In silence the heart raves.It utters words
Meaningless, that never had
A meaning.I was ten, skinny, red-headed,

Freckled.In a big black Buick,
Driven by a big grown boy, with a necktie, she sat
In front of the drugstore, sipping something

Through a straw. There is nothing like
Beauty. It stops your heart.It
Thickens your blood.It stops your breath.It

Makes you feel dirty.You need a hot bath.
I leaned against a telephone pole, and watched.
I thought I would die if she saw me.

Her love is like the hardy flower
That blooms amid the Alpine snows;
Deep-rooted in an icy bower,
No blast can chill its sweet repose;
But fresh as is the tropic rose,
Drenched in mellowest sunny beams,
It has as sweet delicious dreams
As any flower that grows.

And though an avalanche came down
And robbed it of the light of day,
That which withstood the tempest's frown
In grief would never pine away.
Hope might withhold her feeblest ray,
Within her bosom's snowy tomb
Love still would wear its everbloom,

Mary: Johnny, sweetheart, can you be true
To all those famous vows you've made?
Will you love me as I love you
Until we both in earth are laid?
Or shall the old wives nod and say
'His love was only for a day,
The mood goes by,
His fancies fly,
And Mary's left to sigh.'

Johnny: Mary, alas, you've hit the truth,
And I with grief can but admit
Hot-blooded haste controls my youth,
My idle fancies veer and flit
From flower to flower, from tree to tree,
And when the moment catches me
Oh, love goes by,
Away I fly,

Zeal is that pure and heavenly flame,
The fire of love supplies ;
While that which often bears the name,
Is self in a disguise.
True zeal is merciful and mild,
Can pity and forbear ;
The false is headstrong, fierce and wild,
And breathes revenge and war.

In the space between love and sleep
when heart mourns in its prison
eyes against shoulder keep
their blood-black curtains tight.
Body rolls back like a stone, and risen
spirit walks to Easter light;

away from its tomb of bone,
away from the guardian tents
of eyesight, walking alone
to unbearable light with angelic
gestures. The fallen instruments
of its passion lie in the relic

darkness of sleep and love.
And heart from its prison cries
to the spirit walking above:
'I was with you in agony.

None, unless the saints above,
Knew the secret of their love;
For with calm and stately grace
Isolde held her queenly place,
Tho’ the courtiers’ hundred eyes
Sought the lovers to surprise,
Or to read the mysteries
Of a love—so rumour said
By a magic philtre fed,
Which for ever in their veins
Burn’d with love’s consuming pains.
Yet their hands would twine unseen,
In a clasp ’twere hard to sever;
And whoso watched their glances meet,
Gazing as they’d gaze for ever,

Might have marked the sudden heat

When Love and I drew softly nigh
And gazed in modest Chloe's eye
We saw reflected there in part
The lovely mansion of her heart,
A sight so fair that, quite bereft
Of sense and shame, we had but left
One wish, that we by foul or fair
Might enter in and tarry there.

But when, with vagabondish art,
We nearer crept to Chloe's heart
That we might steal therein, we found
Her heart with barbed wires enwound;
And crawling through those cruel rings
My garments caught, Love caught his wings.

'Trees,' so he said and laid him lovingly
At a great beech-tree's root, 'are my best friends.
Upon their love it seems my life depends.
No dog or woman for me! Give me a tree!
In winter saying, ' Courage! hold to me!'
In spring, ' Look up! hope's here, and winter ends!'
In summer, 'Come! here's peace that naught transcends
In autumn, ' See! the dreams I bring to thee!'
Why, I have loved a tree until for me
It had a soul. And as the Greeks believed
So I believe: that in each dwells a life,
Lovely, ecstatic, that some man may see

We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.

Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.

We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love

Too young for love?
Ah, say not so!
Tell reddening rose-buds not to blow
Wait not for spring to pass away,--
Love's summer months begin with May!
Too young for love?
Ah, say not so!
Too young? Too young?
Ah, no! no! no!

Too young for love?
Ah, say not so,
To practise all love learned in May.
June soon will come with lengthened day
While daisies bloom and tulips glow!

Too young for love?
Ah, say not so!
Too young? Too young?
Ah, no! no! no!