Perhaps it is not love, said I,
That melts my soul when Flavia's nigh;
Where wit and sense like hers agree,
One may be pleased, and yet be free.

The beauties of her polish'd mind
It needs no lover's eye to find;
The hermit freezing in his cell
Might wish the gentle Flavia well.

It is not love—averse to bear
The servile chain that lovers wear;
Let, let me all my fears remove,
My doubts dispel—it is not love.

Oh! when did wit so brightly shine
In any form less fair than thine?
It is—it is love's subtle fire,

The burning fire shakes in the night,
On high her silver candles gleam,
With far-flung arms enflamed with light,
The trees are lost in dream.

Come in thy beauty! 'tis my love,
Lost in far-wandering desire,
Hath in the darkling deep above
Set stars and kindled fire.

B ELOVÈD , from the hour that you were born
I loved you with the love whose birth is pain;
And now, that I have lost you, I must mourn
With mortal anguish, born of love again;
And so I know that Love and Pain are one,
Yet not one single joy would I forego.—
The very radiance of the tropic sun
Makes the dark night but darker here below.
Mine is no coward soul to count the cost;
The coin of love with lavish hand I spend,
And though the sunlight of my life is lost
And I must walk in shadow to the end,—
I gladly press the cross against my heart,

You tell me that you truly love;
Ah! know you well what love does mean?
Does neither whim nor fancy move
The rapture of your transient dream?

Tell me, when absent do you think
O'er ev'ry look and ev'ry sigh?
Do you in melancholy sink,
And hope and doubt you know not why?

When present, do you die to say
How much you love, yet fear to tell?
Does her breath melt your soul away?
A touch, your nerves with transport swell?

Or do you faint with sweet excess
Of pleasure rising into pain,
When hoping you may e'er possess

When Love is kind,
Cheerful and free,
Love 's sure to find
Welcome from me.

But when Love brings
Heartache er pang,
Tears, and such things—
Love may go hang!

If Love can sigh
For one alone,
Well pleased am I
To be that one,

But should I see
Love given to rove
To two or three,
Then—good by Love!

Love must, in short,
Keep fond and true,
Thro' good report,
And evil too.

Else, here I swear,
Young Love may go,
For aught I care—

I am in love with him to whom a hyacinth is dearer
Than I shall ever be dear.
On nights when the field-mice are abroad he cannot sleep:
He hears their narrow teeth at the bulbs of his hyacinths.
But the gnawing at my heart he does not hear.

A YOUTH beside a maiden strayed
Within the woodland's changing shade.
‘I love her!’ cried the eager boy;
The maiden's bosom felt no joy
At this confession.—Loves her?—who?
He loves another? is it true?
They were companions free to rove,
But never had they spoke of love;
And fancy heard
Each building bird
Sing, O he loves another!

The lovely maiden's cheek turns pale
Before the raptured lover's tale,
She marks what he confides to her,
She looks on him, the worshipper
Of some strange beauty, who perchance
Hath won him by a word or glance,

Maybe love will come
cause I am not so dumb
Tonight it fills my heart
heavy sad apart
from one or two I fancy
now I'm an old fairy.

This is hard to say
I've come to be this way
thru many loves of youth
that taught me most heart truth
Now I come by myself
in my hand like an old elf

It's not the most romantic
dream to be so frantic
for young men's bodies,
as an old sugar daddy
blest respected known,
but left to bed alone.

How come love came to end
flaccid, how pretend
desires I have used
Four decades as I cruised

Two bubbles on a mountain stream,
Began their race one shining morn,
And lighted by the ruddy beam,
Went dancing down 'mid shrub and thorn.

The stream was narrow, wild and lone,
But gayly dashed o'er mound and rock,
And brighter still the bubbles shone,
As if they loved the whirling shock.

Each leaf, and flower, and sunny ray,
Was pictured on them as they flew,
And o'er their bosoms seemed to play
In lovelier forms and colors new.

Thus on they went, and side by side,
They kept in sad and sunny weather,

All round they murmur, ‘O profane,
Keep thy heart's secret hid as gold’;
But I, by God would sooner be
Some knight in shattering wars of old,

In brown outlandish arms to ride,
And shout my love to every star
With lungs to make a poor maid's name
Deafen the iron ears of war.

Here, where these subtle cowards crowd,
To stand and so to speak of love,
That the four corners of the world
Should hear it and take heed thereof.

That to this shrine obscure there be
One witness before all men given,
As naked as the hanging Christ,