“But only three in all God’s universe”
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning(1806-1851)

But only three in all God’s universe
Have heard this word thou hast said; Himself, beside
Thee speaking and me listening! and replied
One of us . . that was God! . . and laid the curse
So darkly on my eyelids as to amerce
My sight from seeing thee,—that if I had died,
The deathweights, placed there, would have signified
Less absolute exclusion. “Nay” is worse
From God than from all others, O my friend!
Men could not part us with their worldly jars,
Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests bend:
Our hands would touch, for all the mountain-bars;—
And, heaven being rolled between us at the end,
We should but vow the faster for the stars.

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Robert Chapin
by Edgar Lee Masters (1868-1950)

Have you stood in front of the iron bars,
And watched the lion look over your head?
He sees the palm-tree and the mate,
And the waste of the tawny desert!
Are you moved by the music, or the concourse
Of melodious words?
But how are you moved except for life
That made a self of you, responding
To sounds or scenes of remembered places,
Or other spheres, perhaps?
Life is a cage! Beauty a vision
Of a freedom once enjoyed.

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Hic Jacet
by William Carlos Williams (1883-1963)

The coroner’s merry little children
         Have such twinkling brown eyes.
Their father is not of gay men
         And their mother jocular in no wise,
Yet the coroner’s merry little children
               Laugh so easily.

They laugh because they prosper.
         Fruit for them is upon all branches.
Lo! how they jibe at loss, for
         Kind heaven fills their little paunches!
It’s the coroner’s merry, merry children
               Who laugh so easily.

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On a Girdle
by Edmund Waller (1606-1687)

That which her slender waist confined
Shall now my joyful temples bind:
No monarch but would give his crown
His arms might do what this has done.

It was my Heaven’s extremest sphere,
The pale which held that lovely deer:
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love
Did all within this circle move.

A narrow compass! And yet there
Dwelt all that’s good, and all that’s fair!
Give me but what this ribband bound,
Take all the rest the Sun goes round.

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Wedlock
by D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930)

                     I

Come, my little one, closer up against me,
Creep right up, with your round head pushed in my breast.

How I love all of you! Do you feel me wrap you
Up with myself and my warmth, like a flame round the wick?

And how I am not at all, except a flame that mounts off you.
Where I touch you, I flame into being; — but is it me, or you?

That round head pushed in my chest, like a nut in its socket,
And I the swift bracts that sheathe it: those breasts, those thighs and knees,

Those shoulders so warm and smooth: I feel that I
Am a sunlight upon them, that shines them into being

But how lovely to be you! Creep closer in, that I am more.
I spread over you! How lovely, your round head, your arms,

Your breasts, your knees and feet! I feel that we
Are a bonfire of oneness, me flame flung leaping round you,
You the core of the fire, crept into me.

Continue reading …

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Never Weather-Beaten Sail
by Thomas Campion (1567-1620)

Never weather-beaten sail more willing bent to shore.
Never tired pilgrim’s limbs affected slumber more,
Than my wearied sprite now longs to fly out of my troubled breast:
O come quickly, sweetest Lord, and take my soul to rest.

Ever blooming are the joys of Heaven’s high Paradise.
Cold age deafs not there our ears nor vapour dims our eyes:
Glory there the sun outshines whose beams the blessed only see:
O come quickly, glorious Lord, and raise my sprite to thee!

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Sur Job
by Isaac de Benserade (1613-1691)

Job, de mille tourments atteint,
Vous rendra sa douleur connuë,
Et raisonnablement il craint
Que vous n’en soyez point émuë.

Vous verrez sa misère nuë,
Il s’est luy-même icy dépeint :
Acoûtumez-vous à la vuë
D’un homme qui souffre et se plaint.

Bien qu’il eût d’extrêmes souffrances.
On voit aller des patiences
Plus loin que la sienne n’alla.

Il souffrit des maux incroyables ;
Il s’en plaignit, il en parla ;
J’en connois de plus misérables.

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Whilst Alexis Lay Prest
by John Dryden (1631-1700)

Whilst Alexis lay prest
In her arms he lov’d best,
With his hands round her neck, and his head on her breast,
He found the fierce pleasure too hasty to stay,
And his soul in the tempest just flying away.

When Celia saw this,
With a sigh and a kiss,
She cry’d, O my dear, I am robb’d of my bliss!
‘Tis unkind to your love, and unfaithfully done,
To leave me behind you, and die all alone.

The youth, though in haste,
And breathing his last,
In pity died slowly, while she died more fast;
Till at length she cry’d, Now, my dear, now let us go;
Now die, my Alexis, and I will die too!

Thus intranc’d they did lie,
Till Alexis did try
To recover new breath, that again he might die:
Then often they died; but the more they did so,
The nymph died more quick, and the shepherd more slow.

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I Must Have Wanton Poets
by Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593)

I must have wanton poets, pleasant wits,
Musicians, that with touching of a string
May draw the pliant king which way I please:
Music and poetry is his delight;
Therefore I’ll have Italian masks by night,
Sweet speeches, comedies, and pleasing shows;
And in the day, when he shall walk abroad,
Like sylvan nymphs my pages shall be clad;
My men, like satyrs grazing on the lawns,
Shall with their goat-feet dance the antic hay;
Sometime a lovely boy in Dian’s shape,
With hair that gilds the water as it glides,
Crownets of pearl about his naked arms,
And in his sportful hands an olive-tree,
To hide those parts which men delight to see,
Shall bathe him in a spring; and there, hard by,
One like Actæon, peeping through the grove,
Shall by the angry goddess be transform’d,
And running in the likeness of an hart,
By yelping hounds pull’d down, shall seem to die:
Such things as these best please his majesty.

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Rondeau
by Vincent Voiture (1597-1648)

Vous parlez comme un Scipion,
Et si vous n’êtes qu’un pion,
D’un mot je vous pourrais défaire;
Mais une palme si vulgaire
N’est pas pour un tel champion.

Je vous le dis sans passion,
N’ayez point de présomption,
Et songez de quelle manière
         Vous parlez.

Eussiez-vous le corps d’Orion,
Avecque la voix d’Arion,
Devant moi vous vous devez taire;
Ne craignez-vous point ma colère?
Qu’est-ce-là, petit embrion?
         Vous parlez!

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