Stern as my conscience, thou seest the points wherein I'm deficient;
Therefore I've always loved thee, as my own conscience I've loved.

If all the world and love were young,
And truth in every Shepherd’s tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move,
To live with thee, and be thy love.

Time drives the flocks from field to fold,
When Rivers rage and Rocks grow cold,
And Philomel becometh dumb,
The rest complains of cares to come.

The flowers do fade, and wanton fields,
To wayward winter reckoning yields,
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy’s spring, but sorrow’s fall.

Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of Roses,

The night has a thousand eyes,
And the day but one;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
With the dying sun.

The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one:
Yet the light of a whole life dies
When love is done.

My voice that is for you the languid one, and gentle,
Disturbs the velvet of the dark night's mantle,
By my bedside, a candle, my sad guard,
Burns, and my poems ripple and merge in flood --
And run the streams of love, run, full of you alone,
And in the dark, your eyes shine like the precious stones,
And smile to me, and hear I the voice:
My friend, my sweetest friend... I love... I'm yours... I'm yours!

When I was twenty inches long,
I could not hear the thrush's song;
The radiance of the morning skies
Was most displeasing to my eyes.

For loving looks, caressing words,
I cared no more than sun or birds;
But I could bite my mother's breast,
And that made up for all the rest.

When I was twenty inches long,
I could not hear the thrush's song;
The radiance of the morning skies
Was most displeasing to my eyes.

For loving looks, caressing words,
I cared no more than sun or birds;
But I could bite my mother's breast,
And that made up for all the rest.

The need to love that all the stars obey
Entered my heart and banished all beside.
Bare were the gardens where I used to stray;
Faded the flowers that one time satisfied.

Before the beauty of the west on fire,
The moonlit hills from cloister-casements viewed
Cloud-like arose the image of desire,
And cast out peace and maddened solitude.

I sought the City and the hopes it held:
With smoke and brooding vapors intercurled,
As the thick roofs and walls close-paralleled
Shut out the fair horizons of the world---

The need for love knocked on my door.
Unsuspecting and oblivious, I lead her inside.
And suddenly she left me craving for more,
and I was unhappy with what was already mine.

The need for love stayed for years,
and she was bossy and whiny and always alone.
She brought sleepless nights and terrible fears,
so I couldn’t find peace even in my home.

The need for love left one morning,
only her memory lingered in my room.
But somehow she managed to leave me a yearning –
a yearning for a need that gave up too soon.

To noble heart Love doth for shelter fly,
As seeks the bird the forest's leafy shade;
Love was not felt till noble heart beat high,
Nor before love the noble heart was made.
Soon as the sun's broad flame
Was formed, so soon the clear light filled the air;
Yet was not till he came:
So love springs up in noble breasts, and there
Has its appointed space,
As heat in the bright flames finds its allotted place.
Kindles in noble heart the fire of love,
As hidden virtue in the precious stone:
This virtue comes not from the stars above,

There's a thing we love to think of when the summer days are long,
And the summer winds are blowing, and the summer sun is strong,
When the orchards and the meadows throw their fragrance on the air,
When the grain-fields flaunt their riches, and the glow is everywhere.
Something sings it all the day,
Canada, fair Canada,
And the pride thrills through and through us,
'Tis our birthplace, Canada!

There's a thing we love to think of when the frost and ice and snow
Hold high carnival together, and the biting north winds blow.