I will be faithful to thee; aye, I will!
And Death shall choose me with a wondering eye
That he did not discern and domicil
One his by right ever since that last Good-bye!

I have no care for friends, or kin, or prime
Of manhood who deal gently with me here;
Amid the happy people of my time
Who work their love's fulfilment, I appear

Numb as a vane that cankers on its point,
True to the wind that kissed ere canker came;
Despised by souls of Now, who would disjoint
The mind from memory, making Life all aim,

This love puts all humanity from me;
I can but maledict her, pray her dead,
For giving love and getting love of thee--
Feeding a heart that else mine own had fed!

How much I love I know not, life not known,
Save as some unit I would add love by;
But this I know, my being is but thine own--
Fused from its separateness by ecstasy.

And thus I grasp thy amplitudes, of her
Ungrasped, though helped by nigh-regarding eyes;
Canst thou then hate me as an envier
Who see unrecked what I so dearly prize?
Believe me, Lost One, Love is lovelier

1

When you shall see me in the toils of Time,
 My lauded beauties carried off from me,
My eyes no longer stars as in their prime,
 My name forgot of maiden fair and free;
When, in your being, heart concedes to mind,
 And judgement, though you scarce its process know,
Recalls the excellencies I once enshrined,
 And you are irked that they have withered so:
Remembering mine the loss is, not the blame,
 That Sportsman Time but rears his brood to kill,
Knowing me in my soul the very same –
 One who would die to spare you touch of ill! –

Lovely was the death
Of Him whose life was Love! Holy with power
He on the thought-benighted Sceptic beamed
Manifest Godhead, melting into day
What floating mists of dark idolatry
Broke and misshaped the omnipresent Sire;
And first by Fear uncharmed the drowsèd Soul.
Till of its nobler nature it 'gan feel
Dim recollections; and thence soared to Hope.
Strong to believe whate'er of mystic good
The Eternal dooms for His immortal sons.
From Hope and firmer Faith to perfect Love
Attracted and absorbed: and centered there

The herdboy returns, none too early—
beside the stream, heavy wind and rain!
Looking behind—a mother's love for her baby:
it is running after her, but can't seem to catch up.

My Mistres seemes but browne (say you) to mee.
Tis verie true, and I confesse the same:
Yet love I her, although that browne she bee,
Because to please me she is glad and faine.
I loved one most Beautiful before,
Whom now (as Death) I deadly doo abhore,
Because to scorne my service her I found,
I gave her ore, and chose to mee this same:
Nor to be faithfull (thinke I) I am bound
To one in whom no kindnes doth remaine:
This is the cause, for Browne and Pittifull,
I left a faire, but yet a faithlesse Trull.

Love this faire Lasse (said Love) once unto mee,
I lov'd her; love her now (saith he) no more,
When thousand darts within my brest there bee,
And if I love her, he mee threatneth sore:
He saith himselfe is falne in love with her,
And that himselfe fore others hee'l prefer.
His sense is this, He in her beauteous eyes,
Hath found such Amours as nere like were seene:
But thinkes he this shall serve, in cunning wise
To make mee leave, he cousning me so cleene?
In spite of him Ile love, sith hart doth gree
With Love in love, as Rivall for to bee.

In Love his Kingdome great, two Fooles there bee;
My Ladie's one, my selfe the other am:
The fond behaviour of both which to see,
Who so but nicely markes, will say the same:
Foolish our thoughts are, foolish our desire,
Foolish our harts in Fancies flame to frie,
Foolish to burne in Loves hot scortching fire.
But what? Fooles are we none, my tung dooth lie:
For who most foolish is and fond in love,
More wiser farre than others, oft doth prove.

The flaming Torch (a shadow of the light)
Put out by hastie hand, doth colour change,
And blacke becomes, which seemd before most bright:
Nor so to show is anie mervaile strange:
So was I long a lively fire of love,
The heate whereof my Bodie oft did prove,
But I, at last (by one who moand my woe)
Extinguisht was, by Pitifull Disdaine:
Then if my colour blacke in face doo show,
You need not much to wonder at the same,
Since tis a Signe (by part to know the whole)
That Love made mee a Fire, Disdaine a Cole.

Who joyes in Love? the Hart alone, to see.
Who languisheth in Love? the Hart alone.
Then ist a thing impossible for mee
To joy or languish, since I Hart have none.
Withouten Hart? then tel me, what am I?
Even bones and flesh united cunningly.
The Soule, where ist? Love that hath tane away,
My Bodie onely resteth in his place.
Depriv'd of Soule and Hart, how live? I say,
I live (maintaind by Love) in this strange case.
O wonder strange, the Bodie live to see,
The Hart and Soule in other place to bee.