am from China living in Shanghai ,a good listener and spectator,but I love english cultures so much,and especially by Shelley and Lord Byron!Also here is a popular one in China by Tagore,have perfect translation in Chinese:
> 
> 
> The furthest distance
> 
> The furthest distance in the world 
> Is not between life and death 
> But when I stand in front of you 
> Yet you don't know that 
> I love you


Excuse me sir/madam, but this "very popular" poem that appears in hundreds, if not thousands of websites, blogs, and BBSes across China is NOT by Tagore. It is a poorly translated version of a "Poetry by relay writing" by a group of Taiwanese students based on two lines of a poem written by a popular female Taiwanese novelist.
Somewhere along the line, someone put in the "Tagore" tag and post it on one Chinese BBS, and as is always the case, that spread and spread.
Several disclaimers have appeared on various forums, but as usual, more people would rather believe in myth rather than truth.
There are at least 8 different English versions (translations) of this poem, some of which are incomprehensible.
E.g. The remotest distance is not in the world ; 
Raw and dead but; 
and
On the boundary farthest distance 
Is not to living with die 
and
The farest distance in the world 
is not that between living and death 
==============================

I notice there are some Chinese nationals visiting this forum; for them, here is one site you can read up on the background to this "myth". It is written mostly in Chinese.
users.openface.ca/~dstephen/fake-tagore.htm

For people who cannot read Chinese, but are curious about what this is all about, there is one version that is mostly in English:
The Story Behind "Furthest/Farthest Distance" 
rainlane.com/dispbbs.asp?boardID=26&ID=24645&page=1

and a "disclaimer" at rpi.edu/~jix/disclaimer.htmlposted by Muyv (Xiaoyun Ji), one of the original translators of the version that is quoted by the poster on this forum.

----------


## Annabel Lee

These are two of my favorite love poems, both by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday'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.

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
"I love her for her smile--her look--her way
Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day" -
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,--and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, -
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou may'st love on, through love's eternity.

----------


## quasimodo1

To Annabel Lee: Ulalume--A Ballad 

THE skies they were ashen and sober; 
The leaves they were crisped and sere-- 
The leaves they were withering and sere: 
It was night, in the lonesome October 
Of my most immemorial year: 
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, 
In the misty mid region of Weir:-- 
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber, 
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. 

Here once, through an alley Titanic, 
Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul-- 
Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul. 
These were days when my heart was volcanic 
As the scoriac rivers that roll-- 
As the lavas that restlessly roll 
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek, 
In the ultimate climes of the Pole-- 
That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek, 
In the realms of the Boreal Pole. 

Our talk had been serious and sober, 
But our thoughts they were palsied and sere-- 
Our memories were treacherous and sere; 
For we knew not the month was October, 
And we marked not the night of the year-- 
(Ah, night of all nights in the year!) 
We noted not the dim lake of Auber, 
(Though once we had journeyed down here) 
We remembered not the dank tarn of Auber, 
Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. 

And now, as the night was senescent, 
And star-dials pointed to morn-- 
As the star-dials hinted of morn-- 
At the end of our path a liquescent 
And nebulous lustre was born, 
Out of which a miraculous crescent 
Arose with a duplicate horn-- 
Astarte's bediamonded crescent, 
Distinct with its duplicate horn. 

And I said--"She is warmer than Dian; 
She rolls through an ether of sighs-- 
She revels in a region of sighs. 
She has seen that the tears are not dry on 
These cheeks where the worm never dies, 
And has come past the stars of the Lion, 
To point us the path to the skies-- 
To the Lethean peace of the skies-- 
Come up, in despite of the Lion, 
To shine on us with her bright eyes-- 
Come up, through the lair of the Lion, 
With love in her luminous eyes." 

But Psyche, uplifting her finger, 
Said--"Sadly this star I mistrust-- 
Her pallor I strangely mistrust-- 
Ah, hasten!--ah, let us not linger! 
Ah,fly!--let us fly!--for we must." 
In terror she spoke; letting sink her 
Wings till they trailed in the dust-- 
In agony sobbed; letting sink her 
Plumes till they trailed in the dust-- 
Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust. 

I replied--"This is nothing but dreaming. 
Let us on, by this tremulous light! 
Let us bathe in this crystalline light! 
Its Sybillic splendor is beaming 
With Hope and in Beauty to-night-- 
See!--it flickers up the sky through the night! 
Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming 
And be sure it will lead us aright-- 
We surely may trust to a gleaming 
That cannot but guide us aright 
Since it flickers up to Heaven through the night." 

Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her, 
And tempted her out of her gloom-- 
And conquered her scruples and gloom; 
And we passed to the end of the vista-- 
But were stopped by the door of a tomb-- 
By the door of a legended tomb:-- 
And I said--"What is written, sweet sister, 
On the door of this legended tomb?" 
She replied--"Ulalume--Ulalume!-- 
'Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!" 

Then my heart it grew ashen and sober 
As the leaves that were crisped and sere-- 
As the leaves that were withering and sere-- 
And I cried--"It was surely October, 
On this very night of last year, 
That I journeyed--I journeyed down here!-- 
That I brought a dread burden down here-- 
On this night, of all nights in the year, 
Ah; what demon hath tempted me here? 
Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber-- 
This misty mid region of Weir:-- 
Well I know, now this dank tarn of Auber-- 
This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir." 

Said we, then--the two, then--"Ah, can it 
Have been that the woodlandish ghouls-- 
The pitiful, the merciful ghouls, 
To bar up our way and to ban it 
From the secret that lies in these wolds-- 
From the thing that lies hidden in these wolds-- 
Have drawn up the spectre of a planet 
From the limbo of lunary souls-- 
This sinfully scintillant planet 
From the Hell of the planetary souls?" 

Edgar Allan Poe

----------


## quasimodo1

(Perhaps no exceeding the mystic beauty of Ulalume, still a unique and intense view of this subject :Smile:  " Love Is A Parallax" by Sylvia Plath
'Perspective betrays with its dichotomy:
train tracks always meet, not here, but only
in the impossible mind's eye;
horizons beat a retreat as we embark
on sophist seas to overtake that mark
where wave pretends to drench real sky.' 

'Well then, if we agree, it is not odd
that one man's devil is another's god
or that the solar spectrum is
a multitude of shaded grays; suspense
on the quicksands of ambivalence
is our life's whole nemesis. 

......

----------


## calupmoney81

_If only I could handle this love I have 
Id give it to you
If only I owend the world 
Id give It to you
If only I had money
Id give it to you 
If only you loved me
Id love you_

"I would not call it the best but I wrote it does that make it the worst??"

----------


## Bakiryu

> To Annabel Lee: Ulalume--A Ballad


This has always been one of my favorite poems!

----------


## quasimodo1

To Bakiryu: Yea, the ballad...Ulalume by Edgar Allen Poe just resonates better with every re-read, don't you think. Much better than the poems everybody associates with Poe. I'll have to look up the poet you posted, can't say i remember much about him. quasimodo1

----------


## Bakiryu

eh, what poet? *looks around* The one in my sig?  :Blush:

----------


## stephofthenight

Sonnet 145 Those lips that Love's own hand did make

Those lips that Love's own hand did make
Breathed forth the sound that said 'I hate'
To me that languish'd for her sake;
But when she saw my woeful state,
Straight in her heart did mercy come,
Chiding that tongue that ever sweet
Was used in giving gentle doom,
And taught it thus anew to greet:
'I hate' she alter'd with an end,
That follow'd it as gentle day
Doth follow night, who like a fiend
From heaven to hell is flown away;
'I hate' from hate away she threw,
And saved my life, saying 'not you.'

----------


## quasimodo1

To Stepofthenight: Use of Shakespeare is like bringing out the best wine when the wedding party is almost over. quasimodo1

Vitam Impendere Amori by Guillaume Apollinaire
(Vitam Impendere Amori: To Threaten Life for Love)





Love is dead within your arms
Do you remember his encounter

Hes dead you restore the charms

He returns at your encounter



Another spring of springs gone past

I think of all its tenderness

Farewell season done at last

Youll return as tenderly

----------


## Tabula_Rasa

1.Love's Philosophy - by Percy Bysshe Shelly
2.Desire - by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
3.I Gave Myself To Him - by Emily Dickinson
4.We'll go no more a-roving - by Lord Byron
5.The Clod and the Pebble - by William Blake

...etc.

----------


## quasimodo1

Corinne's Last Love Song

I 

HOW beautiful, how beautiful you streamed upon my sight, 
In glory and in grandeur, as a gorgeous sunset-light! 
How softly, soul-subduing, fell your words upon mine ear, 
Like low aerial music when some angel hovers near! 
What tremulous, faint ecstasy to clasp your hand in mine, 
Till the darkness fell upon me of a glory too divine! 
The air around grew languid with our intermingled breath, 
And in your beauty's shadow I sank motionless as death. 
I saw you not, I heard not, for a mist was on my brain-- 
I only felt that life could give no joy like that again. 

II 

And this was Love, I knew it not, but blindly floated on, 
And now I'm on the ocean waste, dark, desolate, alone; 
The waves are raging round me--I'm reckless where they guide; 
No hope is left to right me, no strength to stem the tide. 
As a leaf along the torrent, a cloud across the sky, 
As dust upon the whirlwind, so my life is drifting by. 
The dream that drank the meteor's light--the form from Heav'n has flown-- 
The vision and the glory, they are passing--they are gone. 
Oh! love is frantic agony, and life one throb of pain; 
Yet I would bear its darkest woes to dream that dream again. 

Jane Francesca Lady Wilde... also Irish nationalist, poet and editor.

----------


## jon1jt

i think this is a love poem in a universal sense. certainly a favorite of mine, perhaps love enough.  :Smile:  



Never Again Would Bird's Song Be the Same


He would declare and could himself believe
That the birds there in all the garden round
From having heard the daylong voice of Eve
Had added to their own an oversound,
Her tone of meaning but without the words.
Admittedly an eloquence so soft
Could only have had an influence on birds
When call or laughter carried it aloft.
Be that as may be, she was in their song.
Moreover her voice upon their voices crossed
Had now persisted in the woods so long
That probably it never would be lost.
Never again would birds' song be the same.
And to do that to birds was why she came. 

Robert Frost

----------


## quasimodo1

i love you much(most beautiful darling)
by: e.e. cummings 
.................................................. .......... 
i love you much(most beautiful darling)

more than anyone on the earth and i
like you better than everything in the sky

-sunlight and singing welcome your coming

----------


## quasimodo1

First Love ...title should read, John Clare


I ne'er was struck before that hour
With love so sudden and so sweet.
Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower 
And stole my heart away complete. 

My face turned pale, a deadly pale.
My legs refused to walk away,
And when she looked what could I ail
My life and all seemed turned to clay. 

And then my blood rushed to my face 
And took my eyesight quite away.
The trees and bushes round the place 
Seemed midnight at noonday. 

I could not see a single thing,
Words from my eyes did start.
They spoke as chords do from the string,
And blood burnt round my heart. 

Are flowers the winter's choice
Is love's bed always snow
She seemed to hear my silent voice 
Not love appeals to know. 

I never saw so sweet a face
As that I stood before.
My heart has left its dwelling place
And can return no more.


- John Clare

----------


## karo

Some Kiss

There is some kiss we want with our whole lives:
the touch of the spirit on the body.

Seawater begs the pearl to break its shell
and the lily, how passionately it needs some wild darling.

At night I open the window
and I ask the moon to come and press its face against mine,
breathe into me.

Close the language door and open the love window.
The moon won't use the door, only the window.

Rumi

----------


## karo

This thread's great. Still working my way through it. In the meantime, here's another contribution from me by Carl Sandburg:

The Great Hunt

I cannot tell you now;
When the wind's drive and whirl
Blow me along no longer,
And the wind's a whisper at last-
Maybe I'll tell you then-
some other time.

When the rose's flash to the sunset
Reels to the rack and the twist,
And the rose is a red bygone,
When the face I love is going
And the gate the end shall clang,
And it's no use to beckon or say, " So long"-
Maybe I'll tell you then-
some other time.

I never knew any more beautiful than you:
I have hunted you under my thoughts,
I have broken down under the wind
And into the roses looking for you.
I shall never find any
greater than you.

----------


## quasimodo1

A TRUE LOVE

WHAT sweet relief the showers to thirsty plants we see, 
What dear delight the blooms to bees, my true Love is to me! 
As fresha dn lusty Ver* foul winter doth exceed, [Spring] 
As morning bright, with scarlet sky, doth pass the evening's weed*, [garment] 
As mellow pears above the crabs* esteemed be,-- [crabapples] 
So doth my Love surmount them all, whom yet I hap to see. 
The oak shall olives bear, the lamb the lion fray*, [frighten] 
The owl shall match the nightingale in tuning of her lay, 
Or I my Love let slip out of mine entire heart, 
So deep reposed in my breast is she for her desert. 
For many blessed gifts, O happy, happy land! 
Where Mars and Pallas strive to make their glory most to stand! 
Yet, land, more is thy bliss, that, in this cruel age, 
A Venus' imp thou hast brought forth, so steadfast and so sage: 
Among the Muses nine, a tenth if Jove would make, 
And to the Graces three, so fourth her would Apollo take. 
Let some for honour hunt, and hoard the massy gold; 
With her so may I live and die, my weal can not be told. 

Nicholas Grimald

Sullivan Ballou's Letter to his Wife




July the 14th, 1861

Washington DC



My very dear Sarah:



The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days - perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more.



Our movement may be one of a few days duration and full of pleasure - and it may be one of severe conflict and death to me. Not my will, but thine 0 God, be done. If it is necessary that I should fall on the battlefield for my country, I am ready. I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans upon the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing - perfectly willing - to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt.



But, my dear wife, when I know that with my own joys I lay down nearly all of yours, and replace them in this life with cares and sorrows - when, after having eaten for long years the bitter fruit of orphanage myself, I must offer it as their only sustenance to my dear little children - is it weak or dishonorable, while the banner of my purpose floats calmly and proudly in the breeze, that my unbounded love for you, my darling wife and children, should struggle in fierce, though useless, contest with my love of country?



I cannot describe to you my feelings on this calm summer night, when two thousand men are sleeping around me, many of them enjoying the last, perhaps, before that of death -- and I, suspicious that Death is creeping behind me with his fatal dart, am communing with God, my country, and thee.



I have sought most closely and diligently, and often in my breast, for a wrong motive in thus hazarding the happiness of those I loved and I could not find one. A pure love of my country and of the principles have often advocated before the people and "the name of honor that I love more than I fear death" have called upon me, and I have obeyed.



Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me to you with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield.



The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when God willing, we might still have lived and loved together and seen our sons grow up to honorable manhood around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me - perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar -- that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name.



Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have oftentimes been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm. But I cannot. I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you, while you buffet the storms with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more.



But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the garish day and in the darkest night -- amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours - always, always; and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.



Sarah, do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again.



As for my little boys, they will grow as I have done, and never know a father's love and care. Little Willie is too young to remember me long, and my blue eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him among the dimmest memories of his childhood. Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care and your development of their characters. Tell my two mothers his and hers I call God's blessing upon them. O Sarah, I wait for you there! Come to me, and lead thither my children.



Sullivan

LOVE SONG FOR ALEX, 1979

My monkey-wrench man is my sweet patootie; 
the lover of my life, my youth and age. 
My heart belongs to him and to him only; 
the children of my flesh are his and bear his rage 
Now grown to years advancing through the dozens 
the honeyed kiss, the lips of wine and fire 
fade blissfully into the distant years of yonder 
but all my days of Happiness and wonder 
are cradled in his arms and eyes entire. 
{unfortunately, an excerpt from this love poem by contemporary poet, Margaret Walker}

----------


## Virgil

> LOVE SONG FOR ALEX, 1979
> 
> My monkey-wrench man is my sweet patootie;


I love that first line!!

----------


## karo

"the children of my flesh are his and bear his rage"

Powerful words! Great!

----------


## quasimodo1

MORE STRONG THAN TIME
Since I have set my lips to your full cup, my sweet, 
Since I my pallid face between your hands have laid, 
Since I have known your soul, and all the bloom of it, 
And all the perfume rare, now buried in the shade; 

Since it was given to me to hear on happy while, 
The words wherein your heart spoke all its mysteries, 
Since I have seen you weep, and since I have seen you smile, 
Your lips upon my lips, and your eyes upon my eyes; 

Since I have known above my forehead glance and gleam, 
A ray, a single ray, of your star, veiled always, 
Since I have felt the fall, upon my lifetime's stream, 
Of one rose petal plucked from the roses of your days; 

I now am bold to say to the swift changing hours, 
Pass, pass upon your way, for I grow never old, 
Fleet to the dark abysm with all your fading flowers, 
One rose that none may pluck, within my heart I hold. 

Your flying wings may smite, but they can never spill 
The cup fulfilled of love, from which my lips are wet; 
My heart has far more fire than you can frost to chill, 
My soul more love than you can make my soul forget

She Walks In Beauty


She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

- Lord Byron

----------


## HailStorm

I was going to post Pablo Neruda's poem but I see Brigitte added it back in June. Still a lot of catching up to do so if these are repeated, my apologies.
Two of my favourite love poems

'Leo Marks' 
The Love That I Have

The life that I have is all that I have, The life that I have is yours.
The love that I have of the life that I have Is yours and yours and yours.
A sleep I shall have, A rest I shall have Yet death will be but a pause.
For the peace of my years In the long green grass Will be yours and yours and yours

<<<<>>>>

Somewhere There Waiteth 
Sir Edwin Arnold

Somewhere there waiteth in this world of ours
For one lone soul another lonely soul,
Each choosing each through all the weary hours,
And meeting strangely at one sudden goal,
Then blend they, like green leaves with golden flowers,
Into one beautiful and perfect whole;
And life's long night is ended, and the way
Lies open onward to eternal day.

----------


## Zombie

I love you
You don't love me
I'll get over it
>.<

----------


## quasimodo1

ELEGY FOR MARIE 
So that our age and ages yet unsung 
May know how well we loved when we were young, 
And that your loveliness, my long delight, 
Shall not forever vanish into night 
And leave behind no trace upon the earth, 
I pledge you all my mettle, all my worth, 
Wit of my wit, which life to you shall give 
Long time or never, as these lines shall live. 
All who shall read the songs I sang for you, 
With bitterness or sweetness threaded through 
According as you dealt me joy or tears, 
Shall call you goddess, and the more the years 
Fly past, the more your perfect loveliness 
Shall age defy, green in its timelessness 
{Beginning of this poem}

----------


## trippy star

Shakespeare's Sonnet XVII:

Who will believe my verse in time to come,
If it were fill'd with your most high deserts?
Though yet heaven knows it is but as a tomb
Which hides your life, and shows not half your parts.
If I could write the beauty of your eyes,
And in fresh numbers number all your graces,
The age to come would say 'This poet lies;
Such heavenly touches ne'er touch'd earthly faces.
So should my papers yellow'd with their age
Be scorn'd like old men of less truth than tongue,
And your true rights be term'd a poet's rage
And stretched metre of an antique song:
But were some child of yours alive that time,
You should live twice; in it and in my rhyme.

----------


## quasimodo1

HOUSES OF DREAMS
You took my empty dreams
And filled them every one
With tenderness and nobleness,
April and the sun.

The old empty dreams
Where my thoughts would throng
Are far too full of happiness
To even hold a song.

Oh, the empty dreams were dim
And the empty dreams were wide,
They were sweet and shadowy houses
Where my thoughts could hide. ............
 {first three stanzas of this poem by Sara Teasdale}

----------


## karo

Upon my couch at night
I sought the one I love - 
I sought, but found him not.
'I must rise and roam the town,
Through the streets and through the squares;
I must seek the one I love.'
I sought, but found him not.
I met the watchmen
Who patrol the town.
'Have you seen the one I love?'
Scarcely had I passed them
When I found the one I love.
I held him fast, I would not let him go
Till I brought him to my mother's house,
To the chamber of her who conceived me.

_Old Testament_

----------


## sreeja

I love William Wordsworth's poems

----------


## quasimodo1

ALFRED DE MUSSET. 

Again I see you, ah my queen, 
Of all my old loves that have been, 
The first love, and the tenderest; 
Do you remember or forget - 
Ah me, for I remember yet - 
How the last summer days were blest? 

Ah lady, when we think of this, 
The foolish hours of youth and bliss, 
How fleet, how sweet, how hard to hold! 
How old we are, ere spring be green! 
You touch the limit of eighteen 
And I am twenty winters old. 

My rose, that mid the red roses, 
Was brightest, ah, how pale she is! 
Yet keeps the beauty of her prime; 
Child, never Spanish lady's face 
Was lovely with so wild a grace; 
Remember the dead summer time. 

Think of our loves, our feuds of old, 
And how you gave your chain of gold 
To me for a peace offering; 
And how all night I lay awake 
To touch and kiss it for your sake, - 
To touch and kiss the lifeless thing. 

Lady, beware, for all we say, 
This Love shall live another day, 
Awakened from his deathly sleep; 
The heart that once has been your shrine 
For other loves is too divine; 
A home, my dear, too wide and deep. 

What did I say--why do I dream? 
Why should I struggle with the stream 
Whose waves return not any day? 
Close heart, and eyes, and arms from me; 
Farewell, farewell! so must it be, 
So runs, so runs, the world away, 

The season bears upon its wing 
The swallows and the songs of spring, 
And days that were, and days that flit; 
The loved lost hours are far away; 
And hope and fame are scattered spray 
For me, that gave you love a day 
For you that not remember it. 

{poet whom Marcel Proust favored, Alfred de Musset}

----------


## Beverly S

Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life & bid thee feed,
By the stream & o'er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing wooly bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice!
Little Lamb who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb I'll tell thee,
Little Lamb I'll tell thee!

He is called by thy name,
For He calls Himself a Lamb:
He is meek & He is mild,
He became a little child:
I a child & thou a lamb,
We are called by His name.
Little Lamb God bless thee.
Little Lamb God bless thee.

Here's a William Wordsworth poem for you, written in 1807 called: My heart leaps up when I behold

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound to each to each by natural piety.

----------


## drunkenKOALA

> *Annabell Lee* 
> 
> IT was many and many a year ago, 
> In a kingdom by the sea, 
> That a maiden there lived whom you may know 
> By the name of Annabel Lee. 
> And this maiden she lived with no other thought 
> Than to love and be loved by me. 
> 
> ...


Nice, I really like it.

----------


## Walid Ammar

Hello everybody
Congratulation, this lovely expression shouldn't be said to me, but to my HEART who was waiting to find out such a site as EDEN AS YOUR SITE.
Thank you

----------


## quasimodo1

I Think I Should Have Loved You by Edna St. Vincent Millay
II

I THINK I should have loved you presently,
And given in earnest words I flung in jest;
And lifted honest eyes for you to see,
And caught your hand against my cheek and breast;
And all my pretty follies flung aside
That won you to me, and beneath your gaze,
Naked of reticence and shorn of pride, 
Spread like a chart my little wicked ways.
I, that had been to you, had you remained, 
But one more waking from a recurrent dream,
Cherish no less the certain stakes I gained,
And walk your memory's halls, austere, supreme,
A ghost in marble of a girl you knew
Who would have loved you in a day or two. 
{by Edna St. Vincent Millay}

My Dear and Only Love

MY dear and only Love, I pray 
This noble world of thee 
Be governed by no other sway 
But purest monarchy; 
For if confusion have a part, 
Which virtuous souls abhor, 
And hold a synod in thy heart, 
I'll never love thee more. 

Like Alexander I will reign, 
And I will reign alone: 
My thoughts shall evermore disdain 
A rival on my throne. 
He either fears his fate too much, 
Or his deserts are small, 
That puts it not unto the touch 
To win or lose it all. 

But I must rule and govern still, 
And always give the law, 
And have each subject at my will, 
And all to stand in awe. 
But 'gainst my battery, if I find 
Thou shunn'st the prize so sore 
As that thou sett'st me up a blind, 
I'll never love thee more. 

Or in the empire of thy heart, 
Where I should solely be, 
Another do pretend a part 
And dares to view with me; 
Or if committees thou erect, 
And go on such a score, 
I'll sing and laugh at thy neglect, 
And never love thee more. 

But if thou wilt be constant then, 
And faithful of thy word, 
I'll make thee glorious by my pen 
And famous by my sword: 
I'll serve thee in such noble ways 
Was never heard before; 
I'll crown and deck thee all with bays, 
And love thee evermore. 

James Graham, First Marquis of Montrose

Poems from the Vita Nuova
Amore e l cor gentil sono una cosa 

Amore e l cor gentil sono una cosa, 
Sì come il saggio in suo dittare pone, 
E così esser lun sanza laltro osa 
Comalma razional sanza ragione. 

Fàlli natura quandè amorosa, 5 
Amor per sire e l cor per sua magione, 
Dentro la qual dormendo si riposa 
Tal volta poca e tal lunga stagione. 

Bieltate appare in saggia donna pui, 
Che piace a gli occhi sì, che dentro al core 10 
Nasce un disio de la cosa piacente; 

E tanto dura talora in costui, 
Che fa svegliar lo spirito dAmore. 
E simil face in donna omo valente. Love and a Gentle Heart Are But One Thing 

Love and a gentle heart are but one thing, 
as the philosopher in his sentence wrote; 
so they without each other live dare not 
as rational spirit without reasoning. 

Tis nature, when in love, makes Love a king, 5 
and in his mansion lodges then the heart, 
wherein he rests, as in his habitat, 
either in brief or lengthy slumbering. 

Beauty in a wise lady then appears, 
which so delights the eye, the heart is taken  10 
with longings of the thing that pleases so; 

and this delight at times so long endures 
it makes Loves very spirit soon awaken. 
The same a woman feels about mans awe.

Lovers' Infiniteness

IF yet I have not all thy love, 
Dear, I shall never have it all, 
I cannot breath one other sigh, to move, 
Nor can entreat one other tear to fall, 
And all my treasure, which should purchase thee -- 
Sighs, tears, and oaths, and letters -- I have spent. 
Yet no more can be due to me, 
Than at the bargain made was meant, 
If then thy gift of love were partial, 
That some to me, some should to others fall, 
Dear, I shall never have Thee All. 
Or if then thou gavest me all, 
All was but All which thou hadst then; 
But if in thy heart, since, there be or shall, 
New love created be, by other men, 
Which have their stocks entire, and can in tears, 
In sighs, in oaths, and letters outbid me, 
This new love may beget new fears, 
For this love was not vowed by thee. 
And yet it was, thy gift being general, 
The ground; thy heart is mine: what ever shall 
Grow there, dear, I should have it all. 

Yet I would not have all yet: 
He that hath all can have no more, 
And since my love doth every day admit 
New growth, thou shouldst have new rewards in store; 
Thou canst not every day give me thy heart; 
If thou canst give it, then thou never gavest it: 
Love's riddles are, that though thy heart depart, 
It stays at home, and thou with losing savest it: 
But we will have a way more liberal 
Than changing hearts, to join them, so we shall 
Be one, and one anothers's All. 

John Donne

----------


## Sylph

*To His Coy Mistress*


Had we but World enough, and Time,
This coyness Lady were no crime.
We would sit down, and think which way
To walk, and pass our long Loves Day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges side.
Should'st Rubies find: I by the Tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood:
And you should if you please refuse
Till the Conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable Love should grow
Vaster then Empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine Eyes, and on thy Forehead Gaze.
Two hundred to adore each Breast.
But thirty thousand to the rest.
An Age at least to every part,
And the last Age should show your Heart.
For Lady you deserve this State;
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my back I alwaies hear
Times winged Charriot hurrying near:
And yonder all before us lye
Desarts of vast Eternity.
Thy Beauty shall no more be found;
Nor, in thy marble Vault, shall sound
My ecchoing Song: then Worms shall try
That long preserv'd Virginity:
And your quaint Honour turn to durst;
And into ashes all my Lust.
The Grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful hew
Sits on thy skin like morning glew,
And while thy willing Soul transpires
At every pore with instant Fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our Time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapt pow'r.
Let us roll all our Strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one Ball:
And tear our Pleasures with rough strife,
Thorough the Iron gates of Life.
Thus, though we cannot make our Sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run. 


*Andrew Marvell*

----------


## AwayAloneAlast

Excellent choice there, Sylph! Marvell is unfortunately quite understudied, but one of my favourite of the older poets.

For myself, I would have to rate Wordsworth's "Three years she grew in sun and shower," as my favourite 'love poem.' It isn't a romantic love poem, but it is certainly filled with a deeply sorrowful love, more powerful than any other I can recall:

Three years she grew in sun and shower;
Then Nature said "A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown;
This child I to myself will take;
She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own.

"Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse: and with me
The girl, in rock and plain,
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power
To kindle or restrain.

"She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn
Or up the mountain springs;
And her's shall be the breathing balm,
And her's the silence and the calm
Of mute insensate things.

"The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her; for her the willow bend;
Nor shall she fail to see
Even in the motions of the storm
Grace that shall mould the maiden's form
By silent sympathy.

"The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.

"And vital feelings of delight
Shall rear her form to stately height,
Her virgin bosom swell;
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give
While she and I together live
Here in this happy dell."

Thus Nature spake -The work was done -
How soon my Lucy's race was run!
She died, and left to me
This heath, this calm and quiet scene;
The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.

----------


## NikolaiI

The Oblation - A.C. Swinburne

Ask nothing more of me, sweet,
All I can give you I give
Heart of my heart, were it more,
More would be laid at your feet:
Love that should help you to live,
Song that should spur you to soar.

All things were nothing to give
Once to have sense of you more,
Touch you and taste of you, sweet,
Think you and breathe you and live,
Swept of your wings as they soar,
Trodden by chance of your feet.

I that have love and no more
Give you but love of you, sweet;
He that hath more, let him give;
He that hath wings, let him soar;
Mine is the heart at your feet
Here, that must love you to live


--
This is not one of the greatest of all times, it's just kinda nice.
(I was reminded it by the Donne poem)

----------


## AwayAloneAlast

*When You are Old* by W.B. Yeats

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.


---
One of my favourite Yeats poems. From his earlier volume, "The Rose."

----------


## patrycja

"The Passionate Shepherd to His Love" - one of the best ever written  :Smile: 


COME live with me and be my Love, 
And we will all the pleasures prove 
That hills and valleys, dale and field, 
And all the craggy mountains yield. 

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

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

A gown made of the finest wool 
Which from our pretty lambs we pull, 
Fair lin&#232;d slippers for the cold, 
With buckles of the purest gold. 

A belt of straw and ivy buds 
With coral clasps and amber studs: 
And if these pleasures may thee move, 
Come live with me and be my Love. 

Thy silver dishes for thy meat 
As precious as the gods do eat, 
Shall on an ivory table be 
Prepared each day for thee and me. 

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing	
For thy delight each May-morning: 
If these delights thy mind may move, 
Then live with me and be my Love.

----------


## MrBojangle

No more  :Biggrin:

----------


## quasimodo1

THE YOUNG FOOLS (LES INGENUS)
High-heels were struggling with a full-length dress
So that, between the wind and the terrain,
At times a shining stocking would be seen,
And gone too soon. We liked that foolishness.

Also, at times a jealous insect's dart
Bothered out beauties. Suddenly a white
Nape flashed beneath the branches, and this sight
Was a delicate feast for a young fool's heart.

Evening fell, equivocal, dissembling,
The women who hung dreaming on our arms
Spoke in low voices, words that had such charms
That ever since our stunned soul has been trembling.

----------


## mukta581

''Time and Love''

WHEN I have seen by Time's fell hand defaced 
The rich proud cost of outworn buried age; 
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed, 
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; 

When I have seen the hungry ocean gain 
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, 
And the firm soil win of the watery main, 
Increasing store with loss, and loss with store; 

When I have seen such interchange of state, 
Or state itself confounded to decay, 
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate 
That Time will come and take my Love away: 

This thought is as a death, which cannot choose 
But weep to have that which it fears to lose.

Last Breath

You have never given me a reason to believe
that you werent perfect,
that I wasnt meant to fall in love with you,
from the first time we met
to the last time well ever see each other.
Youre my newest tragedy,
my newest reason to breathe,
and I cant afford to have
these feelings go unrequited,
I cant afford to let you go,
because my heart is spent from
the last time it was taken
and wrung dry of passion
before it was given back to me.
But I could fall asleep so alone
and wake up with my head
full of thoughts of you,
whispering I love you softly, as if
you were there next to me,
searching for your hand to hold,
wanting to just stare into your eyes for a while.
And if I saw you there, I wouldnt dare to blink
because youd disappear if I did,
and youre too damn beautiful to look away from.
I cant live without you, girl.
Ive absolutely lost my mind in this love for you.
I want my future to have you in it,
I want my life to be spent with you,
I want you to say that you can see
this fire in my eyes and in my heart,
and I want to see the same in yours.
I want to grow old with you,
I want to see the world with you,
I want to love you with everything I possibly can,
because every minute would be well worth it.
And if I couldnt do that, if you couldnt love me,
Id still wait for you until my last breath,
wishing only to use it to tell you one last time
how much I love you.

Show me I can trust you

I'm trying to give you my trust
Because you've got my heart
Please don't play with it
I'm tired of the same games

I want you to know
I really do have something for you
I hope you feel the same way to.
Can we make this work?

I honestly don't know
Where this is gonna lead us
I barely know you
But you got me dreamin of u every night

Do me a favor babe?
I'm gonna try to give 
My trust to you
Just please... show me that I can.

----------


## Anonymous Angel

*A very beautiful love poem, one of my favorites. Long ago, I did a painting based on this particular poem. (Above) I hope you like both the poem and the painting...Rebecca Tacosa Gray*

*Painting: 

My Prince, My Patterns.
Watercolor on Arches Watercolor Paper
Copyright 2000, Rebecca Tacosa Gray*

_________________________________

*PATTERNS

I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.

My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and silver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whale-bone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime-tree. For my passion
Wars against the stiff brocade.
The daffodils and squills
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime-tree is in blossom
And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom.

And the plashing of waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Comes down the garden-paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding.
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seems the stroking of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled upon the ground.

I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths,
And he would stumble after,
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, melting, unafraid.
With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon -
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sifts through the shade.

Underneath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
"Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday se'nnight."
As I read it in the white, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
"Any answer, Madam?" said my footman.
"No," I told him.
"See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer."
And I walked into the garden,
Up and down the patterned paths,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.

In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this lime,
We would have broke the pattern;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat.
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answered, "It shall be as you have said."
Now he is dead.

In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?

Amy Lowell [1874-1925]*

----------


## mukta581

Why I fall in love with you!

Since I met you,
I've fallen in love with you,
at least a hundred times
for a hundred different reasons.

Sometimes I fall in love with you
when I watch you doing something you enjoy,
something you are so involved in,
that you are unaware of my presence.

Sometimes I fall in love with you
when I listen to you talk to other people.
Whether you are being interesting and funny
or warm and caring, 
and genuinely concerned,
you have a way of making people feel better 
with nothing more than words.

Sometimes I fall in love with you
just thinking about you,
remembering all the memories we've made.

Falling in love for the first time,
staying in love during the rough times,
finding more to love about you every day.
And whenever I think about 
the wonderful things that lie ahead of us,
I fall so totally and completely,
In love with you,
All over again.

You need to understand, 
with you my love has no beginning,
and most certainly no end, 
My love for you,
I most certainly know,
Only knows,
FOREVER!

----------


## Nicki

My Dearest...
Not your words, not mine,
but our hearts and souls entwined.
No time or distance will prevail, 
in the story these two will tell.
Exact thoughts. different words,
singing in our hearts to be heard.
The deepest pain they do share,
and tired souls to each they bare.
Only dreams were left to grasp,
a thought of a forever love at last.
For there is nothing greater to be,
than a lover who is just like thee.
Now my heart is lifted of the weight,
for I have found my true SoulMate!
love...

by CSL

----------


## mukta581

Love!!!!

You make me feel real
you make me feel alive
inside its your love i secretly thrive

the things you say
the things you do
no one Ive met can compare to you

your my soul mate so special
your my everything your the one
you my match me we stick like glue
when were apart i feel so blue

i hate the fact i cant be with you
believe me when i say this i really really do
id give anything in this world just to be laying next to you

my heart and soul to you i owe
i hate the way life's planned out its evil taunting flow
the things i think and feel for you no one can ever no

id love to leave and spread my wings fly away like a dove
id leave with you and never look back my special secret love

----------


## dramasnot6

> Why I fall in love with you!
> 
> Since I met you,
> I've fallen in love with you,
> at least a hundred times
> for a hundred different reasons.
> 
> Sometimes I fall in love with you
> when I watch you doing something you enjoy,
> ...


Aww
That says it all  :Smile:

----------


## DeathAngel

To my Dear and Loving Husband

By Anne Bradstreet 


If ever two were one, then surely we. 
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee. 
If ever wife was happy in a man, 
Compare with me, ye women, if you can. 
I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold, 
Or all the riches that the East doth hold. 
My love is such that rivers cannot quench, 
Nor ought but love from thee give recompense. 
Thy love is such I can no way repay; 
The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray. 
Then while we live, in love let’s so persever, 
That when we live no more, we may live ever.

----------


## mukta581

My Love

My love is like an ocean
It goes down so deep
My love is like a rose
Whose beauty you want to keep.

My love is like a river
That will never end
My love is like a dove
With a beautiful message to send.

My love is like a song
That goes on and on forever
My love is like a prisoner
It's to you that I surrender.

Perfection in my Eyes

All I ever wanted was to be part of your heart,
And for us to be together, to never be apart.

No one else in the world can even compare,
You're perfect and so is this love that we share.

We have so much more than I ever thought we would,
I love you more than I ever thought I could.

I promise to give you all I have to give,
I'll do anything for you as long as I live.

In your eyes I see our present, our future and past,
By the way you look at me I know we will last.

I hope that one day you'll come to realize,
How perfect you are when seen through my eyes.

----------


## intoxicatedsoul

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

----------


## mukta581

You will never know!!!!
You will never know,
how much you hurt me,
when you walk way,

you will never know,
how much i cry,
when you never say i love you,

you will never know,
how much i just love you,
and only you,

you will never know,
how much i want to be with you,
cause i am so happy,

you will never know,
how much it hurts,
when you leave me on my own,

you will never know,
how much i truly,
do trust you,

you will never know,
how much,
you really do mean to me!!

----------


## LarryK

from one of the oldest love songs:

... I am the rose of Sharon, 
and the lily of the valley,
As the lily among thorns, 
so is my love among the daughters,

As the apple tree among the trees of the wood,
so is my beloved among the sons.
I sat down under his shadow
with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting house,
and his banner over me was love.

Stay me with flagons, 
comfort me with apples:
for I am sick with love. ...

from The Song Of Solomon: 2:1-5, KJV

oh, also: ASPHODEL by William Carlos Williams [much too long to quote, but one of the greatest of all love poems]

----------


## JBrower

*Sky Blue and Black* _by Jackson Browne_
In the calling out to one another
Of the lovers up and down the strand
In the sound of the waves and the cries
Of the seagulls circling the sand
In the fragments of the songs
Carried down the wind from some radio
In the murmuring of the city in the distance
Ominous and low

I hear the sound of the world where we played
And the far too simple beauty
Of the promises we made

If you ever need holding
Call my name, Ill be there
If you ever need holding
And no holding back, Ill see you through
Sky blue and black

Where the touch of the lover ends
And the soul of the friend begins
Theres a need to be separate and a need to be one
And a struggle neither wins
Where you gave me the world I was in
And a place I could make a stand
I could never see how you doubted me
When Id let go of your hand

Yeah, and I was much younger then
And I must have thought that I would know
If things were going to end

And the heavens were rolling
Like a wheel on a track
And our sky was unfolding
And itll never fold back
Sky blue and black

And Id have fought the world for you
If I thought that you wanted me to
Or put aside what was true or untrue
If Id known thats what you needed
What you needed me to do

But the moment has passed by me now
To have put away my pride
And just come through for you somehow

If you ever need holding
Call my name, Ill be there
If you ever need holding
And no holding back, Ill see you through

Youre the color of the sky
Reflected in each store-front window pane
Youre the whispering and the sighing
Of my tires in the rain
Youre the hidden cost and the thing thats lost
In everything I do
Yeah and Ill never stop looking for you
In the sunlight and the shadows
And the faces on the avenue
Thats the way love is
Thats the way love is
Thats the way love is
Sky blue and black

----------


## quasimodo1

MORE STRONG THAN TIME
Since I have set my lips to your full cup, my sweet, 
Since I my pallid face between your hands have laid, 
Since I have known your soul, and all the bloom of it, 
And all the perfume rare, now buried in the shade; 

Since it was given to me to hear on happy while, 
The words wherein your heart spoke all its mysteries, 
Since I have seen you weep, and since I have seen you smile, 
Your lips upon my lips, and your eyes upon my eyes; 

Since I have known above my forehead glance and gleam, 
A ray, a single ray, of your star, veiled always, 
Since I have felt the fall, upon my lifetime's stream, 
Of one rose petal plucked from the roses of your days; 

I now am bold to say to the swift changing hours, 
Pass, pass upon your way, for I grow never old, 
Fleet to the dark abysm with all your fading flowers, 
One rose that none may pluck, within my heart I hold. 

Your flying wings may smite, but they can never spill 
The cup fulfilled of love, from which my lips are wet; 
My heart has far more fire than you can frost to chill, 
My soul more love than you can make my soul forget

----------


## thom

The Lake Isle of Innisfree by William Butler Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, 
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made: 
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, 
And live alone in the bee-loud glade. 

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, 
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; 
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, 
And evening full of the linnet's wings. 

I will arise and go now, for always night and day 
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; 
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey, 
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

----------


## Tarquin

my favorite love poem is by Cassandra Clare, in her book City of Bones:

"To love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed"

----------


## thom

"Celia Celia", Adrian Mitchell 

When I am sad and weary
When I think all hope has gone
When I walk along High Holborn
I think of you with nothing on

 :Wink:

----------


## 7deadlysins

Auden's 'Tell me the truth about Love'

My boyfriend read this two me one afternoon.
It's just beautiful.

O Tell Me The Truth About Love


Some say love's a little boy, 
And some say it's a bird, 
Some say it makes the world go around,
Some say that's absurd, 
And when I asked the man next-door, 
Who looked as if he knew, 
His wife got very cross indeed, 
And said it wouldn't do.

Does it look like a pair of pyjamas, 
Or the ham in a temperance hotel? 
Does its odour remind one of llamas, 
Or has it a comforting smell? 
Is it prickly to touch as a hedge is, 
Or soft as eiderdown fluff? 
Is it sharp or quite smooth at the edges? 
O tell me the truth about love.

Our history books refer to it 
In cryptic little notes, 
It's quite a common topic on
The Transatlantic boats; 
I've found the subject mentioned in
Accounts of suicides, 
And even seen it scribbled on
The backs of railway guides.

Does it howl like a hungry Alsatian, 
Or boom like a military band? 
Could one give a first-rate imitation
On a saw or a Steinway Grand? 
Is its singing at parties a riot? 
Does it only like Classical stuff? 
Will it stop when one wants to be quiet? 
O tell me the truth about love.

I looked inside the summer-house; 
It wasn't over there; 
I tried the Thames at Maidenhead, 
And Brighton's bracing air. 
I don't know what the blackbird sang, 
Or what the tulip said; 
But it wasn't in the chicken-run, 
Or underneath the bed.

Can it pull extraordinary faces? 
Is it usually sick on a swing? 
Does it spend all its time at the races, 
or fiddling with pieces of string? 
Has it views of its own about money? 
Does it think Patriotism enough? 
Are its stories vulgar but funny? 
O tell me the truth about love.

When it comes, will it come without warning
Just as I'm picking my nose? 
Will it knock on my door in the morning, 
Or tread in the bus on my toes? 
Will it come like a change in the weather? 
Will its greeting be courteous or rough? 
Will it alter my life altogether? 
O tell me the truth about love. 

 :Smile: 




> i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
> 
> i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
> my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
> i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
> by only me is your doing,my darling)
> i fear
> no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
> no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
> ...




I read this last summer, i think it one of the most beautiful poems i have ever read, so simple, so real.

----------


## Pensive

> Auden's 'Tell me the truth about Love'
> 
> My boyfriend read this two me one afternoon.
> It's just beautiful.
> 
> O Tell Me The Truth About Love
> 
> 
> Some say love's a little boy, 
> ...


It's brilliant! Thanks for posting the poem.  :Smile:

----------


## Paul Roe

I think I will arise now and go to Innisfree, and there watch the swallows twitter. 
Nine pearls and rubies will I give away there, but I will keep my fancy free.
If I had world enough and time, an hundred years would be spent on this reply.
But, at my back, time's winged chariot is hurrying near and it will not stop for me.

Do I paraphrase myself through these lines? Very well then, I do.
I am a vast, colossal wreck and I have a mind of winter, especially when I am sitting in silence listening to the frozen lake crack, pop and rumble.
I will sing praise for the bright star.
I will wish myself to be as steadfast.
Nature's eremite will guide me down the road less taken toward immortallity.

Be not proud, Time and Death.
This verse your virtues rare shall eternize, but you are already there.
Down by the sally gardens, where frost is no longer spectre gray, where spring springs from the breast of the sky, I palely loiter.
Not ancient ladies, when refused a kiss, are so far from hope and love, though the daisies spring and the butterflies flicker about.

A singing skylark lifts me up before a bawling nightingale sets me down.

To Keats, Shelley, Frost, Whitman, Dickinson, Stevens, Yeats, Marvell, Pope, Housman, and Spenser...
Cheers!

Paul
antiaging4geeks.com

----------


## islandclimber

ode with a lament---- Pablo Neruda

----------


## Roivas

Well, this depends on what is meant by a love poem, but here are two poems that I like which deal with love:

"Night is My Sister, and How Deep in Love"

Night is my sister, and how deep in love
How drowned in love and weedily washed ashore,
There to be fretted by the drag and shove
At the tide's edge, I lie -- these things and more:
Whose arm alone between me and the sand,
Whose voice alone, whose pitiful breath brought near,
Could thaw these nostrils and unlock this hand.
She could advise you, should you care to hear.
Small chance, however, in a storm so black,
A man will leave his friendly fire and snug
For a drowned woman's sake, and bring her back
To drip and scatter shells upon the rug.
No one but Night, with tears on her dark face,
Watches beside me in this windy place.

~Edna St. Vincent Millay

"I Thought Once How Theocritus Had Sung"

I thought once how Theocritus had sung
Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,
Who each one in a gracious hand appears
To bear a gift for mortals, old or young;
And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,
I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,
The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,
Those of my own life, who by turns had flung
A shadow across me. Straightaway I was 'ware,
So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move
Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,--
_Guess now who holds thee?--Death_, I said. But, there,
The silver answer rang, --_Not Death, but Love_.

~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

----------


## nacreous

yes, those were very pretty, but I think that Byron's "She walks in beauty" is the all-time single best love poem ever.
just my opinion.

----------


## Pecksie

I will probably think of many more poems after I've posted this, but here are a few that really moved and continue to move me (in no particular order):

A Feaver, by John Donne
The Good Morrow, by John Donne
"Black absence hides upon the past...", by John Clare
Sonnet V, by Garcilaso de la Vega
Poem 20, by Pablo Neruda
Sonnet ("Largo espectro de plata conmovida..."), by Federico García Lorca
Song of the Soldier Husband, by Miguel Hernández (and many more of his)
They Flee from Me, by Sir Thomas Wyatt
Sonnet 116, by William Shakespeare
"Grieve not, dear love, although we often part...", by the Earl of Bristol
"Love's Philosophy", by P. B. Shelley

----------


## kelby_lake

> I misread "love" for "loved" in suggesting Keats' Ode. With an apology I want to add that Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress" should be on the list of best "love" poems.[/i]


i like that too. okay it's not a romantic love poem but 'On A Dead Child' is nice:

http://www.poetry-archive.com/m/on_a_dead_child.html

Dissolution/fading of love:

http://www.bartleby.com/121/8.html

----------


## qimissung

I'm new to this forum, but I've really enjoyed reading these poems. I didn't realize e.e. cummings had written such lovely poems; I also like the one that ends "nobody, not even the rain has such small hands."

I like Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Yeats, and Neruda, and on and on. It has been fun.

I know Edna St. Vincent Millay is on here several times, and I apologize if this one has been included. It is the one that makes my throat close up and makes my heart give a lurch of recognition.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,
Or nagged by want past resolution's power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.

----------


## Quoth the Raven

Hi, this is my first post  :Smile:  

I just read through the entirety of this thread and there are so many beautiful poems I would have picked that have already been mentioned - notably Elizabeth Barrett Browning's _Sonnets from the Portuguese No. 14_, e. e. cummings' _i carry your heart with me_ and Alfred Noyes' _The Highwayman_.


This poem may not be the greatest of all time, but I do have a fondness for it:

_I Am Very Bothered_ - Simon Armitage

I am very bothered when I think
of the bad things I have done in my life.
Not least that time in the chemistry lab
when I held a pair of scissors by the blades
and played the handles
in the naked lilac flame of the Bunsen burner;
then called your name, and handed them over.

O the unrivalled stench of branded skin
as you slipped your thumb and middle finger in,
then couldn't shake off the two burning rings. Marked,
the doctor said, for eternity.

Don't believe me, please, if I say
that was just my butterfingered way, at thirteen,
of asking you if you would marry me.

----------


## Kafka's Crow

BE in me as the eternal moods
of the bleak wind, and not
As transient things are—
gaiety of flowers.
Have me in the strong loneliness
of sunless cliffs
And of gray waters.
Let the gods speak softly of us
In days hereafter,
the shadowy flowers of Orcus
Remember thee. 

Ezra Pound

----------


## Page Sniffer

I vote for two of his, but they go together so beautifully as in a "before" (perhaps when love is being anticipated), and "after" as in wisdom found when a heart is broken and trying to heal. Yeats hits it square on the head and in the heart. They are: _He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven_, and _Never Give All the Heart_. 

I loaned my copy out, sorry I didn't post them with my opinions. I have the first memorised, but the second not enough to post it and do it justice. They are easy to find however. Thanks and peace to us all.

----------


## dramasnot6

> I'm new to this forum, but I've really enjoyed reading these poems. I didn't realize e.e. cummings had written such lovely poems; I also like the one that ends "nobody, not even the rain has such small hands."
> .


My favorite love poems are also by ee cummings.

----------


## quasimodo1

Love Poem for Wednesday


Youre the day after Tuesday, before eternity.
Youre the day we ran out of tomatoes 
and used tiny packets of ketchup instead.

You are salt, no salt, too much salt, a hangover.
You hold the breath of an abandoned cave.
Sometimes you surprise me with your 

aurora borealis and Ill pull over to watch you; 
Ill wait in the dark shivering fields of you.
But mostly, not. My students dont care for you

{excerpt}

Imagining you my being burns more brightly, my 

veins turn the night red. About my heart the armed 

guardian rattles with suspicion. Has your feeling 

cought sight of me down through the liberated 

stars: Are you coming from unopposable space. -- 

Rainer Maria Rilke, Paris, May, 1913 {translated by 

Edward Snow}

----------


## zaazusmiles

> This poem is one of the most widly love poems in the world, written about her husband Robert Browning. 
> 
> "How do i love thee, let me count the ways" 
> "if god choose, i shall but love thee better after death"
> 
> just 2 lovely lines - looking the rest up on the net is worth it - i love it.


Ahh... Elizabeth Barret Browning's sonnets are the best love poems of all time. Makes you want to fall in love all over and over again.

----------


## stark6

Erano i capei d'oro a l'aura sparsi
che 'n mille dolci nodi gli avolgea,
e 'l vago lume oltra misura ardea
di quei begli occhi ch'or ne son sì scarsi;

e 'l viso di pietosi color farsi,
non so se vero o falso, mi parea:
i' che l'esca amorosa al petto avea,
qual meraviglia se di subito arsi?

Non era l'andar suo cosa mortale
ma d'angelica forma, e le parole
sonavan altro che pur voce umana;
uno spirto celeste, un vivo sole
fu quel ch'i' vidi, e se non fosse or tale,
piaga per allentar d'arco non sana.

Francesco Petrarca

This translation is not so good but...

She let her sunlit tresses fly 
tangled and golden in the air. 
Unmeasurable light was in her eyes 
(how fine they were!) and now that look is rare.

Her kindness showed in tender glances, 
wind-flushed cheeks. At least that's how it seemed. 
I was walking tinder, I took chances. 
The next part might be something that I dreamed:

A fiery lightness in her bearing, 
a voice that wasn't mortal — it was song, 
a sort of angel presence she was wearing.

She was a thing from heaven. If I'm wrong 
I'd just as soon not know. 
To heal the wound you don't unstring the bow.

----------


## Niketa

:Smile:  I may not get to see you often as i like Imay not get to hold you in my arms all through the night But deep in my heart I truly know you're the one that i love and i can't let you go I can't promise you the world but i can try too give you a happy life I can't promise you i'll never make mistakes But i can try the best i can I can't promise you that I'll catch you everytime you'll fall but i can try always be close by so that i can help youu get up I can't promise that our love will last forever like in storybooks but i can promise that no matter what i'll never forget the memories i made with you :Smile:

----------


## pballplaya101

Im not able to express my love in that mannor because in that mannor there are no words that could express my love for you, there are no sentences that are made up of words that could express my love, there are no frases that could express this undying fire and passion that i have for one very beautiful girl, there are no paragraphs, essays, comics, books, novels, or dictionaries that could express this awe powerfull connection that i have with the one girl that truley has my heart....so you ask me why i love you and in depth and this is why i cant tell you.

----------


## mazHur

*THE LOOK*
*anon*


*STEPHON kissed me in the spring,Robin in the fall,But Colin only looked at meAnd never kissed at all.Stephon's kiss was lost in jest,Robin's lost in play,But the kiss in Colin's eyesHaunts me night and day.*

----------


## woodce

Thomas Hood's Time, Hope, and Memory is pretty good. My favorite is the very beginning when he says, "Fly through the world, and I will follow thee,Only for looks that may turn back on me;" 

and the end, "When thou art vext, then, turn again, and see Thou hast loved Hope, but Memory loved thee."

----------


## mazHur

What We Might Be, What We Are

 by X. J. Kennedy

If you were a scoop of vanilla
And I were the cone where you sat,
If you were a slowly pitched baseball
And I were the swing of a bat,

If you were a shiny new fishhook
And I were a bucket of worms,
If we were a pin and a pincushion,
We might be on intimate terms.

If you were a plate of spaghetti
And I were your piping-hot sauce,
We'd not even need to write letters
To put our affection across,

But you're just a piece of red ribbon
In the beard of a Balinese goat
And I'm a New Jersey mosquito.
I guess we'll stay slightly remote.

----------


## woodce

Yeat's Never give all the heart was not what i expected. I expected more.

----------


## learntodiscover

Edgar Allen poe, LENORE
*
Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
Let the bell toll! -a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river -
And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear? -weep now or never more!
See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!
Come! let the burial rite be read -the funeral song be sung! -
An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young -
A dirge for her, the doubly dead in that she died so young.

"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,
And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her -that she died!
How shall the ritual, then, be read? -the requiem how be sung
By you -by yours, the evil eye, -by yours, the slanderous tongue
That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?"

Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song
Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong!
The sweet Lenore hath "gone before," with Hope, that flew beside,
Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride -
For her, the fair and debonnaire, that now so lowly lies,
The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes -
The life still there, upon her hair -the death upon her eyes.

Avaunt! tonight my heart is light. No dirge will I upraise,
But waft the angel on her flight with a paean of old days!
Let no bell toll! -lest her sweet soul, amid its hallowed mirth,
Should catch the note, as it doth float up from the damned Earth.
To friends above, from fiends below, the indignant ghost is riven -
From Hell unto a high estate far up within the Heaven -
From grief and groan to a golden throne beside the King of Heaven."*

I know it might not look like a love poem but I keep coming back to it. The is the second poem I know from him that he mentions the name LENORE with sweet remembrance. I think H emight hae truly loved a lenore (or maybe the real woman has a different name) who died.
Look at his famous poem THE RAVEN and you'll see what I mean.

----------


## mazHur

> Edgar Allen poe, LENORE
> *
> Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
> Let the bell toll! -a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river -
> And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear? -weep now or never more!
> See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!
> Come! let the burial rite be read -the funeral song be sung! -
> An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young -
> A dirge for her, the doubly dead in that she died so young.
> ...



Beautiful poem by Poe,,, wonder how many young wives died before his eyes other than Annabel Lee or all are the one and the same? :Biggrin:

----------


## heisenheim

hello,

the poem is really cool. I try to find the song of that poem.. 

Thanks...

----------


## traytray

Hmm..indeed i'm quite torn..i hold so many close to my heart. Some that come to mind are..William Wordsworth..Emily Dickinson..Elizabeth Barrett Browning..Lord Byron..John Keats..William Shakespeare..Pablo Neruda. :Wink:

----------


## carino

Don't go far off, not even for a day
Don't go far off, not even for a day, 
Because I don't know how to say it - a day is long
And I will be waiting for you, as in
An empty station when the trains are 
Parked off somewhere else, asleep. 

Don't leave me, even for an hour, because then 
The little drops of anguish will all run together, 
The smoke that roams looking for a home will drift 
Into me, choking my lost heart. 

Oh, may your silhouette never dissolve
On the beach, may your eyelids never flutter
Into the empty distance. Don't LEAVE me for 
A second, my dearest, because in that moment you'll 
Have gone so far I'll wander mazily 
Over all the earth, asking, will you 
Come back? Will you leave me here, dying?

Pablo Neruda

----------


## Cellar Door

NO SECOND TROY

by: W. B. Yeats (1865-1939)

 WHY should I blame her that she filled my days
With misery, or that she would of late
Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways,
Or hurled the little streets upon the great,
Had they but courage equal to desire?
What could have made her peaceful with a mind
That nobleness made simple as a fire,
With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is not natural in an age like this,
Being high and solitary and most stern?
Why, what could she have done, being what she is?
Was there another Troy for her to burn?

"No Second Troy" is reprinted from The Green Helmet and Other Poems. W.B. Yeats. Dundrum: Cuala Press, 1910.

I know "No Second Troy" is not a typical love poem, but the story behind it is amazing; Yeats, Maude Gonne, her husband McBride- I love it... She was violence, he detested violence, but loved her. I find it to be captivating.

----------


## Jozanny

> I know "No Second Troy" is not a typical love poem, but the story behind it is amazing; Yeats, Maude Gonne, her husband McBride- I love it... She was violence, he detested violence, but loved her. I find it to be captivating.


Could you explain this a little better? Maude Gonne had a violent temperment; her husband McBride did not and loved her? Where does Yeats fit into this?

----------


## JBI

> Could you explain this a little better? Maude Gonne had a violent temperment; her husband McBride did not and loved her? Where does Yeats fit into this?


Both Gonne and Husband had violent temperaments. Their marriage failed due to domestic violence, as it is told, and I highly doubt it was her hitting him.

This from Yeats on the subject;

from Easter 1916

"This other man I had dreamed
A drunken, vain-glorious lout.
He had done most bitter wrong
To some who are near my heart,
Yet I number him in the song;
He, too, has resigned his part
In the casual comedy;
He, too, has been changed in his turn,
Transformed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born."

----------


## Jozanny

> Both Gonne and Husband had violent temperaments. Their marriage failed due to domestic violence, as it is told, and I highly doubt it was her hitting him.
> 
> This from Yeats on the subject;
> 
> from Easter 1916
> 
> "This other man I had dreamed
> A drunken, vain-glorious lout.


Hmm. Yeats was something of an elision in my formative years such as yours. I never really took to him, but I never really had much enthusiasm for Irish literary traditions, and that despite Joyce. I did enjoy listening to old Celtic mythology "untainted" by Anglican penetration, and there were some interesting poems in Kinsella's anthology that used Celtic to interesting advantage, but nothing I've read of Irish authors to date has ever really won my empathy, except Swift, but to me he is about as British as they come.

----------


## mangueken

I have always thought e.e. cummings wrote some very beautiful love poems

----------


## Cellar Door

Jozanny-

I mean to say that Yeats loved Maude Gonne, even though Yeats detested violence. I suppose I should have clarified that in my post. Oops. I am a big fan of Yeats; perhaps this will clear up what I meant:




In 1889, Yeats met Maud Gonne, then a twenty-three year old heiress and ardent Nationalist.[29] Gonne was eighteen months younger than Yeats and later claimed she met the poet as a "paint-stained art student."[30] Gonne had admired "The Isle of Statues" and sought out his acquaintance. Yeats developed an obsessive infatuation with her beauty and outspoken manner, and she was to have a significant and lasting effect on his poetry and his life thereafter.[31] Looking back in later years, he admitted "it seems to me that she [Gonne] brought into my life those daysfor as yet I saw only what lay upon the surfacethe middle of the tint, a sound as of a Burmese gong, an over-powering tumult that had yet many pleasant secondary notes."[32] Yeats' love remained unrequited, in part due to his reluctance to participate in her nationalist activism.[33] His only other love affair during this period was with Olivia Shakespear, whom he had first met in 1896, and parted with one year later. In 1895, he visited Gonne in Ireland and proposed marriage, but was rejected. He later admitted that from that point "the troubling of my life began."[34] Yeats proposed to Gonne three more times: in 1899, 1900 and 1901. She refused each proposal, and in 1903, to his horror, married the Irish nationalist Major John MacBride.[35]

Yeats' friendship with Gonne persisted, and in Paris in 1908 they finally consummated their relationship. "The long years of fidelity rewarded at last" was how another of his lovers described the event. Yeats was less sentimental and later remarked that "the tragedy of sexual intercourse is the perpetual virginity of the soul."[34] The relationship did not develop into a new phase after their night together, and soon afterwards Gonne wrote to the poet indicating that despite the physical consummation, they could not continue as they had been: "I have prayed so hard to have all earthly desire taken from my love for you & dearest, loving you as I do, I have prayed & I am praying still that the bodily desire for me may be taken from you too."[36] By January 1909, Gonne was sending Yeats letters praising the advantage given to artists who abstain from sex. Nearly twenty years later, Yeats recalled the night with Gonne in his poem "A Man Young and Old":

My arms are like the twisted thorn
And yet there beauty lay;
The first of all the tribe lay there
And did such pleasure take;
She who had brought great Hector down
And put all Troy to wreck.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WB_Yeats

----------


## Jozanny

That cleared up things substantially Cellar; much appreciated.

----------


## JBI

Either way though, Yeats is still one of the greatest poets; perhaps the greatest 20th century one. He seems to be the greatest first generation modernist, and was held even by them as such.

----------


## Jozanny

> Either way though, Yeats is still one of the greatest poets; perhaps the greatest 20th century one. He seems to be the greatest first generation modernist, and was held even by them as such.


Do you believe this or are you repeating consensus? 

I am, no pun intended, handicapped in my diffidence toward the man because his reputation was fed to me rather than studied so that I could make up my own mind--and as previously indicated, *the Celtic pathos* at some point becomes belabored victimization in my sensibility. Look at the Italian approach, in comparison. Italy wraps itself up in Old World corrosion and its authors remain perfectly contented to frolic on these grounds, from Dante through Eco. Irish writers seem to demand that their hurt feelings be indulged--and I'd argue that even Joyce does not transcend this. He makes it squarely front and center of his genius. It seems only now in the early 21st century that Ireland is dusting itself off and saying to the rest of the world, "hey, we're kind of pretty, ain't we?"

I seem to derive better rewards from other sources, and that's okay. :Tongue:

----------


## JBI

I believe it - I have read over his collected poems, time after time, and am amazed on every reading. Metrically, and in terms of syntax and form, there is no match - he understands the way words work, and uses them to create deeper meanings than what appear on the page. In terms of content, his later works especially transcend his "Irishness" as you have called it, in the sense that he seems to have purged the majority of personal experience out of his work, in an (successful) attempt to make his poetry universal.

If you look into his process, you can see exactly why he achieves such effects. He used to write an average of two lines a day - that is, spend so many hours writing but two lines, then thinking over them, and revising them. With such slow care, and skill with language, it is almost inevitable that such poetic strength will emerge.

----------


## Jozanny

> If you look into his process, you can see exactly why he achieves such effects. He used to write an average of two lines a day - that is, spend so many hours writing but two lines, then thinking over them, and revising them. With such slow care, and skill with language, it is almost inevitable that such poetic strength will emerge.


I will take it under advisement JBI, with the caveat--(and I tried to explain this to luke, though elocution failed me to some degree)--I do not really like studying poetry while immersed in the process of publishing my own.

The only reason I've made some effort at it since *getting to know* you and quasi, in this forum, is I have not truly been working, and so what the hay :Tongue: , yet my intellect rebels, insisting that I stand on my own two feet, with perhaps muted appreciation for a spare group of *moderns* and contemporaries. Anne Sexton doesn't make me feel threatened, so I can enjoy her evocative playfulness with fairy tale, and Vassar is to some degree a spiritual sister, which is why she gets a pass. Yeats, and even to some degree his errant sympathizer Roethke, makes me feel impatient. I am actually surprised, in fact, that I came to enjoy Browning on my own, by myself, with neither the ghost of my Shakespearean or my actually deceased Jamesian guiding me through to appreciation.

----------


## JBI

I guess that's the difference - I have no ambition to write poetry in the next little while, but all the ambition to write about poetry. Either way though, if I were writing poetry still, I would probably stick to obscure multicultural sources, as that is what critics are looking for / society is looking for.

----------


## Sunflower

(Rainer Maria Rilke) Autumn Day (Translated by M. D. Herter Norton, 1938)
Lord, it is time. The summer was very big.
Lay thy shadow on the sundials,
and on the meadows let the winds go loose.
Command the last fruits that they shall be full;
give them another two more southerly days,
urge them on to fulfillment and drive
the last sweetness into heavy wine.
Who has no house now, will build him one no more.
Who is alone now, long will so remain,
will wake, read, write long letters
and will in the avenues to and fro
restlessly wander, when the leaves are blowing.

----------


## Guinivere

Robert Burns, Ae fond kiss

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever; 
Ae fareweel, alas, for ever! 
Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
Who shall say that Fortune grieves him, 
While the star of hope she leaves him? 
Me, nae cheerful twinkle lights me; 
Dark despair around benights me. 

I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy, 
Naething could resist my Nancy: 
But to see her was to love her; 
Love but her, and love for ever. 
Had we never lov'd sae kindly, 
Had we never lov'd sae blindly, 
Never met-or never parted, 
We had ne'er been broken-hearted. 

Fare-thee-weel, thou first and fairest! 
Fare-thee-weel, thou best and dearest! 
Thine be ilka joy and treasure, 
Peace, Enjoyment, Love and Pleasure! 
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever! 
Ae fareweeli alas, for ever! 
Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.

----------


## mazHur

> Robert Burns, Ae fond kiss
> 
> Ae fond kiss, and then we sever; 
> Ae fareweel, alas, for ever! 
> Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
> Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
> Who shall say that Fortune grieves him, 
> While the star of hope she leaves him? 
> Me, nae cheerful twinkle lights me; 
> ...



enchanting poesy!
excellent!

----------


## byquist

Shakespeare's sonnet that starts:

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun ...

----------


## JBI

> Shakespeare's sonnet that starts:
> 
> My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun ...


Sonnet 130.

----------


## V.Jayalakshmi

Dear Members,
Really,amazing! I thought I had contributed here.Anyway it was pleasure again to read all over again.I am glad so many read with so much variety.So here is my contribution.

By Florence Earle Coates 


IF love were but a little thing— 
Strange love, which, more than all, is great— 
One might not such devotion bring, 
Early to serve and late. 

If love were but a passing breath— 5 
Wild love—which, as God knows, is sweet— 
One might not make of life and death 
A pillow for love’s feet.

----------


## backline

> "Ah, love, let us be true
> To one another! "
> Matthew Arnold: Dover Beach
> they may be the sadest lines in the history. in this untrue world, the only thing that is true is true love. but is love always be true?



Cruised back four years (page 6) for this reference.

Dover Beach, by Mathew Arnold, is not only my favorite poem, but a great love poem.

The Industrial Revolution was on, and yet years before Charles Darwin sailed on the Beagle naturalists had noted that the incessant waves had eroded the face of the "White Cliffs of Dover" revealing 10,000 years of limestone. Upon examination the shellfish fossils that made up the lime had changed very little in that time.
Therefore, the world was a lot older than the 6,000 years interpreters of the Bible said.
"Tain't so!" - What the Bible said, was the conclusion. Thus England entered the "Post Christian" phase.

Poetry changed.

Arnold in "Dover Beach," cuts to the heart of the matter: if heretofore life's "meaning" had crashed like a dove on Dover beach, what would replace it?

Dover Beach
by Mathew Arnold

The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair.
Upon the straights;-on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night air!

Only, from the long line of spray
Where sea meets the moon-blanched sand,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then begin again,
With tremendous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the AEgaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like folds of a bright girdle furled.

But now I only hear
Its meloncholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night wild, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain,
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

-1848


It seems like a vision poem like The Seine Net, by Robinson Jeffers. But that vision is not addressed to a loved one, nor is it about the conclusion that only love has meaning now.

In any event it gets my vote for greatest love poem (with the background info anyway).
Or at least I tend to agree with Arnold's viewpoint: If; then...

----------


## Jozanny

And why do we neglect Donne?

*THE CANONIZATION.
by John Donne


FOR God's sake hold your tongue, and let me love ;
Or chide my palsy, or my gout ;
My five gray hairs, or ruin'd fortune flout ;
With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve ;
Take you a course, get you a place, 
Observe his Honour, or his Grace ;
Or the king's real, or his stamp'd face 
Contemplate ; what you will, approve, 
So you will let me love.

Alas ! alas ! who's injured by my love? 
What merchant's ships have my sighs drown'd?
Who says my tears have overflow'd his ground? 
When did my colds a forward spring remove? 
When did the heats which my veins fill 
Add one more to the plaguy bill?
Soldiers find wars, and lawyers find out still 
Litigious men, which quarrels move, 
Though she and I do love.

Call's what you will, we are made such by love ; 
Call her one, me another fly,
We're tapers too, and at our own cost die, 
And we in us find th' eagle and the dove. 
The phoenix riddle hath more wit 
By us ; we two being one, are it ;
So, to one neutral thing both sexes fit. 
We die and rise the same, and prove 
Mysterious by this love.

We can die by it, if not live by love, 
And if unfit for tomb or hearse
Our legend be, it will be fit for verse ; 
And if no piece of chronicle we prove, 
We'll build in sonnets pretty rooms ; 
As well a well-wrought urn becomes
The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs, 
And by these hymns, all shall approve 
Us canonized for love ;

And thus invoke us, "You, whom reverend love 
Made one another's hermitage ;
You, to whom love was peace, that now is rage ;
Who did the whole world's soul contract, and drove 
Into the glasses of your eyes ;
So made such mirrors, and such spies,
That they did all to you epitomize
Countries, towns, courts beg from above 
A pattern of your love."
*

As it is late for me, I will return to say something about Donne and his illumination on love tomorrow, possibly.

----------


## AliciaLoh

My name will be up in your list one day. I'll do whatever it takes to be as famous as Bob Dylan or Shakespeare.

----------


## Jozanny

> And why do we neglect Donne?
> 
> *
> Call's what you will, we are made such by love ; 
> Call her one, me another fly,
> We're tapers too, and at our own cost die, 
> And we in us find th' eagle and the dove. 
> The phoenix riddle hath more wit 
> By us ; we two being one, are it ;
> ...


For someone who can sometimes scoff at great poets with impatience, I am seemingly most lenient when it comes to continued appreciation of Donne; he is my favorite Elizabethan, and The Canonization is one of my favorite poems, and the verses I single out here is what elevates the piece to metaphysical mastery.

----------


## JBI

Jacobean, not Elizabethan.

----------


## Jozanny

> Jacobean, not Elizabethan.


For a quibble, my friend, that is a stretch. Kermode counts him among the Elizabethan, but with a little quell-time, perhaps, I can offer a little more analysis. Not this morning tho.

----------


## Cat_Brenners

I love Cummings love poems. Hard to beat them.
Cat

----------


## conartist

The Ecstacy, John Donne

----------


## Alan kikani

Here is my favorite love poem , which is by Lord Byron


When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this. 

The dew of the morning
Sunk chill on my brow-
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame:
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame. 

They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o'er me-
Why were thou so dear?
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:-
Long, long shall I rue thee,
Too deeply to tell. 

In secret we met-
In silence I grieve,
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee?-
With silence and tears.

----------


## dramasnot6

> I love Cummings love poems. Hard to beat them.
> Cat


I could not agree more.

----------


## Jassica

My favorite love poem... by A. Pushkin (of course, it is only translation)

To ***
The wondrous moment of our meeting... 
I well remember you appear 
Before me like a vision fleeting, 
A beauty's angel pure and clear. 

In hopeless ennui surrounding 
The worldly bustle, to my ear 
For long your tender voice kept sounding, 
For long in dreams came features dear. 

Time passed. Unruly storms confounded 
Old dreams, and I >from year to year 
Forgot how tender you had sounded, 
Your heavenly features once so dear. 

My backwoods days dragged slow and quiet -- 
Dull fence around, dark vault above -- 
Devoid of God and uninspired, 
Devoid of tears, of fire, of love. 

Sleep from my soul began retreating, 
And here you once again appear 
Before me like a vision fleeting, 
A beauty's angel pure and clear. 

In ecstasy the heart is beating, 
Old joys for it anew revive; 
Inspired and God-filled, it is greeting 
The fire, and tears, and love alive. 

And other Pushkin's poems such as "Confession", Tatyana's letter from Eugeni Onegin and so on

----------


## PoeticPassions

Ah, I love that Byron poem, Alan... I have it posted on one of my blogs.... though in a sense it isn't really a love poem. More of a lament... perhaps with a tinge of bitterness and disdain.

Any love poem by Pablo Neruda is so passionate... so beautiful.

----------


## ~Sophia~

Letter - (Leonard Cohen from Let Us Compare Mythologies)

How you murdered your family
means nothing to me
as your mouth moves across my body

And I know your dreams
of crumbling cities and galloping horses
of the sun coming too close 
and the night never ending

but these mean nothing to me
beside your body

I know that outside a war is raging
That you issue orders
That babies are smothered and generals beheaded

But blood means nothing to me
It does not disturb your flesh

tasting blood on your tongue
does not shock me
as my arms grow into your hair

Do not think I do not understand
what happens
after the troops have been massacred
and the harlots put to the sword

And I write this only to rob you

that when one morning my head
hangs dripping with the other generals
from your house gate

that all this was anticipated
and so you will know that it meant nothing to me.

----------


## Pryderi Agni

> I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You
> 
> I do not love you except because I love you;
> I go from loving to not loving you,
> From waiting to not waiting for you
> My heart moves from cold to fire.
> 
> I love you only because it's you the one I love;
> I hate you deeply, and hating you
> ...



Nothing more need be said before Senor Neruda.

----------


## Basak

distant eyes

distant eyes! you were birds
and seemed treasuries of sorrow
you've been quiet since the final death
you stopped
and toward
that profound conclusion from within
an amber worm, advanced
beyond carrying its reasons around
like a shell, with its stones
more ruby than a mystery,
more diamond...
distant eyes!
and flocks of pain...

distant eyes! you were birds
or the metaphors of birds...
or else resembled a bit of prose
and those
who came you took one by one:
and the prophet of a storm; of death
it was the spring, skipping
over the spoor of roses
you came... distant eyes!
you! autumn angels...

distant eyes! you were birds,
and seemed treasuries of sorrow


Hilmi Yavuz
Translation by Walter Andrews

----------


## mmmmmm

was a favorite poem of Audrey Hepburn.

I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times…
In life after life, in age after age, forever.
My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,
That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,
In life after life, in age after age, forever.

Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age-old pain,
It's ancient tale of being apart or together.
As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge,
Clad in the light of a pole-star piercing the darkness of time:
You become an image of what is remembered forever.

You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.
At the heart of time, love of one for another.
We have played along side millions of lovers, shared in the same
Shy sweetness of meeting, the same distressful tears of farewell-
Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.

Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you
The love of all man’s days both past and forever:
Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life.
The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours –
And the songs of every poet past and forever.

----------


## Silas Thorne

I did a bit of editing to this love letter from Tarzan in 'Tarzan of the Apes', Chapter 18, by Edgar Rice Burroughs: 

I am Tarzan of the Apes. 
I want you. I am yours. You are mine. 
We live here together always in my house. 
I will bring you the best of fruits, the tenderest deer, the finest meats that roam the jungle. 
I will hunt for you. I am the greatest of the jungle fighters. 
I will fight for you. I am the mightiest of the jungle fighters. 
You are Jane Porter, I saw it in your letter. 
When you see this you will know that it is for you and that Tarzan of the Apes loves you.

 :FRlol:  Will this work? :Wink:

----------


## a_little_wisp

Ah, this is by Peter S. Beagle from his book 'The Last Unicorn'. It's... nothing crazily elegant, but ... love isn't always crazily elegant. Anyway: 

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/show/2531

----------


## Fallen_Angel

There are so many great poems on this thread. My little piece of Love poem. 

Celestial Love 

Higher far,
Upward, into the pure realm,
Over sun or star,
Over the flickering D?on film,
Thou must mount for love,?br> Into vision which all form
In one only form dissolves;
In a region where the wheel,
On which all beings ride,
Visibly revolves;
Where the starred eternal worm
Girds the world with bound and term;
Where unlike things are like,
When good and ill,
And joy and moan,
Melt into one.
There Past, Present, Future, shoot
Triple blossoms from one root
Substances at base divided
In their summits are united,
There the holy Essence rolls,
One through separated souls,
And the sunny ?n sleeps
Folding nature in its deeps,
And every fair and every good
Known in part or known impure
To men below,
In their archetypes endure.

The race of gods,
Or those we erring own,
Are shadows flitting up and down
In the still abodes.
The circles of that sea are laws,
Which publish and which hide the Cause.
Pray for a beam
Out of that sphere
Thee to guide and to redeem.
O what a load
Of care and toil
By lying Use bestowed,
From his shoulders falls, who sees
The true astronomy,
The period of peace!
Counsel which the ages kept,
Shall the well-born soul accept.
As the overhanging trees
Fill the lake with images,
As garment draws the garment's hem
Men their fortunes bring with them;
By right or wrong,
Lands and goods go to the strong;
Property will brutely draw
Still to the proprietor,
Silver to silver creep and wind,
And kind to kind,
Nor less the eternal poles
Of tendency distribute souls.
There need no vows to bind
Whom not each other seek but find.
They give and take no pledge or oath,
Nature is the bond of both.
No prayer persuades, no flattery fawns,
Their noble meanings are their pawns.
Plain and cold is their address,
Power have they for tenderness,
And so thoroughly is known
Each others' purpose by his own,
They can parley without meeting,
Need is none of forms of greeting,
They can well communicate
In their innermost estate;
When each the other shall avoid,
Shall each by each be most enjoyed.
Not with scarfs or perfumed gloves
Do these celebrate their loves,
Not by jewels, feasts, and savors,
Not by ribbons or by favors,
But by the sun-spark on the sea,
And the cloud-shadow on the lea,
The soothing lapse of morn to mirk,
And the cheerful round of work.
Their cords of love so public are,
They intertwine the farthest star.
The throbbing sea, the quaking earth,
Yield sympathy and signs of mirth;
Is none so high, so mean is none,
But feels and seals this union.
Even the tell Furies are appeased,
The good applaud, the lost are eased.

Love's hearts are faithful, but not fond,
Bound for the just, but not beyond;
Not glad, as the low-loving herd,
Of self in others still preferred,
But they have heartily designed
The benefit of broad mankind.
And they serve men austerely,
After their own genius, clearly,
Without a false humility;
For this is love's nobility,
Not to scatter bread and gold,
Goods and raiment bought and sold,
But to hold fast his simple sense,
And speak the speech of innocence,
And with hand, and body, and blood,
To make his bosom-counsel good:
For he that feeds men, serveth few,
He serves all, who dares be true.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

----------


## Red-Headed

Favourite poem of all time is a difficult one! I don't know what criteria you could use to determine that. I might plump for Milton's _Paradise Lost_, Blake's _Tyger_ or Coleridge's _The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere_ (original spelling).

However, I have always loved Louis Macneice's _Bagpipe Music_.

I'm going to have to get better reading glasses as I have posted this in the wrong forum. Doh!

I will say my favourite *love* poem would be Yeat's _No Second Troy_, as it is predominantly about his unrequited love for Maud Gonne.

----------


## Alan kikani

It is the hour

It is the hour when from the boughs 
The nightingale's high note is heard; 
It is the hour -- when lover's vows 
Seem sweet in every whisper'd word; 
And gentle winds and waters near, 
Make music to the lonely ear. 
Each flower the dews have lightly wet, 
And in the sky the stars are met, 
And on the wave is deeper blue, 
And on the leaf a browner hue, 
And in the Heaven that clear obscure 
So softly dark, and darkly pure, 
That follows the decline of day 
As twilight melts beneath the moon away.

----------


## blithe_spirit

My favourite love poem has to be:

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, 
Enwrought with golden and silver light, 
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths 
Of night and light and the half light, 
I would spread the cloths under your feet: 
But I, being poor, have only my dreams; 
I have spread my dreams under your feet; 
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams. 

_He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven_ by W.B.Yeats

A beautiful sentiment, beautifully written.

----------


## Tournesol

I really love these two poems by Robert Browning! 
They're both bitter-sweet! 



_Meeting at Night_

The gray sea and the long black land; 
And the yellow half-moon large and low 
And the startled little waves that leap 
In fiery ringlets from their sleep, 
As I gain the cove with pushing prow, 
And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. 

Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; 
Three fields to cross till a farm appears; 
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch 
And blue spurt of a lighted match, 
And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears, 
Than the two hearts beating each to each! 

_Parting at Morning_ 

Round the cape of a sudden came the sea, 
And the sun looked over the mountain's rim: 
And straight was a path of gold for him, 
And the need of a world of men for me.

----------


## Saladin

*My Love Is Like to Ice* by_ Edmund Spenser_

My love is like to ice, and I to fire:
How comes it then that this her cold so great
Is not dissolved through my so hot desire,
But harder grows the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
Is not allayed by her heart-frozen cold,
But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,
And feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told,
That fire, which all things melts, should harden ice,
And ice, which is congealed with senseless cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device?
Such is the power of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind.

----------


## Silas Thorne

'The Mistress: A Song' 
by John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester

An age in her embraces passed
Would seem a winter's day;
When life and light, with envious haste,
Are torn and snatched away.

But, oh! how slowly minutes roll.
When absent from her eyes
That feed my love, which is my soul,
It languishes and dies.


For then no more a soul but shade
It mournfully does move
And haunts my breast, by absence made
The living tomb of love.


You wiser men despise me not,
Whose love-sick fancy raves
On shades of souls and Heaven knows what;
Short ages live in graves.


Whene'er those woundng eyes, so full
Of sweetness, you did see,
Had you not been profoundly dull,
You had gone mad like me.


Nor censure us, you who perceive
My best beloved and me
Sign and lament, complain and grieve;
You think we disagree.


Alas, 'tis sacred jealousy,
Love raised to an extreme;
The only proof 'twixt her and me,
We love, and do not dream.


Fantastic fancies fondly move
And in frail joys believe,
Taking false pleasure for true love;
But pain can ne'er deceive.


Kind jealous doubts, tormenting fears,
And anxious cares when past,
Prove our heart's treasure fixed and dear,
And make us blessed at last.

----------


## Silenced Chaos

My favourite love poem is probably Matthew Arnorld's

'Dover Beach'

The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand;
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the A gaean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.


Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.



The 'Ah, love, let us be true to one another!' fragment is intensely memorable.

----------


## forever_bloom

If You Forget Me 

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I want you to know
one thing. 

You know how this is: 
if I look 
at the crystal moon, at the red branch 
of the slow autumn at my window, 
if I touch 
near the fire 
the impalpable ash 
or the wrinkled body of the log, 
everything carries me to you, 
as if everything that exists, 
aromas, light, metals, 
were little boats 
that sail 
toward those isles of yours that wait for me. 

Well, now, 
if little by little you stop loving me 
I shall stop loving you little by little. 

If suddenly 
you forget me 
do not look for me, 
for I shall already have forgotten you. 

If you think it long and mad, 
the wind of banners 
that passes through my life, 
and you decide 
to leave me at the shore 
of the heart where I have roots, 
remember 
that on that day, 
at that hour, 
I shall lift my arms 
and my roots will set off 
to seek another land. 

But 
if each day, 
each hour, 
you feel that you are destined for me 
with implacable sweetness, 
if each day a flower 
climbs up to your lips to seek me, 
ah my love, ah my own, 
in me all that fire is repeated, 
in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten, 
my love feeds on your love, beloved, 
and as long as you live it will be in your arms 
without leaving mine.

----------


## qimissung

That's lovely, forever bloom. Who wrote it?

----------


## Lynne50

On a much lighter note...
Here by Grace Paley
Here

Here I am in the garden laughing
an old woman with heavy breasts
and a nicely mapped face.

How did this happen?
well that's who I wanted to be
at last a woman
in the old style of sitting,

stout thighs apart under
a big skirt grandchild sliding
on off my lap a pleasant
summer perspiration.

that's my old man across the yard
he's talking to the meter reader
he's telling him the world's a sad story
how electricity is oil or uranium and so forth.

I tell my grandson 
run over to your grandpa and ask him
to sit beside me for a minute.

I am suddenly exhausted by my desire
to kiss his sweet explaining lips.

----------


## Nick Capozzoli

_The Exequy_ by Henry King...

This is a superb lament to the poet's dead wife. I won't quote this long poem, but I direct your attention to the passage beginning with:

Mean time, thou hast her, earth: much good
May my harm do thee...

----------


## wessexgirl

There are so many beautiful love poems on this thread, many of them favourites of mine. I couldn't just pick one from the greats of Shakespeare, Donne, Neruda, Barrett Browning, Yeats, Byron.......

I didn't see Christina Rossetti on here though, (apologies if I've missed her). 

Christina Rossetti 
Remember 

REMEMBER me when I am gone away, 
Gone far away into the silent land; 
When you can no more hold me by the hand, 
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay. 
Remember me when no more day by day 
You tell me of our future that you plann'd: 
Only remember me; you understand 
It will be late to counsel then or pray. 
Yet if you should forget me for a while 
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave 
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had, 
Better by far you should forget and smile 
Than that you should remember and be sad.

----------


## alexisj

On Love

Kahlil Gibran
1923 

When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep,
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.

For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth.

Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire,
that you may become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.

All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart,
and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.

But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.

Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.

When you love you should not say,
'God is in my heart,' but rather,
'I am in the heart of God.'
And think not you can direct the course of love,
for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.

Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night,
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love's ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.


This poem may not be popular to some of you guys..but i do hope that you get to read this and get to understand the message it conveys. it's really lovely guys , trust me..!

________________

"When the hired gets tired, the tired gets fired."
from dress up games and hair games community, Phil

----------


## qimissung

It's beautiful.

----------


## Stargazer86

I really like The Highway Man by Alfred Noyes
so romantic!

----------


## Saladin

*Ghazal 464*

The fame of your virtuous deeds
Like my love have reached a peak
Joy is what everyone needs
Neither can fade, nor are weak

Wine, imagination will find
Is outside the realm of mind
No metaphor of any kind
Can transcend wine-speak

My purpose will come about
On the day that I find out
You granted without a doubt
The union that I seek

When with you, I stay
A year is just like a day
And the times you are away
A moment, a year-long streak

A vision of your face
In my dreams I trace
In my wakefulness I chase
My dreams to have a peek

Your grace on my heart bestow
As your love & kindness grow
My weakness will clearly show
Like a crescent, lean & meek

Hafiz, don't groan & blame
If for union you aim
Not for a day or a week;
Of separation you must reek

- Hafiz

----------


## lady_litlover

Ono Komachi's tankas are really beautiful for being so short

Yielding to a love 
that recognizes no bounds,
I will go by night-
for the world will not censure
one who treads the path of dreams

but I think some of Thomas Wyatt's poems are equally beautiful... I can't decide

----------


## Pryderi Agni

> Ono Komachi's tankas are really beautiful for being so short
> 
> Yielding to a love 
> that recognizes no bounds,
> I will go by night-
> for the world will not censure
> one who treads the path of dreams
> 
> but I think some of Thomas Wyatt's poems are equally beautiful... I can't decide


Oh, my...another Ono no Komachi lover...

How about this, then? 




> Why do I want to dress me up without you around me? 
> I don't even feel like taking my comb made of box tree in the vanity case.


It's by Harima no Otome.

----------


## sadparadise

Just finished listening to a simple twist of fate. Now I am reading this as one of the greatest love poems. That is a simple twist of fate! My 8 year old loves this song. You should hear her sing the long notes on the words e.g straight and freight train. We play this song quite often.

I will add, My Love is a Red Red Rose. The Scottish Bard Rabbie Burns.

----------


## optimisticnad

there are so many that i love but at the moment the one that comes to mind and I hope we've not had it already is Derek Walcott's 'Love after Love', love thyself first huh....

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life

OH OH, damn you guys have got me started but i love this one by shelley, this and walcott's above is the only few poems that I know by memory.

MUSIC, when soft voices die, 
Vibrates in the memory; 
Odours, when sweet violets sicken, 
Live within the sense they quicken; 

Rose leaves, when the rose is dead, 
Are heap'd for the belovèd's bed: 
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, 
Love itself shall slumber on.

ok my last fave for tonight, i lvoe the first stanza, its amazing. by anne finch 

Cou'd we stop the time that's flying
...Or recall it when 'tis past
Put far off the day of Dying
...Or make Youth forever last
To Love wou'd then be worth our cost.

But since we must loose those Graces
...Which at first your hearts have wonne
And you seek for in new Faces
...When our Spring of Life is done
It wou'd but urdge our ruine on.

Free as Nature's first intention
...Was to make us, I'll be found
Nor by subtle Man's invention
...Yield to be in Fetters bound
By one that walks a freer round.

Marriage does but slightly tye Men
...Whil'st close Pris'ners we remain
They the larger Slaves of Hymen
...Still are begging Love again
At the full length of all their chain.

----------


## Heathcliff

> I really like The Highway Man by Alfred Noyes
> so romantic!


-hi-fives loudly-

I was about to say that.

My year seven English teacher made me read it. Left me in tears in the middle of the school library.

----------


## muel

Watery eyes, what a pair they make,
Fascinating and yet demanding;
Distance kept to separate emotions,
Tangled in the seat of passions.

Restitution for the emancipation,
Liberation did come late;
Closest feelings fled incognito,
Watery eyes, my fondest REMEMBRANCE.

----------


## milktea

To those who said simple answer: Dante <-- Yes.

But... if it hasn't been mentioned already:

Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus
Rumoresque senum severiorum
Omnes unius aestimemus assis.
Soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum
deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.
Dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut nequis malus invidere possit,
cum tantum sciat esse basiorum.

I'm pretty sure this is the sole inspiration for the numerous kiss poems like Tennyson's Love's latest hour is this, which is another great love poem.

----------


## sweetdisorder

Though Im young and I might not even know what love means I'd have to say the poem that admire the most would have to be " Love's Philosophy" by Percy Bysshe Shelly (1792-1822).
The last for lines always reply in my in mind over and over again:
"and the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea
What are all these kissings worth
If thou kiss not me"

----------


## *Genie*

Modestly(!), I suggest my own poem:

Thy love, at my glacial heart, has started a fire;
Burning my whole "Me" whilst melting the frost,
Made all the world, and ME above, be lost
In its new, mightily-conquered empire.

The lord by whom all my talent's hired,
And all my thoughts, for, I feel no ability,
Versus Plato's will, to oppose its authority;
So, let my soul, happily, by it be inspired.

Yet, thou dear me!, are not to be beheld;
For, folk just see the bright flames in dance,
At whose fever, all burn and fade, no chance,
Even for the poor match who first made it flared.

But no matter, what THEY say, view and hear;
To me, thy love and thou are yet so dear.


By: Genie Parker

Besides, I add this song by Ben Jonson and hope it is new here:

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.

I sent thee late a rosy wreath, 
Not so much honouring thee 
As giving it a hope that there 
It could not wither'd be. 
But thou thereon didst only breathe 
And sent'st it back to me; 
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, 
Not of itself but thee!

----------


## Uroboros1989

I think that the best poem of love is John Donn's "Plea". 
He subtly highlights the true tender nature of man and vicious nature of woman hahahahah
I'm joking....
But i love this poem very much!

----------


## sinotsimon

I'm sure someone will have already posted this, but here it is, an obvious choice and a beautiful poem.

EE Cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant 
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

----------


## Sebas. Melmoth

Of course _I_ don't know all the love poems ever written; but of those I _do_ know, *Poe's Annabel Lee* holds a special place in my imagination:

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling--my darling--my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

This works in so many ways on so many levels, from the sheer rhythm and music of the words, to the mood painting and imaginative tropes: this is great art and sincere human emotion: magnificent!

----------


## Remarkable

Sebas. Melmoth, I came to this thread with the intention of posting the exact same poem :Smile: . I find Annabel Lee to be to thoroughly enthralling: except from the wondrous use of language, with flows so easily, I find in it this marvelous evolution of the ordinary and mediocre into something heavenly (Annabel Lee died of a cold and Poe was able to make a great declaration of love out of it)...

I received a collection of Poe's poems from someone very dear to me and they hold a double significance for me, but I remember the first time I read Annabel Lee to my class during lunch break and they were all eyes and ears. I felt like love really knows how to get you!

----------


## henslerm

Rilke's Duino Elegies some of the most beautiful verse ever written. Deep, enchanting and engaging, it must be read repeatedly to gain any appreciation for it.

----------


## andrewparkin

its my list 

Sonnet 116 - William Shakespeare
Love One Another - Kahlil Gibran
Meeting at Night - Robert Browning
My River - Emily Dickinson
Love's Philosophy - Percy Bysshe Shelley
Maud - Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Annabelle Lee - Edgar Allan Poe
Bright Star, Would I Were Steadfast as Thou Art - John Keats
To His Coy Mistress - Andrew Marvell

----------


## Gregory Samsa

Gaius Valerius Catullus

*Lets Live and Love: to Lesbia*

Let us live, my Lesbia, let us love,
and all the words of the old, and so moral,
may they be worth less than nothing to us!
Suns may set, and suns may rise again:
but when our brief light has set,
night is one long everlasting sleep.
Give me a thousand kisses, a hundred more,
another thousand, and another hundred,
and, when weve counted up the many thousands,
confuse them so as not to know them all,
so that no enemy may cast an evil eye,
by knowing that there were so many kisses.

----------


## Seasider

It's very clear.
Our Love is here to stay.
Not for a year, 
But ever and a day.
The radio and the telephone
And the movies that we know,
May just be passing fancies
And in time may go.
But oh my dear
Our love is here to stay
Together we're
Going a long, long way.
In time The Rockies may crumble
Gibraltar may tumble.
They're only made of clay.
But our love is here to stay.

I think it's by Ira Gershwin. Such an American poem. Perfect for the period which I take to be the thirties. Love it. And the tune that Gershwin wrote was pretty good too.

----------


## erin montemurro

I too am a poetry enthusiast and have enjoyed much of the poetry mention by other members in this thread however i have recently moved to China and have been dabbling in some Chinese classic poetry - one of my favorites is a writer named Li Bai - for those interested why not check out a poem or two of this Tang Dynasty poets pieces of work (English translations can easily found on net ) - Erin

----------


## Rodof

Wendy Cope is one of my favourites

Valentine

My heart has made its mind up
And I’m afraid it’s you.
Whatever you’ve got lined up,
My heart has made its mind up
And if you can’t be signed up
This year, next year will do.
My heart has made its mind up

And I’m afraid it’s you.

http://www.lovepoems-lovepoetry.com/...by-wendy-cope/

----------


## Vir

Well, I know I'm a bit late to this party. But I am now several hours invested in it, so I thought I'd take the liberty to revive the thread at the risk of annoying people and cast a vote.

This is my favorite love poem—or at least it is until I finish considering the contention this thread has offered.



My Picture
By Abraham Cowley

Here, take my likeness with you, whilst 'tis so;
For when from hence you go,
The next sun’s rising will behold
Me pale, and lean, and old.
The man who did this picture draw,
Will swear next day my face he never saw.

I really believe, within a while,
If you upon this shadow smile,
Your presence will such vigour give,
(Your presence which makes all things live)
And absence so much alter me,
This will the substance, I the shadow be.

When from your well-wrought cabinet you take it,
And your bright looks awake it;
Ah, be not frighted, if you see,
The new-soul'd picture gaze on thee,
And hear it breathe a sigh or two;
For those are the first things that it will do.

My rival-image will be then thought blest,
And laugh at me as dispossessed; 
But, thou, who (if I know thee right)
I’th’ substance does not much delight,
Wilt rather send again for me.
Who then shall but my picture’s picture be.

----------


## Transmodernism

I hope I don't annoy anyone by posting this because it's not in English. I'd translate it, but it would sound tacky: in my opinion this exquisite sonnet by Petrarch is untranslatable because the precise way he uses the Italian language constitutes the art and beauty of this piece.

Quando fra l'altre donne ad ora ad ora
Amor vien nel bel viso di costei,
quanto ciascuna è men bella di lei
tanto cresce 'l desio che m'innamora.

I' benedico il loco e 'l tempo et l'ora
che sí alto miraron gli occhi mei,
et dico: Anima, assai ringratiar dêi
che fosti a tanto honor degnata allora.

Da lei ti vèn l'amoroso pensero,
che mentre 'l segui al sommo ben t'invia,
pocho prezando quel ch'ogni huom desia;

da lei vien l'animosa leggiadria
ch'al ciel ti scorge per destro sentero,
sí ch'i' vo già de la speranza altero.

----------


## Tristram_Buckle

This may now be my favorite! Thank you.

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms
Which I gaze on so fondly today,
Were to change by tomorrow, and fleet in my arms
Like fairy gifts fading away;
Thou wouldst still be adored
As this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will.
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervour and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear.
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sun-flower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turned when he rose.

----------


## z2011

Hi,

This is a poem I have written, looking forward to reading your opinions about it:

What would you do if you wake up thirsty in the middle of night.
Searching, And no water was around.
What would you do if you lost the blanket warms you in a winter night..
If you lost the only candle and you alone in the dark
If you were alive and part of your body taken apart..
If you lost the love of your life
What would you do..
Don't tell me it's life
Same words, same expressions, over, and over, I said to others all my life..
Now, how can I breathe
How can I live
And, just for her I was alive..
Every morning counting seconds to see her smile.
To see the life doors opening for me through her eyes..
To see the wind blowing her hair, on my face, flies.
To walk me n her holding hands very tight....
Just to feel the touch of her lips on my cheeks lies..
If you lost the love of your life.
What would you do
------------------------------------------------------------
Source: http://poemszm.blogspot.com/

Regards

----------


## Buh4Bee

Sorry, not a poem, but felt compelled to post this oldy, but goody:

I Corinthians 13:4

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.

----------


## moxeee

The Cinnamon Peeler

If I were a cinnamon peeler
I would ride your bed
and leave the yellow bark dust
on your pillow.

Your breasts and shoulders would reek
you could never walk through markets
without the profession of my fingers
floating over you. The blind would
stumble certain of whom they approached
though you might bathe
under the rain gutters, monsoon.

Here on the upper thigh
at this smooth pasture
neighbour to your hair
or the crease
that cuts your back. This ankle.
You will be known among strangers
as the cinnamon peeler's wife.

I could hardly glance at you
before marriage
never touch you
- your keen nosed mother, your rough brothers.
I buried my hands
in saffron, disguised them
over smoking tar,
helped the honey gatherers...

When we swam once
I touched you in the water
and our bodies remained free,
you could hold me and be blind of smell.
You climbed the bank and said

this is how you touch other women
the grass cutter's wife, the lime burner's daughter.
And you searched your arms
for the missing perfume

and knew

what good is it
to be the lime burner's daughter
left with no trace
as if not spoken to in the act of love
as if wounded without the pleasure of a scar.

You touched
your belly to my hands
in the dry air and said
I am the cinnamon
peeler's wife. Smell me.
-- Michael Ondaatje

----------


## louisgeorge

cool !!!
If I were a cinnamon peeler
I would ride your bed
and leave the yellow bark dust
on your pillow.  :Smile:

----------


## mazHur

I wish i were the little pendant encircling.....your neck.......the tip of which jostling.......over your your silky bosom......I wish i were the little piece of fabric...........touching your soft breast......I wish you were the energy which makes my heartthrob........at your thought........,..........I wish you always lived in my heart........and whenever I wanted to see you........I could just look down and......take a glimpse of your picture.

----------


## peggynevers

I just love this site. And it is so great that so many are inspired by the deepest emotions of others. Some words penetrate to the core of my being, its so amazing that something so powerful are only appreciated by so few.

----------


## Number7

My True-Love Hath My Heart

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for the other given:
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss;
There never was a bargain better driven.
His heart in me keeps me and him in one,
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides;
He loves my heart for once it was his own;
I cherish his because in me it bides.
His heart his wound receivèd from my sight;
My heart was wounded with his wounded heart;
For as from me on him his hurt did light,
So still methought in me his hurt did smart:
Both equal hurt, in this change sought our bliss,
My true love hath my heart and I have his.

Sir Phillip Sidney. 

The obvious implication of this poem would in our time be called 'gay', this poem seems to suggest that two men can have a relationship that is mutually beneficial and complimentary although reading this in such a way is to do so through the prism of Twenty First Century Western society. In the Elizabethan era on the other hand this poem could be about number of things, the most obvious being manly love in a religious sense, or even the political and cultural devotion of the poet to his sovereign in an era of widening social and sectarian allegiances. 

This could be a poem about _trust_, a quality we in today;s cynical world have little appreciation of, the poem raises itself above the literal or the contractual, to admire a quality that is given because it comes from deep down and is generously bestowed. In doing this this raises the language of the verse into metaphor above the literal and into a quasi-religious marriage ceremony between the two subjects. 

Of course the poem is suffused with the Italian Renaissance Platonism of the time, Sidney being heavily influenced by this philosophy, as were the manners of the aristocratic courtiers of the time.

----------


## kelby_lake

The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes  :Smile:

----------


## SkyCetacean

Someone's already posted it but I absolutely adore Shakepseare's Sonnet 116. To look on tempests and remain unshaken... I think that's a powerful image of the dedication necessary for long-term commitment.

----------


## Irishcrusader95

i've never really been one for poetry but i always keep coming back to this one, usually because of the loneliness that is in my heart. i love this one for the elequence and smootness of reading it as it ryames so well and speaks os true of lost love.




> Do you remember some time ago?
> I asked if you were perfect but you said no
> Did you ever think that:
> In my dreams you're the sweetest thing
> In my life you are everything
> Still you say you're not
> So I ask, why is it so hard to let go?
> 
> Everyone thinks I'm strong 
> ...


credit gos entirly to the author from this site
http://www.best-love-poems.com/poems.php?id=730779

----------


## billysiv

My Spell of Enchantment

I burn a blood red rose,
In flames divine.
Take Catherines heart
And make it mine.
I summon thee beloved one,
Love me more than anyone.
Bind body, heart and soul with mine
Together till the end of time.
These the things I need from you
Be thee loving, loyal, sweet and true.
I invoke the spirits from above
Make me your one and only love.
Sprites of Earth and Wind and Fire
Maketh me your hearts desire.
Love me true and we shalt be
Entwined thro all eternity

My dreams are the product of my wandering soul, freed from the shackles of my body and conscious thoughts during sleep. These dreams are crucial indications of my secret thoughts and hearts desires. Dearest Catherine you are constantly in my daydreams and a presence in my nocturnal wanderings. You were there before I met you and there you will forever be.
I love you so very much
All my love Bill xxx

----------


## Ser Nevarc

All good poems are love poems

----------


## Melanie

My favorite parts by *Paul Simon*:
___________________________________
FOR EMILY, WHENEVER I MAY FIND HER (parts)

"What a dream I had
Pressed in organdy
Clothed in crinoline of smoky burgundy
Softer than the rain"

also...

"And when you ran to me
Your cheeks flushed with the night
We walked on frosted fields
Of juniper and lamplight"

and...

"...when I awoke
And felt you warm and near
I kissed your honey hair
With my grateful tears"
___________________________________

DANGLING CONVERSATION (parts)

"...And we note our places with bookmarkers
That measure what we’ve lost
Like a poem poorly written
We are verses out of rhythm
Couplets out of rhyme
In syncopated time"

and...

"You’re a stranger now unto me
Lost in the dangling conversation
And the superficial sighs
In the borders of our lives"

----------


## cafolini

Nice parts.

----------


## Darcy88

They were probably posted somewhere in the preceding 30 pages, but if they weren't here are two of the greatest love poems:

Love's Philosophy

"The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever,
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one another's being mingle;--
Why not I with thine?
See! the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower would be forgiven,
If it disdained it's brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;--
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me?

- Shelley


THE GOOD-MORROW.
by John Donne

"I wonder by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved ? were we not wean'd till then ? 
But suck'd on country pleasures, childishly ? 
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers' den ?
'Twas so ; but this, all pleasures fancies be ;
If ever any beauty I did see, 
Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls, 
Which watch not one another out of fear ;
For love all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone ;
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown ;
Let us possess one world ; each hath one, and is one. 

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears, 
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest ;
Where can we find two better hemispheres 
Without sharp north, without declining west ?
Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally ;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I 
Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die."

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## Nick Capozzoli

I cannot chose the "best," but I think that _The Exequy_ by Henry King (1592-1669) is a very great love poem. It's an elegy to his dead wife, so it's not a "happy" poem...and some may find it maudlin. I find it to be both profoundly touching and beautiful. It's too long to quote here entire, but I'll quote a particularly fine passage. To set the scene, King is addressing both his dead wife and Nature, which has claimed her body. It begins:

_Accept thou Shrine of my dead Saint,
Instead of dirges, this complaint;
And for sweet flowers to crown they hearse,
Receive a strew of weeping verse
From thy grieved friend, whom thou might's see
Quite melted into tears for thee._

The 6th stanza is particularly fine:

_Mean time, thou hast her, earth: much good
May my harm do thee. Since it stood
With heaven's will I might not call
Her longer mine, I give thee all
My short-lived right and interest
In her, whom living, I loved best:
With a most free and bounteous grief,
I give thee what I could not keep.
Be kind to her, and prithee look
Thou write into thy Dooms-day book
Each parcel of this Rarity
Which in thy Casket shrined doth lie:
See that thou make thy reckoning straight,
And yield her back again by weight;
For thou must audit on thy trust
Each grain and atom of this dust,
As thou wilt answer Him that lent,
Not gave thee, my dear Monument._

The iambic tetrameter of the whole poem, and this passage in particular, is brilliantly modulated. Modern readers may find it inappropriately strange and perhaps silly when King starts demanding that the earth keep track of his dead wife's body and render it back, by weight, on Dooms-day. 

I do not find that part of Stanza 6 at all silly. King is taking a tragically heroic stance. A mere mortal, he challenges Nature, which had the power to take his wife, and which will eventually take him. He does this brilliantly, by reminding Nature that it just as subservient to God and God's laws as we are subject to the laws of Nature now and until Dooms-day. He's lost his wife...for now...and he must accept that. He remains, however, unbowed.

_The Exequy_ is not as widely known as it should be. I first encountered it in a college course that used the anthology, _Quest For Reality_ by Winters and Fields.

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## veganpoet

My personal favorite for a very long time has been Pablo Neruda's I Do Not Love You, closely followed by Shakespeare's Sonnet 116 and Elizabeth Barrett Browning's How Do I Love Thee?

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## papillondemai

> Elizabeth Barrett Browning's How Do I Love Thee?


Let me count the ways ...
I love thee for the heighth
and depth and breadth
that my soul can feel 
when feeling out of sight...

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## quidoftullamore

[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in] by ee cummings.


i carry your heart with me(i carry it in 
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere 
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done 
by only me is your doing,my darling) 
i fear 
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want 
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true) 
and its you are whatever a moon has always meant 
and whatever a sun will always sing is you 


here is the deepest secret nobody knows 
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud 
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows 
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide) 
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart 


i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

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