Farewell! Forget the days of trial,
Of grudge, ill humor, misery--
Tempests of heart and floods of weeping,
And the revengeful jealousy.
Ah, but the days whereon the sun rose
To light love's wonder, and begot
In us the power of aspiration,--
bless them and forget them not!
In Nature's pieces still I see
Some error that might mended be;
Something my wish could still remove,
Alter or add; but my fair love
Was fram'd by hands far more divine,
For she hath every beauteous line:
Yet I had been far happier,
Had Nature, that made me, made her.
Then likeness might (that love creates)
Have made her love what now she hates;
Yet I confess I cannot spare
From her just shape the smallest hair;
Nor need I beg from all the store
Of heaven for her one beauty more.
[W.]
IF her disdain least change in you can move,
You do not love,
For when that hope gives fuel to the fire,
You sell desire.
Love is not love, but given free ;
And so is mine ; so should yours be.
[D.]
Her heart, that weeps to hear of others' moan,
To mine is stone.
Her eyes, that weep a stranger's eyes to see,
Joy to wound me.
Yet I so well affect each part,
As—caused by them—I love my smart.
[W.]
Say her disdainings justly must be graced
Because I went the lone ways
Among the tall trees,
Because I loved the blue days,
The bird melodies,
Deemed you I did our love wrong
In loving these too?
Ah, every forest love song
Was sung, love, for you.
The green slope, the sky above,
The wild forest lore-
All these were but the mind's love:
The deep heart has more.
And were you rival of the wren?
Resentful of the dawn?
Ah, what would these avail, then,
If you, dear, were gone?
The wild joy that things possess
"Am Kreuzweg wird begraben
Wer selber brachte sich um."
When first the world grew dark to me
I call'd on God, yet came not he.
Whereon, as wearier wax'd my lot,
On Love I call'd, but Love came not.
When a worse evil did befall,
Death, on thee only did I call.
Drive me out of my mind, O Mother!
What use is esoteric knowledge
Or philosophical knowledge
Transport me totally with the burning wine
Of your all-embracing love.
Mother of mystery, who imbues with mystery
The hearts of those who love you,
Immerse me irretrievably
In the stormy ocean without boundary,
Pure love, pure love, pure love.
Wherever your lovers reside
Appears like a madhouse
To common perception.
Some are laughing with your freedom,
Thy love thou sendest oft to me,
And still as oft I thrust it back;
Thy messengers I could not see
In those who everything did lack,
The poor, the outcast and the black.
Pride held his hand before mine eyes,
The world with flattery stuffed mine ears;
I looked to see a monarch's guise,
Nor dreamed thy love would knock for years,
Poor, naked, fettered, full of tears.
Yet, when I sent my love to thee,
Thou with a smile didst take it in,
And entertain'dst it royally,
Bring on my palm a twin cranes
I’ll give you love, fragrant kiss,
With wizardly game, moonbeam will fall down
From your eyes
Give me dense evening, I’ll affix a full moon
On your temple, Goddess of rocky wings
Will fly away from your heart, as if the streams
Of love flow down from the stairs of Louvre
Give me transparent sky, all the costly French perfumes
Of the shopping malls of the City
Will be sprinkle down your body
Which you’ll not feel
I’ll take up from the damaged youthfulness
The Seraph-song of morning's prime
That hail'd Messiah's birth,
The charter of a coming time
When Love shall rule the earth,
Rings from yon far Judaean hill —
Let it not your wonder move,
Less your laughter, that I love.
Though I now write fifty years,
I have had, and have, my peers;
Poets, though divine, are men,
Some have lov'd as old again.
And it is not always face,
Clothes, or fortune, gives the grace;
Or the feature, or the youth.
But the language and the truth,
With the ardour and the passion,
Gives the lover weight and fashion.
If you then will read the story,
First prepare you to be sorry
