Even from earthly love thy face avert not,Since to the Real it may serve to raise thee.Ere A, B, C, are rightly apprehended,How canst thou con the pages of thy Koran?A sage (so heard I), unto whom a studentCame craving counsel on the course before him,Said, " If thy steps be strangers to love's pathways,Depart, learn love, and then return before me!For, shouldst thou fear to drink wine from Form's flagon,Thou canst not drain the draught of the Ideal.But yet beware!

F AIR sir, this love of ours,
In joy begun so well,
I see at length to fail upon thy part:
Wherefore my heart sinks very heavily.
Fair sir, this love of ours
Began with amorous longing, well I ween:
Yea, of one mind, yea, of one heart and will

Do but consider this small dust, here running in the glass,
By atoms moved.
Could you believe that this the body was
Of one that loved?
And in his mistress' flame playing like a fly,
Turned to cinders by her eye?
Yes, and in death as life unblest,
To have't expressed,
Even ashes of lovers find no rest.

Disdain me still, that I may ever love,
For who his Love enjoys, can love no more;
The war once past, with peace men cowards prove,
And ships returned do rot upon the shore:
Then though thou frown, I'll say thou art most fair,
And still I'll love, though still I must despair.

As heat 's to life, so is desire to love,
For these once quenched, both life and love are done:
Let not my sighs, nor tears, thy virtue move;
Like basest metals, do not melt too soon.
Laugh at my woes, although I ever mourn,
Love surfeits with rewards, his nurse is scorn.

Dear , when the sun is set
From my life's air,
And your eyes, newly wet
With tears for me,
Make my sky darker yet, —
Remember where
Your eyes in light laved all my destiny:
Weep not, weep not, since so much love was there!

Remember that through you
My rapture came:
I gained from faith so true
More than I asked, —
For not the half I knew
My need might name,
Until I saw the soul your love unmasked:
Then crave not of the night my vanished flame.

Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours away,
In visions bright redeeming
The fleeting joys of day;
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours away,
In visions bright redeeming
The fleeting joys of day;
Dreaming the happy hours,
Dreaming the happy hours away;
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming,
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours away;
My own love is sweetly dreaming the happy hours away.
Come where my love lies dreaming,
Dreaming the happy hours away.

Come to me, Eros, if you needs must come
This year, with milder twinges;
Aim not your arrow at the bull's-eye plumb,
But let the outer pericardium
Be where the point impinges.

Garishly beautiful I watch them wane
Like sunsets in a pink west,
The passions of the past; but O their pain!
You recollect that nice affair with Jane?
We nearly had an inquest.

I want some mellower romance than these,
Something that shall not waken
The bosom of the bard from midnight ease,
Nor spoil his appetite for breakfast, please,

Come, oh, come, my life's delight,
Let me not in languor pine!
Love loves no delay;
The more enjoyed the more divine:

Oh, come, and take from me
The pain of being deprived of thee!

Thou all sweetness dost enclose
Like a little world of bliss.
Beauty guards thy looks: the rose
In them pure and eternal is.
Come then, and make thy flight
As swift to me as heavenly light!

Cock Robin got up early
At the break of day,
And went to Jenny's window
To sing a roundelay,
He sang Cock Robin's love
To the little Jenny Wren,
And when he got unto the end,
Then he began again.

Clasp her and hold her and love her,
— Here in the arching green
Of boughs that bend above her
— With belts of blue between.

Clasp her and hold her and love her,
— Swift! Ere the splendor dies;
The blue grows black above her,
— The earth in shadow lies.

Flowers of dream enfold her.
— Soft! Let me bend above,
Clasp her and love her and hold her,
— Clasp her and hold and love.