love poems for her

O Love, that lights this world,
Yet leaves us i' the dark; —
I led thee to my couch,
A grave-cloth was thy sark!
O Love, we would be clothed,
And thou hast left us stark.

Lancelot (crazed) sings —

Once there was a castle hall,
Fair, fair to see,
Armored dight, and splendored all,
Filled with shout o' revelry.
Came the hosts o' fate and rage
Thundered on its walls amain.
Sunken now like ruined age,
Never laughs its light again.

I loved a Queen and she loved me.

(with acknowledgments to Cole Porter)

VERSE 1

Mr. Irving Berlin
Often emphasizes sin
In a charming way.
Mr. Coward, we know,
Wrote a song or two to show
Sex was here to stay.
Richard Rodgers, it's true,
Took a more romantic view
Of this sly biological urge.
But it really was Cole
Who contrived to make the whole
Thing merge.

REFRAIN 1

He said the Belgians and Greeks do it,
Nice young men who sell antiques do it,

VERSE 1 SHE :

Relax for one moment, my Jerry,
Come out of your dark monastery,
While Venus is beaming above.
Darling, let's talk about love.

REFRAIN 1

Let's talk about love, that wonderful thing,
Let's blend the scent of Venice with Paris in spring,
Let's gaze at that moon and try to believe
We're Venus and Adonis, or Adam and Eve.
Let's throw away anxiety, let's quite forget propriety,
Respectable society, the rector and his piety,

Sufficeth it to you, my joys interred,
In simple words that I my woes complain,
You that then died when first my fancy erred,
Joys under dust that never live again?

If to the living were my muse addressed
Or did my mind her own spirit still inhold,
Were not my living passion so repressed
As to the dead the dead did these unfold,

Some sweeter words, some more becoming verse
Should witness my mishap in higher kind;
But my love's wounds, my fancy in the hearse,
The idea but resting of a wasted mind,

PROLOGUE

S ELF-LOVE , which never rightly understood,
Makes poets still conclude their plays are good,
And malice, in all critics, reigns so high,
That for small errors they whole plays decry;
So that to see this fondness, and that spite,
You 'd think that none but madmen judge or write.
Therefore our poet, as he thinks not fit
T' impose upon you what he writes for wit;
So hopes, that leaving you your censures free,
You equal judges of the whole will be:

One-sided love:
Even I hate
this sorry self of mine —
so hate me,
and I'll know we share
at least that emotion

I

The man stood silent, peering past
His utmost verge of memory.
What lay beyond, beyond that vast
Bewildering darkness and dead sea
Of noisome vapors and dread night?
No light! not any sense of light
Beyond that life when Love was born
On that first, far, dim rim of morn:
No light beyond that beast that clung
In darkness by the light of love
And died to save her young.
And yet we know life must have been
Before that dark, dread life of pain;

I

What is there in a dear dove's eyes,
Or voice of mated melodies,
That tells us ever of blue skies
And cease of deluge on Love's seas?
The dove looked down on Jordan's tide
Well pleased with Christ the Crucified;
The dove was hewed in Karnak stone
Before fair Jordan's banks were known.
The dove has such a patient look,
I read rest in her pretty eyes
As in the Holy Book.

I think if I should love some day —
And may I die when dear Love dies —

" And God said, Let there be light. "

Rise up! How brief this little day?
We can but kindle some dim light
Here in the darkened, wooded way
Before the gathering of night.
Come, let us kindle it. The dawn
Shall find us tenting farther on.
Come, let us kindle ere we go —
We know not where; but this we know,
Night cometh on, and man needs light.
Come! camp-fire embers, ere we grope
Yon gray archway of night.

Life is so brief, so very brief,
So rounded in, we scarce can see

Let sordid mortals toil all day,
For gold and silver search and dig;
A greater treasure I enjoy
In this, my charming talking pig.

Though mighty monarchs on their thrones
In pride and state look fierce and big,
They are not so content and blessed
As is old Tony with his pig.

I neither care who's in or out,
Whether Tory, whether Whig,
I love my country, King and Queen,
But best of all I love my pig.