Eph. What Friendship is, ARDELIA shew.
Ard. 'Tis to love, as I love You.
Eph. This Account, so short (tho' kind)
Suits not my enquiring Mind.
Therefore farther now repeat;
What is Friendship when complete?
Ard. 'Tis to share all Joy and Grief;
'Tis to lend all due Relief
From the Tongue, the Heart, the Hand;
'Tis to mortgage House and Land;
For a Friend be sold a Slave;
'Tis to die upon a Grave,
If a Friend therein do lie.
Eph. This indeed, tho' carry'd high,
This, tho' more than e'er was done

A DIALOGUE: Addressed to a young Lady.

Friendship:

In vain thy lawless Fires contend with mine,
Tho' Crouds unnumber'd fall before thy Shrine;
Let Youths, who ne'er aspir'd to noble Fame,
And the soft Virgin, kindle at thy Flame,
Thee, Son of Indolence and Vice, I scorn,
By Reason nourish'd, and of Virtue born.

Love:

Vain is that boasted Reason 'gainst my Dart,
I pierce the Sage's, as the vulgar Heart,
All Ages, Sexes, the soft Torment share,
The hoary Patriot, and the blooming Fair.

After the fierce midsummer all ablaze
Has burned itself to ashes, and expires
In the intensity of its own fires,
There come the mellow, mild, St. Martin days
Crowned with the calm of peace, but sad with haze.
So after Love has led us, till he tires
Of his own throes, and torments, and desires,
Comes large-eyed Friendship: with a restful gaze.
He beckons us to follow, and across
Cool verdant vales we wander free from care.
Is it a touch of frost lies in the air?
Why are we haunted with a sense of loss?

Friend, why is my love so cross with me
That he has chosen to live in fairylands?
To whom shall I reveal my agony?

He left to roam in meadows of flowers.
When he rested for a moment under the pomegranate trees,
Bright buds burst into ecstatic bloom.

When lovers' hearts were put up for sale,
The bidding was so brisk in the market of love
That sweet-bosomed belle got eleven for a cowry!

The belle, far gone on jewels and trinkets,
Adorned herself in her splendid room,
Till the storm of love ended this madness of youth.

Friend, has springtime come to the garden of love,
And is my sweetheart out enjoying love's bloom ?

The breeze will wake up, at break of dawn,
The sleeping flowers in all beds.
But I wonder if the bulbul would be awake !

Amazed at his tireless mission to stain her name
From pole to pole, the dew-drenched masval asks the breeze
'Could a soul like his have ever known rest ?'

I am unburdening my heart to the rose,
For I may never get a chance to speak

Dearly I love a friend; yet a foe I may turn to my profit;
Friends show me that which I can; foes teach me that which I should.

The high-handed man, solicitous
Untamed your demons; what passion
Seethed within you to be kissed again,
To be insulted, and restored,
Adored.

But now – your maidenhead intact –
You have only dreams, and no decipherer;
Only dreams to tell what might have been;
What young man, waiting across the seas
Would sail to claim your hand.

How I shall weep for you, gone as you are
Into a lonely death, like millions,
Without love, without love, without love.

When you called me
To light up your life
I could never refuse.
But, there are things I ask of you.

Love, I can’t be a candle
For I know it is an ancient lie.
The candle is for the solemn,
And for those who yearn a slow
And settled tenderness. Not for us.
It is for those who can bear to leave
A mass of their waste, the dregs of their glory.
O, it is for the selfish who seek to burn through a medium.

Love, I will promise you a substitute.
I could be that piece of holy camphor
So safely locked away from prying hands.

(Translated from the French by Edouard Rodti)

My wife with the hair of a wood fire
With the thoughts of heat lightning
With the waist of an hourglass
With the waist of an otter in the teeth of a tiger
My wife with the lips of a cockade and of a bunch of stars of the last magnitude
With the teeth of tracks of white mice on the white earth
With the tongue of rubbed amber and glass
My wife with the tongue of a stabbed host
With the tongue of a doll that opens and closes its eyes
With the tongue of an unbelievable stone

By all means they try to hold me secure who love me in this world.
But it is otherwise with thy love which is greater than theirs,
and thou keepest me free.

Lest I forget them they never venture to leave me alone.
But day passes by after day and thou art not seen.

If I call not thee in my prayers, if I keep not thee in my heart,
thy love for me still waits for my love.