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nvi,
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OXFORD GARLANDS
LOVE POEMS
SELECTED BY
K. M. LEONARD
Love that I know, love I am wise in,
R. Bridges
HUMPHREY MILFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW NEW YORK
TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY
1914
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OXFORD: HORACE HART
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
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-J
INDEX OF AUTHORS
PAGE
Arnold, Matthew (1822-88) . . . Ill, 113
Barnes, William (1801-86) 41
Beaumont, Francis (1584-1616), and Fletcher, John
(1579-1625) 103
Beddoes, Thomas Lovell 11803-49) ... 20
Blake, William (1757-1827). . . 18,51
Breton, Nicholas (1545 ?-1626 ?) . . . 43
Bridges, Robert (b. 1844) . . . . 5, 59, 60
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett (1806-61) . 68. 69, 121
Browning, Robert (1812-89) . 43, 64, 66, 67, 115
Burns, Robert (1759-96) ... 84, 85, 57, 107
Byron, George Gordon, Lord (1788-1824) . 16, 17, 89,
108
Campion, Thomas (1567-1620) 26, 27, 75, 93, 94, 95, 98
Carew, Thomas (1595 ?-1689 ?)
Clough, Arthur Hugh (1819-61)
Coleridge, Hartley (1796-1849)
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor (1772-1834)
Congbeve, William (1670-1729) .
Cowley, Abraham (1618-67)
Davenant, Sir William (1606-68)
Dolben, Digby Mackworth (1848-67)
Donne, John (1573-1681)
Dorset, Charles Sackville, Earl of (1638-1706) 81
Drayton, Michael (1568-1631)
Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-82)
Greene, Robert (1560 ?-92)
Herrick, Robert (1591-1674) . 30,
Hood, Thomas (1799-1845) •
Jonson, Ben (1573 ?-1637) .
Keats, John (1795-1821)
Landor, Walter Sayage (1775-1864)
A2
81,96
66
40
11, 15, 71
. 103
73
84
83
7, 48, 49, 97
92, 107
9
. 22,23
52, 55, 77, 78, 118
36,88
28, 29, 72, 76
86
105, 106, 119, 120
^7X987 3itized by G00gle
INDEX OF AUTHORS
Lodge, Thomas (1558 ?-1625)
Lovelace, Richard (1618-58)
Lyly, John (1554 ?-1606) .
Marlowe, Christopher (1564-03) .
Marvell, Andrew (1621-78)
Melton, John (1608-74)
Patmore, Coventry Kersey Dighton
Peacock, Thomas Love (1785-1866)
Ralegh, Sir Walter (1552 ?-1618)
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel (1828-82)
Sackville. See Dorset.
Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1882) .
Ssdley, Sir Charles (1689 ?-1701)
Shakespeare, William (1564-1616) 6,
Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822)
Sidney, Sir Philip (1554-86)
Southey, Robert (1774-1848)
Suckling, Sir John (1609-42)
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord (1809-92)
Vaughan, Henry (1622-95) .
Verb, Aubrey Thomas de (1814-1902)
Waller, Edmund (1606-87) .
Watts-Dunton, Theodore (1882-1914)
Whitehead, William (1715-85) .
Wither, George (1586-1667)
Wordsworth, William (1770-1850)
Unknown
PAGE
18
82, 85, 86
21
24,46
80
118
(1828-96) . 117
109
47
20, 70, 82, 110
• 104
105
, 25, 26, 45, 74, 90
16, 40, 56, 118
44,58,99
15
. 102
33, 58, 62, 68
90
89
. 82, 79
. Ill
96
100
114, 119
54, 70, 74
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LOVE
LOVE THAT I KNOW
Love that I know, love I am wise in, love,
My strength, my pride, my grace, my skill untaught,
My faith here upon earth, my hope above,
My contemplation and perpetual thought :
The pleasure of my fancy, my heart's fire, 5
My joy, my peace, my praise, my happy theme,
The aim of all my doing, my desire
Of being, my life by day, by night my dream :
Love, my sweet melancholy, my distress,
My pain, my doubt, my trouble, my despair, :
My only folly and unhappiness,
And in my careless moments still my care ;
love, sweet love, earthly love, love divine,
Say'st thou to-day, O love, that thou art mine ?
R. Bridges,
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6 SHAKESPEARE
THE TRUE PROMETHEAN FIRE
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive ;
They are the ground, the books, the academes,
From whence doth spring the true Promethean fire.
Love, first learned in a lady's eyes,
Lives not alone immured in the brain, 5
But, with the motion of all elements,
Courses as swift as thought in every power,
And gives to every power a double power,
Above their functions and their offices.
It adds a precious seeing to the eye ; 10
A lover's eyes will gaze an eagle blind ;
A lover's ear will hear the lowest sound,
When the suspicious head of theft is stopped :
Love's feeling is more soft and sensible
Than are the tender horns of cockled snails ; 15
Love's tongue proves dainty Bacchus gross in taste.
For valour, is not Love a Hercules,
Still climbing trees in the Hesperides ?
Subtle as Sphinx ; as sweet and musical
As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair ; 20
And when Love speaks, the voice of all the gods
Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.
Never durst poet touch a pen to write
Until his ink were tempered with Love's sighs ;
O I then his lines would ravish savage ears, 25
And plant in tyrants mild humility.
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive :
They sparkle still the right Promethean fire ;
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DONNE 7
They are the books, the arts, the academes.
That show, contain and nourish all the world : 30
Else none at all in aught proves excellent!
W. Shakespeare.
LET ME NOT TO THE MARRIAGE
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove :
O, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark, 5
That looks on tempests and is never shaken ;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth 's unknown, although his height be
taken.
Love 's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come ; 10
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me proved
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
W. Shakespeare,
THE UNDERTAKING
I have done one braver thing
Than all the Worthies did,
And yet a braver thence doth spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.
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DONNE
It were but madness now to impart 5
The skill of specular stone,
When he which can have learned the art
To cut it, can find none.
So, if I now should utter this,
Others (because no more xo
Such stuff to work upon there is,)
Would love but as before.
But he who loveliness within
Hath found, all outward loathes,
For he who colour loves, and skin, 15
Loves but their oldest clothes.
If, as I have, you also do
Virtue attired in woman see,
And dare love that, and say so too,
And forget the He and She ; 20
And if this love, though placed so,
From profane men you hide,
Which will no faith on this bestow,
Or, if they do, deride :
Then you have done a braver thing *5
Than all the Worthies did ;
And a braver thence will spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.
J. Donne,
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EMERSON
GIVE ALL TO LOVE
Give all to love ;
Obey thy heart ;
Friends, kindred, days,
Estate, good-fame,
Plans, credit, and the Muse, — 5
Nothing refuse.
'Tis a brave master ;
Let it have scope :
Follow it utterly,
Hope beyond hope : IO
High and more high
It dives into noon,
With wing unspent,
Untold intent ;
But it is a god, 15
Knows its own path,
And the outlets of the sky.
It was not for the mean ;
It requireth courage stout,
Souls above doubt, 20
Valour unbending ;
Such 'twill reward, —
They shall return
More than they were,
And ever ascending 35
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10 EMERSON
Leave all for love ;
Yet, hear me, yet,
One word more thy heart behoved,
One pulse more of firm endeavour, —
Keep thee to-day, 30
To-morrow, for ever,
Free as an Arab
Of thy beloved.
Cling with life to the maid ;
But when the surprise, 35
First vague shadow of surmise,
Flits across her bosom young
Of a joy apart from thee,
Free be she, fancy-free ;
Nor thou detain her vesture's hem, 40
Nor the palest rose she flung
From her summer diadem.
Though thou loved her as thyself,
As a self of purer clay,
Though her parting dims the day, 45
Stealing grace from all alive ;
Heartily know,
When half -gods go,
The gods arrive.
R. W, Emerson.
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COLERIDGE 11
LOVE
All thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
Oft in my waking dreams do I 5
Live o'er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay,
Beside the ruined tower.
The moonshine, stealing o'er the scene,
Had blended with the lights of eve ; 10
And she was there, my hope, my joy,
My own dear Genevieve !
She leaned against the armed man,
The statue of the armed knight ;
She stood and listened to my lay, 15
Amid the lingering light.
Few sorrows hath she of her own,
My hope I my joy ! my Genevieve !
She loves me best, whene'er I sing
The songs that make her grieve. 20
I played a soft and doleful air,
I sang an old and moving story —
An old rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.
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12 COLERIDGE
She listened with a flitting blush, 25
With downcast eyes and modest grace ;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.
I told her of the Knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand ; 30
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.
I told her how he pined : and ah 1
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love, 35
Interpreted my own.
She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes, and modest grace ;
And she forgave me, that I gazed
Too fondly on her face ! 40
But when I told the cruel scorn
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight,
And that he crossed the mountain-woods,
Nor rested day nor night ;
That sometimes from the savage den, 45
And sometimes from the darksome shade,
And sometimes starting up at once
In green and sunny glade, —
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COLERIDGE 18
There came and looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright ; 50
And that he knew it was a Fiend,
This miserable Knight 1
And that unknowing what he did,
He leaped amid a murderous band,
And saved from outrage worse than death 55
The Lady of the Land 1
And how she wept, and clasped his knees ;
And how she tended him in vain —
And ever strove to expiate
The scorn that crazed his brain ; — 60
And that she nursed him in a cave ;
And how his madness went away,
When on the yellow forest-leaves
A dying man he lay ; —
His dying words — but when I reached 65
That tenderest strain of all the ditty,
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity !
All impulses of soul and sense
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve ; 70
The music and the doleful tale,
The rich and balmy eve ;
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14 COLERIDGE
And hopes, and fears that kindle hope,
An undistinguishable throng,
And gentle wishes long subdued, 75
Subdued and cherished long !
She wept with pity and delight,
She blushed with love, and virgin-shame ;
And like the murmur of a dream,
I heard her breathe my name. 80
Her bosom heaved— she stepped aside,
As conscious of my look she stepped —
Then suddenly, with timorous eye
She fled to me and wept.
She half enclosed me with her arms, 85
She pressed me with a meek embrace ;
And bending back her head, looked up,
And gazed upon my face.
'Twas partly love, and partly fear,
And partly 'twas a bashful art, 90
That I might rather feel, than see,
The swelling of her heart.
I calmed her fears, and she was calm,
And told her love with virgin pride ;
And so I won my Genevieve, 95
My bright and beauteous Bride.
S. T. Colebidge,
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SOUTHEY 15
REASON FOR LOVE'S BLINDNESS
I have heard of reasons manifold
Why Love must needs be blind,
But this the best of all I hold— l
His eyes are in his mind.
What outward form and feature are 5
He guesseth but in part ;
But that within is good and fair
He seeth with the heart.
S. T, Coleridge,
LOVE INDESTRUCTIBLE
They sin who tell us Love can die.
With life all other passions fly,
All others are but vanity.
In Heaven Ambition cannot dwell,
Nor Avarice in the vaults of Hell ; * 5
Earthly these passions of the Earth,
They perish where they have their birth ;
But Love is indestructible.
Its holy flame for ever burneth,
From Heaven it came, to Heaven returneth ; 10
Too oft on Earth a troubled guest,
At times deceived, at times oppressed,
It here is tried and purified,
Then hath in heaven its perfect rest ;
It soweth here with toil and care, 15
But the harvest time of Love is there.
R« Southey.
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16 SHELLEY
THE LOVE OF MAN AND OF WOMAN
Man's love is of man's life a thing apart,
'lis woman's whole existence ; man may range
The court, camp, church, the vessel, and the mart ;
Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange
Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart, 5
And few there are whom these cannot estrange ;
Men have all these resources, we but one,
To love again, and be again undone.
Lord Byron.
WHEN THE LAMP IS SHATTERED
When the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead —
When the cloud is scattered
The rainbow's glory is shed.
When the lute is broken, 5
Sweet tones are remembered not ;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.
As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute, 10
The heart's echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute : —
No song but sad dirges,
Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges 15
That ring the dead seaman's knell.
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BYRON 17
When hearts have once mingled.
Love first leaves the well-built nest ;
The weak one is singled
To endure what it once possessed. ao
O Love ! who bewailest
The frailty of all things here,
Why choose you the frailest
For your cradle, your home, and your bier ?
Its passions will rock thee 25
As the storms rock the ravens on high ;
Bright reason will mock thee,
Like the sun from a wintry sky.
Prom thy nest every rafter
Will rot, and thine eagle home 10
Leave thee naked to laughter,
When leaves fall and cold winds come.
P. B. Shelley.
THE FATALITY OF LOVE
Oh, Love ! what is it in this world of ours
Which makes it fatal to be loved ? Ah why
With cypress branches hast thou wreathed thy
bowers,
And made thy best interpreter a sigh ?
As those who dote on odours pluck the flowers, 5
And place them on their breast — but place to die —
Thus the frail beings we would fondly cherish
Are laid within our bosoms but to perish.
Lord Bybon.
O.G.— LOVB jj
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18 BLAKE
THE CLOD AND THE PEBBLE
* Love seeketh not itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair.'
So sung a little clod of clay,
Trodden with the cattle's feet,
But a pebble of the brook
Warbled out these metres meet :
4 Love seeketh only self to please,
To bind another to its delight,
Joys in another's loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite.'
W. Blake.
LOVE, IN MY BOSOM, LIKE A BEE
Love, in my bosom, like a bee,
Doth suck his sweet.
Now with his wings he plays with me,
Now with his feet.
Within mine eyes he makes his nest,
His bad amidst my tender breast,
My kisses are his daily feast ;
And yet he robs me of my rest !
Ah ! wanton, will ye ?
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LODGE 19
And if I sleep, then percheth he, 10
With pretty flight,
And makes his pillow of my knee
The livelong night.
Strike I my lute, he tunes the string ;
He music plays if so I sing, 15
He lends me every lovely thing,
Yet cruel he my heart doth sting :
Whist, wanton, still ye !
Else I with roses every day *
Will whip you hence, 20
And bind you, when you long to play,
For your offence.
I'll shut mine eyes to keep you in ;
I'll make you fast it for your sin ;
I'll count your power not worth a pin. 25
— Alas ! what hereby shall I win,
If he gainsay me ?
What if I beat the wanton boy
With many a rod ?
He will repay me with annoy 30
Because a god 1
Then sit thou safely on my knee ;
Then let thy bower my bosom be ;
Lurk in mine eyes, I like of thee ;
O Cupid, so thou pity me. 35
Spare not, but play thee !
T. Lodge.
B 2
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20 BEDDOES
LOVE'S LOVERS
Some ladies love the jewels in Love's zone
Arid gold-tipped darts he hath for painless play
In idle scornful hours he flings away ;
And some that listen to his lute's soft tone
Do love to vaunt the silver praise their own ; 5
Some prize his blindfold sight ; and there be they
Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday
And thank his wings to-day that he is flown.
My lady only loves the heart of Love :
Therefore Love's heart, my lady, hath for thee
His bower of unimagined flower and tree : u
There kneels he now, and all-anhungered of
Thine eyes grey-lit in shadowing hair above,
Seals with thy mouth his immortality,
D. G. Rossetti.
IP THOU WILT EASE THINE HEART
If thou wilt ease thine heart
Of love and all its smart,
Then sleep, dear, sleep ;
And not a sorrow
Hang any tear on your eye-lashes ;
Lie still and deep,
Sad soul, until the sea- wave washes
The rim o' the sun to-morrow,
In eastern sky.
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LYLY 21
But wilt thou cure thine heart 10
Of love and all its smart,
Then die, dear, die ;
'Tis deeper, sweeter,
Than on a rose-bank to lie dreaming
With folded eye ; 15
And there alone, amid the beaming
Of love's stars, thou'lt meet her
In eastern sky.
T. L. Beddoes.
CUPID AND MY CAMPASPE
Cupid and my Campaspe played
At cards for kisses, Cupid paid ;
He stakes his quiver, bow, and arrows,
His mother's doves, and team of sparrows ;
Loses them too ; then, down he throws
The coral of his lip, the rose
Growing on 's cheek (but none knows how),
With these, the crystal of his brow,
And then the dimple of his chin ;
All these did my Campaspe win.
At last he set her both his eyes ;
She won, and Cupid blind did rise.
O Love ! has she done this to thee ?
What shall (alas !) become of me ?
J. Lyly,
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GREENE
FAWNIA
Ah ! were she pitiful as she is fair,
Or but as mild as she is seeming so,
Then were my hopes greater than my despair j
Then all the world were heaven, nothing woe.
Ah ! were her heart relenting as her hand, 5
That seems to melt e'en with the mildest touch,
Then knew I where to seat me in a land
Under the wide heavens, but yet not such :
Just as she shows, so seems the budding rose,
Yet sweeter far than is an earthly flower ; 10
Sovereign of Beauty ! like the spray she grows,
Compassed she is with thorns and cankered bower :
Yet were she willing to be plucked and worn,
She would be gathered, though she grew on thorn.
Ah ! when she sings, all music else be still, 15
For none must be compared to her note ;
Ne'er breathed such glee from Philomela's bill ;
Nor from the Morning-Singer's swelling throat.
Ah ! when she riseth from her blissful bed,
She comforts all the world, as doth the sun ; 20
And at her sight the night's foul vapour 's fled ;
When she is set, the gladsome day is done :
O glorious Sun ! imagine me the west,
Shine in my arms, and set thou in my breast I
R. Greene.
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GREENE 28
SAMELA
Like to Diana in her summer weed,
Girt with a crimson robe of brightest dye,
goes fair Samela.
Whiter than be the flocks that straggling feed,
When washed by Arethusa's Fount they lie,
is fair Samela.
As fair Aurora in her morning grey,
Decked with the ruddy glister of her love,
is fair Samela.
Like lovely Thetis on a calmed day, xo
When as her brightness Neptune's fancy move,
shines fair Samela.
Her tresses gold, her eyes like glassy streams,
Her teeth are pearl, the breasts are ivory
of fair Samela. 15
Her cheeks like rose and lily yield forth gleams,
Her brows bright arches framed of ebony :
thus fair Samela
Passeth fair Venus in her bravest hue,
And Juno in the show of majesty, 20
for she 's Samela ;
Pallas, in wit — all three, if you well view,
For beauty, wit, and matchless dignity
yield to Samela.
R. Greene.
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24 MARLOWE
HELEN
Was this the face that launched a thousand ships.
And burned the topless towers of Ilium ? —
Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss ! —
Her lips suck forth my soul : see where it flies !—
Come, Helen, come, give me my soul again. $
Here will I dwell, for heaven is in these lips,
And all is dross that is not Helena.
I will be Paris, and for love of thee,
Instead of Troy, shall Wittenberg be sacked,
And I will combat with weak Menelaus, 10
And wear thy colours on my plum&d crest
Yea, I will wound Achilles in the heel,
And then return to Helen for a kiss.
Oh, thou art fairer than the evening air
Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars ; 15
Brighter art thou than flaming Jupiter
When he appeared to hapless Semele ;
More lovely than the monarch of the sky
In wanton Arethusa's azured arms ;
And none but thou shalt be my paramour 1 20
C, Marlowe.
LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT
It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is overruled by fate.
When two are stripped, long ere the course begin,
We wish that one should lose, the other win ;
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SHAKESPEARE 25
And one especially do we affect 5
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect ;
The reason no man knows ; let it suffice
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight :
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight ? 10
C. Marlowe.
SHALL I COMPARE THEE
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day ?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate :
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date :
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 5
And often is his gold complexion dimmed ;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,