I LOVE thee well, thou solitary Cave,
Though thee no legend, or of war or love,
Or mermaid issuing from her coral grove
Ennoble: nought beside the fretful wave
That round thy portal arch doth idly rave,
Has waked thine echoes; nor in lonely age
Has seaman sought thee for his hermitage,
That ocean's voice might lull him to his grave
I love thee for his sake who brought me here,
Companion of my wildered walk, and bore
A part in all those visions dim and dear
In which my tranced spirit loves to soar,
When gales sigh soft, and rills are murmuring near,

Out at sunrise on Romney Marsh
We hear the curlew call,
The young lambs crying to the sheep
Within the old sea-wall;
The bleak tree that the sea-wind strikes
Is bowed across the lilied dykes,
All heaven drifting with the lark,
The lark that sings for all.

You gather mushrooms from the grass,
The newborn mushrooms white,
And stoop about with tender cries
That come of pure delight.
The sheep-lit pastures run for miles
With distant villages for isles,
And Lymne's grey castle on the down
Beholds us from the height.

How hard from loving to refrain,
How hard to bear the lover's pain,
But harder still than all, to prove
The pangs of unrequitted love.
Nor worth, nor wisdom now avail
The fair one's bosom to assail;
'Gainst each accomplishment 'tis steel'd,
And only will to riches yield.
Oh! may the wretch be doubly curst,
Who taught the use of money first!
How, by his fatal art has he
Made friends and brothers disagree!
What wars, what slaughters we behold
For sake of this detested gold!
To gold, the source of ill to all,
We hapless lovers owe our fall,

The usually hateful crow—
How lovely on the morn of snow!

All my weakness, all my failings,
Lord, in sorrow I deplore;
Make me purer, stronger, better,
That my heart may love thee more
I have failed to follow closely
All the steps marked out for me,
Yet I dare to hope formercy,
For my heart still trusts in thee.
Henceforth, Saviour, walk beside me,
Lead me by thy loving hand
Till my feet shall reach the portals
Of the dear Immanuel's land

Full of failings, yet I come,
Saviour, make my heart thy home!
Let it be, let it be,
Full of light and purity let it be, let it, let it be.

Ask not overmuch for fair
Form and face: let women be
Good: beauty is but a snare:
Gladly woo, if good is she.

After the strewn leaves of roses
Richer the rich mind uncloses.
Boorish is he, and unwise,
Who judges women by the eyes.

I Waited full two hours, or more,
Beneath the old pine tree,
Where oft I've lingered twilight hours,
Watching, my Love, for thee.

I waited till the shadows grew
Like giants, grim and grey;
I waited till night's coming chased
The shadows far away.

I waited for, I knew not what;
But, oh, I waited there,
Hoping, perchance, some ray to find,
To lighten my despair.

A year ago last May, I sat
Beneath the old pine-tree;
My tryst was not a broken one,
For, Love, you came to me.

I waited, and my spirit called

Yesternight thy languorous glances Of my life and soul beraught me;
But thy ruby lip with kisses, Of its favour, new life brought me.

No to-day's growth my love-liking For that musky down of thine is;
Long time with the wine of passion Hath its crescent-cup distraught me.

Well my constancy this showeth That, in spite of thine oppression,
From thy quest I rested never, Albe weariness besought me.

Righteousness nor yet amendment Hope from me, the tavern-haunter;
For unto the topers' service, Ere I was, The Fates forethought me.

'Twixt heat and cold, 'twixt death and life,
I freeze and burn, I live and die;
Which jointly work in me such strife,
I live in death, in cold I fry:
Nor hot, nor cold, nor 'live, nor dead,
Neither, and both, this life I lead.

First, burning heat sets all on fire,
Whereby I seem in flames to fry;
Then cold Despair kills hot Desire,
That drenched deep in death I lie:
Heat drives out cold, and keeps my life;
Cold quencheth heat, no end of strife.

The less I hope to have my will,
The more I feel desire increase;

They say that shadows of deceased ghosts
Do haunt the houses and the graves about,
Of such whose life's lamp went untimely out,
Delighting still in their forsaken hosts:
So, in the place where cruel Love doth shoot
The fatal shaft that slew my love's delight,
I stalk, and walk, and wander day and night,
Even like a ghost with unperceived foot.
But those light ghosts are happier far than I,
For, at their pleasure, they can come and go
Unto the place that hides their treasure so,
And see the name with their fantastic eye: