Quieta Ne Movete II
IF one should wake one's frozen faith
In sunlight of her radiant eyes,
Bid it forget its dream of death,
In this new dream of Paradise,
Bid it forget the long, slow pain,
The agony when, all in vain,
It fought for life, and how one swore,
Once cold, it should not waken more;
If hope one buried long ago
Should thrill beneath those smiles of hers,
Should in one's sere life stir and grow,
As in brown woods the young spring stirs;
If, breaking icy bonds of grief,
One's soul should start to bud and leaf,
It might forget in that springtide
How last year's leaves fell off and died.
If from warm faith and hope set high
A lovely living child was born,
With lips more pure than starlit sky,
And eyes as clear as summer morn,
Child-love might grow till one forgot
Old love, that was and now is not--
Forgot that far-off time of tears,
And all these desolated years.
And yet of faith, hope, love, one knows
So well what end the years will make,
If one should dig beneath Time's snows
And wake them now for her sweet sake.
New life may mean new joy; but then,
What lives again may die again,
And to that second death there may
Be no new resurrection-day.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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The Dead To The Living
Work while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.
IN the childhood of April, while purple woods
With the young year's blood in them smiled,
I passed through the lanes and the wakened fields,
And stood by the grave of the child.
And the pain awoke that is never dead
Though it sometimes sleeps, and again
It set its teeth in this heart of mine,
And fastened its claws in my brain:
For it seemed so hard that the little hands
And the little well-loved head
Should be out of reach of my living lips,
And be side by side with the dead--
Not side by side with us who had loved,
But with these who had never seen
The grace of the smile, the gold of the hair,
And the eyes of my baby-queen.
Yet with trees about where the brown birds build,
And with long green grass above,
She lies in the cold sweet breast of earth
Beyond the reach of our love;
Whatever befalls in the coarse loud world,
We know she will never wake.
When I thought of the sorrow she might have known,
I was almost glad for her sake. . . .
Tears might have tired those kiss-closed eyes,
Grief hardened the mouth I kissed;
I was almost glad that my dear was dead
Because of the pain she had missed.
Oh, if I could but have died a child
With a white child-soul like hers,
As pure as the wind-flowers down in the copse,
Where the soul of the spring's self stirs;
Or if I had only done with it all,
And might lie by her side unmoved!
I envied the very clods of earth
Their place near the child I loved!
And my soul rose up in revolt at life,
As I stood dry-eyed by her grave,
When sudden the grass of the churchyard sod
Rolled back like a green smooth wave;
The brown earth looked like the brown sea rocks,
The tombstones were white like spray,
And white like surf were the curling folds
Of the shrouds where the dead men lay;
For each in his place with his quiet face
I saw the dead lie low,
Who had worked and suffered and found life sad,
So many sad years ago.
Unchanged by time I saw them lie
As when first they were laid to rest,
The tired eyes closed, the sad lips still,
And the work-worn hands on the breast.
There were some who had found the green world so grey,
They had left it before their time,
And some were little ones like my dear,
And some had died in their prime;
And some were old, they had had their fill
Of bitter unfruitful hours,
And knew that none of them, none, had known
A flower of a hope like ours!
Through their shut eyelids the dead looked up,
And without a voice they said:
'We lived without hope, without hope we died,
And hopeless we lie here dead;
And death is better than life that draws
Pain in, as it draws in breath,
If life never dreams of a coming day
When life shall not envy death.
Through the dark of our hours and our times we lived,
Uncheered by a single ray
Of such hope as lightens the lives of you
Who are finding life hard to-day;
With our little lanterns of human love
We lighted our dark warm night--
But you in the chill of the dawn are set
With your face to the eastern light.
Freedom is waiting with hands held out
Till you tear the veil from her face--
And when once men have seen the light of her eyes,
And felt her divine embrace,
The light of the world will be risen indeed,
And will shine in the eyes of men,
And those who come after will find life fair,
And their lives worth living then!
Will you strive to the light in your loud rough world,
That these things may come to pass,
Or lie in the shadow beside the child,
And strive to the sun through the grass?'
'My world while I may,' I cried; 'but you
Whose lives were as dark as your grave?'
'We too are a part of the coming light,'
They called through the smooth green wave.
Their white shrouds gleamed as the flood of green
Rolled over and hid them from me--
Hid all but the little hands and the hair,
And the face that I always see.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Christmas
WITH garlands to grace it, with laughter to greet it,
Christmas is here, holly-red and snow-white,
Hung round with quaint legends, and old-as-life stories
Of mystical beauty and lifelong delight;
With dreams of the Christ-child, with Santa Claus fables,
Without doubts to trouble or questions to break
The absolute faith in the triumph of goodness,
In God and in nature on guard for its sake;
Without fear of death, with no memories of grief,
Believing life clear as our cloudless belief;
What wonder if rose-coloured Christmas appear
As the happiest day of our happy child year?
With the swiftness of thought, with the spring's incompleteness,
Childhood has passed, and its place is filled up;
Hope suns our youth into midsummer sweetness,
And the roses of love wreathe our life's golden cup.
We shall do--we shall dare--and our faith has no limit,
Wrong must go down 'neath the sword of the right
And life is so joyous, and may be so glorious,
And day looks so long, and so distant the night.
We love--there are chances--and if we should meet
The woman who holds all our heart at her feet
At Christmas--would that not make Christmas more dear
Than all other days of our love-lightened year?
With the sadness of tears, with the speed of the swallow,
Youth has gone by, and its hope and its faith;
Love has grown into grief, and remembrance is anguish,
And down the dim years sound the footsteps of death.
There sit at our feast (for we still hold our revels)
The phantom of hope and the spectre of truth.
This life we believed in--how has it rewarded
The passionate faith of our long-ago youth?
Our hearth is deserted--our Christmas Day seems
But the ghost of a day from a lifetime of dreams.
Oh, lost voices that call us--we hear you--we hear!
Oh, most desolate day of our desolate year!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Hope Dieth: Hope Liveth
Strong are thine arms, O love, & strong
Thine heart to live, and love, and long;
But thou art wed to grief and wrong:
Live, then, and long, though hope be dead!
Live on, & labour thro’ the years!
Make pictures through the mist of tears,
Of unforgotten happy fears,
That crossed the time ere hope was dead.
Draw near the place where once we stood
Amid delight’s swift-rushing flood,
And we and all the world seemed good
Nor needed hope now cold and dead.
Dream in the dawn I come to thee
Weeping for things that may not be!
Dream that thou layest lips on me!
Wake, wake to clasp hope’s body dead!
Count o’er and o’er, and one by one
The minutes of the happy sun
That while agone on kissed lips shone,
Count on, rest not, for hope is dead.
Weep, though no hair’s breadth thou shalt move
The living Earth, the heaven above
By all the bitterness of love!
Weep and cease not, now hope is dead!
Sighs rest thee not, tears bring no ease,
Life hath no joy, and Death no peace:
The years change not, though they decrease,
For hope is dead, for hope is dead.
Speak, love, I listen: far away
I bless the tremulous lips, that say,
“Mock not the afternoon of day,
Mock not the tide when hope is dead!”
I bless thee, O my love, who say’st:
“Mock not the thistle-cumbered waste;
I hold Love’s hand, and make no haste
Down the long way, now hope is dead.
With other names do we name pain,
The long years wear our hearts in vain.
Mock not our loss grown into gain,
Mock not our lost hope lying dead.
Our eyes gaze for no morning-star,
No glimmer of the dawn afar;
Full silent wayfarers we are
Since ere the noon-tide hope lay dead.
Behold with lack of happiness
The master, Love, our hearts did bless
Lest we should think of him the less:
Love dieth not, though hope is dead!”
poem by William Morris
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Love, Hope, and Faith
We live tomorrow
the dreams of today
Our hopes of the future
gives us faith along the way
Love is the river
of this wakened state
Its never out of time
its never too late
It gives us life
as it flows through our lives
It tears through confusion
loneliness and strife
Love cuts a clear path
through the test of time
You can see where it has been
and watch it unwind
Free as a river
that you can’t control
You can’t even say
where it might flow
Hope is a power
that cant be taken away
It can pull you through
even the toughest of days
Hope can keep you going
when everything else fails
It keeps you company
on the loneliest of trails
Faith is ever daring
in the face of defeat
It can bring you courage
that nothing can beat
Faith is never doubting
in yourself or your beliefs
Holding on to what you know
when content is just a dream
Faith can give you strength
to face what the future brings
Combined with hope and love
you only need the three of these
Love is like a River
Hope is like a dream
Faith is just believing
with nothing to be seen
So dream of tomorrow
and love for today
Hope with all your heart
Let faith show you the way
poem by Rusty Gibson
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I can't forget
I can't forget your smile
I can't forget your laughing eyes
Your kindness causes me to cry
I ask.
I ask.
I ask myself why
Are you s much apart of my life
Our midnight conversations rang in the back of my mind.
Time after Time
I crave for your company
I cry out at night for your warmth
I can't forget the woman you are.
I can't forget you are my friend
As well as my lover.
I can't forget you waiting outside my J.O.B.
To bring me home
I can't forget your tears
When I was laid off.
I can't forget, I just can't
I can't forget the first time I saw you.
Radiant and full of life/ you are.
Your voice low and sweet,
Eyes glued to mine as we speak
I just can't forget
I can't forget how myself esteem grew
While with you.
I can't forget
The long walks and talks of encouragement
You are...You are...You are!
UN_FOR_GET_TABLE!
You are my life line
You are my door to time
I can't forget
Sinking into your womanhood
I can't forget how you cuddled my manhood
I can't forget
You have shown me un-conditional love
And passon as well as concern
I can't forget
Those things I earned
I cant forget
How you crawled into bed next to me
Slow and easy, full of strength.
Pulling me close to your warm and soft body.
Wrapping your legs around mine
As to never let me go.
I can't forget
Giving me eye to eye contact
As we introduced oursleves once again.
I can't forget
As the moon was reaching it's
Apex(so were we)
My emotions outof control
My body limp, but full.
Your scent seasoning the room
With the after glow of us
I can't forget
I can't forget
I can't forget
I love you
That is always
I can't forget
Every morning I wake to a kiss
As gentle and as strong as the mildst river
I can't forget...You...I can't foget.
poem by whisperkwane Lamb
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Evelyn Hope
I
Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead!
Sit and watch by her side an hour.
That is her book-shelf, this her bed;
She plucked that piece of geranium-flower,
Beginning to die too, in the glass;
Little has yet been changed, I think:
The shutters are shut, no light may pass
Save two long rays thro' the hinge's chink.
II
Sixteen years old, when she died!
Perhaps she had scarcely heard my name;
It was not her time to love; beside,
Her life had many a hope and aim,
Duties enough and little cares,
And now was quiet, now astir,
Till God's hand beckoned unawares,—
And the sweet white brow is all of her.
III
Is it too late then, Evelyn Hope?
What, your soul was pure and true,
The good stars met in your horoscope,
Made you of spirit, fire and dew—
And, just because I was thrice as old
And our paths in the world diverged so wide,
Each was nought to each, must I be told?
We were fellow mortals, nought beside?
IV
No, indeed! for God above
Is great to grant, as mighty to make,
And creates the love to reward the love:
I claim you still, for my own love's sake!
Delayed it may be for more lives yet,
Through worlds I shall traverse, not a few:
Much is to learn, much to forget
Ere the time be come for taking you.
V
But the time will come,—at last it will,
When, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I shall say)
In the lower earth, in the years long still,
That body and soul so pure and gay?
Why your hair was amber, I shall divine,
And your mouth of your own geranium's red—
And what you would do with me, in fine,
In the new life come in the old one's stead.
VI
I have lived (I shall say) so much since then,
Given up myself so many times,
Gained me the gains of various men,
Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes;
Yet one thing, one, in my soul's full scope,
Either I missed or itself missed me:
And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope!
What is the issue? let us see!
VII
I loved you, Evelyn, all the while.
My heart seemed full as it could hold?
There was place and to spare for the frank young smile,
And the red young mouth, and the hair's young gold.
So, hush,—I will give you this leaf to keep:
See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand!
There, that is our secret: go to sleep!
You will wake, and remember, and understand.
poem by Robert Browning from Men and Women (1855)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Hope That I Have Found
I feel strange yet overjoyed
I never thought that there would be any hope for me
Yet I found some
A woman so beautiful and pure
I love her and she loves me
I can’t believe that I’ve finally had success
After all the failure
I’ve finally found the light
I’ve finally done something right
I hope to nurture and grow and revel in this love
I hope that I won’t ever fail her in love
A new man I am
Living in a new phase of life
Finally accomplishing my dream
My dream of having love in my life
This love I have will last for years I hope
She is my love forevermore
My love for as long as our love is real and pure
poem by Alex Fischer
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Echo
Come to me in the silence of the night;
Come in the speaking silence of a dream;
Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright
As sunlight on a stream;
Come back in tears,
O memory, hope, love of finished years.
O dream, how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet,
Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,
Where souls brimfull of love abide and meet;
Where thirsting longing eyes
Watch the slow door
That opening, letting in, lets out no more.
Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live
My very life again though cold in death:
Come back to me in dreams, that I may give
Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:
Speak low, lean low
As long ago, my love, how long ago.
poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti (1893)
Submitted by anonym
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My gift of wedding anniversary..........
Since we married, our journey of life was
pleasant and sailed without any trouble
We know the day when we started our life
We were close to each other's hearts as a good life partners
But there were days we had gone through pain in our life
because no child had born to us for a long time.
You were very upset about me and tried to keep me away
You thought that I am incapable to give you a child
You treated me with unpleasant words and miserable life
Those roads were very hard for me to travel but I did it
Because my faith and love made me to over come all those obstacles
And today we are blessed with a baby boy and he is a God's child
When I see my child’s face then I forget all those mistakes
and pains that's you have given to me.
And still I treat you as my wonderful and loving husband
Since, eighteen years have been passed and our wedding
anniversary is due to fall shortly and let us pray God to give us long life
And let us forget all our past life of bitterness and look for a life
that will take us a joinery of LOVE with our ever loving baby.
Ravi Sathasivam / Sri Lanka
poem by Ravi Sathasivam
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Love Has Come
Hurry now wake up your eyes,
Time for little ones to see.
Daddys got a big surprise
Hiding there beneath the christmas tree.
How they are like the child in me!
See the wonder in their eyes,
Like a fairytale come true.
One more time I realize
All the love our lives found in you.
Love has come
For the world to know,
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
And I believe that angels sang
That hope had begun,
When the God of glory,
Who is full of mercy,
Sent his son.
If I could have a special dream
Coming true on christmas morn,
I would want the world to see
How his father smiled when christ was born.
The greatest gift the world has known!
So come on kids, look high and low
For all the toys youve dreamed to find,
But I believe youll never know
A greater joy than jesus love inside.
(you gotta know!)
(know!)
Love has come
For the world to know,
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
And I believe that angels sang
That hope had begun,
When the God of glory,
Who is full of mercy,
Yes, the God of glory,
Sent his son.
(dont you know that)
Love has come
For the world to know, (know)
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
And I believe that angels sang
That hope had begun,
When the God of glory,
Who is full of mercy,
Yes, the God of glory,
Sent his son.
Love has come
For the world to know,
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
And I believe that angels sang
That hope had begun,
When the God of glory,
Who is full of mercy,
Yes, the God of glory,
Sent his son.
(dont you know)
Love has come
For the world to know,
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
And I believe that angels sang
That hope had begun,
When the God of glory,
Who is full of mercy,
Yes, the God of glory,
Sent his son.
(I can see that)
Love has come
For the world to know,
As the wisemen knew
Such a long time ago.
song performed by by Amy Grant
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Faith, Hope and Love
With faith, hope and love, let us we pray.
We believe in this new union today,
And hope that it will always display
Mutual love, respect and equal say.
There’ll be highs and lows in future years.
Many smiles though a few tears.
A wondrous future there’ll always be
If faith, hope and love are family.
Through tribulations this union will need
To be placed ahead of self wants and greed.
At times success will need a healthy shove
From large daily doses of faith, hope and love.
This union’s endurance for eternity
Depends on putting “you” in place of “me”.
And each day of every year
To say, “I love you, my dear.”
Faith, hope and love will then live
As constant companions to give and give.
poem by Gregory Huyette
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Never Grow Old
I had a dream
Strange it may seems
It was my perfect day
Open my eyes
I realize
This is my perfect day
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Do-do-do-do
Birds in the sky
They look so high
This is my perfect day
I feel the breeze
I feel it is
It is my perfect day
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Hope you never grow old
Forever young
I hope you stay
Forever young
Do-do-do-do
song performed by by Cranberries from Wake Up And Smell The Coffee
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Long Dream
You know
We are living
There’s a start of this life
And so it has an end
Life is started
And will be ended
Life is a dream
A very long dream
There’re beautiful dreams
And there’re bad ones
We’re dreaming both
That’s why this dream is called life
Dream with laughters and tears
Dream with happiness and sadness
Dream with friends and enemies
Dream with love and hatred
We started it
When we were born
And one day it must be ended
When death comes
You’ll wake up
From your long dream
With God beside you
And start a new one
poem by Clara Odelia Ciutara
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Forget Me Not
Forget me not
Baby baby
As I rock you gently
Right here in my arms
I promise to always
Be here for you
Keep you safe and warm
Sometimes in the middle of the night
I wake up cryin when I think of how long
It took to find you
And now that I have I wont be movin on
Nothing can ever separate us
We know where we belong
All Im asking you
All Im asking
Before this moments gone
Forget me not
Dont forget what we got
Every day is surely but a dream
I found the sweetest of all things
For all my life
Youll be my light
With every beat thats in your heart
Oh baby please remember to
Forget me not
Time is funny
Time can fly
Thats one thing for sure
Ill wake tomorrow
Blink my eyes
See you standin at that door
And Ill be lookin at you
See the wonder of what love can be
Someday I might have to let you go
And thats just so hard to believe
And if I do youll know just
How much you mean to me
And all Ill ask of you
All Ill ask you
Before I set you free
Forget me not
Dont forget what we got
Every day is surely but a dream
I found the sweetest of all things
For all my life
Youll be my light
With every beat thats in your heart
Oh baby please remember to
Forget me not
Forget me not
Forget me not
Forget me
Dont forget me baby
Forget me
Not
Before I set you free yeah
Forget me not
Forget me
Dont forget what we got
What we got
Every day is surely but a dream
I found the sweetest of all things
For ever more
Connection
Ill thee adore
With every beat thats in your heart
Thats in my heart
Oh baby please remember to
Forget me not
Dont forget what we got
With every beat thats in your heart
Oh baby please remember to
Forget me not
Not
Forget me not
song performed by by Celine Dion
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Variations Upon Love
I
For God's sake, let me love you, and give over
These tedious protestations of a lover;
We're of one mind to love, and there's no let:
Remember that, and all the rest forget.
And let's be happy, mistress, while we may,
Ere yet to-morrow shall be called to-day.
To-morrow may be heedless, idle-hearted:
One night's enough for love to have met and parted.
Then be it now, and I'll not say that I
In many several deaths for you would die;
And I'll not ask you to declare that you
Will longer love than women mostly do.
Leave words to them whom words, not doings, move,
And let our silence answer for our love.
II
Oh, woman! I am jealous of the eyes
That look upon you; all my looks are spies
That do but lurk and follow you about,
Restless to find some guilty secret out.
I am unhappy if I see you not,
Unhappy if I see you; tell me what
That smile betokens? what close thing is hid
Beneath the half-way lifting of a lid?
Who is it, tell me, I so dread to meet,
Just as we turn the corner of the street?
Daily I search your baffling eyes to see
Who knows what new admitted company?
And, sick with dread to find the thing I seek,
I tremble at the name you do not speak.
III
I know your lips are bought like any fruit;
I know your love, and of your love the root;
I know your kisses toll for love that dies
In kissing, to be buried in your eyes;
I know I am degraded for your sake,
And that my shame will not so much as make
Your glory, or be reckoned in the debt
Of memories you are mindful to forget.
All this I know, and, knowing it, I come
Delighted to my daily martyrdom;
And, rich in love beyond the common store,
Become for you a beggar, to implore
The broken crumbs that from your table fall,
Freely, in your indifference, on all.
IV
I loved her; and you say she loved me not.
Well, if I loved her? And if she forgot,
Well, I have not forgotten even yet:
Time, and spent tears, may teach me to forget.
And so she loves another, and did then
When she was heaven and earth to me, and when,
Truly, she made me happy. It may be:
I only know how good she was to me.
Friend, to have loved, to have been made happy thus,
What better fate has life in store for us,
The dream of life from which we have to wake,
Happier, why not? why not for a dream's sake?
To have been loved is well, and well enough
For any man: but 'tis enough to love.
poem by Arthur Symons
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You Cant Make It Love
By michael mcdonald and john scott sherrill
You if anyone should know what time will tell
Not so long ago you taught me oh so well
Now your time has come
Someone took your place
(theres) no need to tell me that hes gone (cause)
I can read it on your face
Chorus:
You learned that you could dream every night
You can try all you like
You can pray every day that its enough
You can hope all you want
Its something to hang your faith on
But you cant make it love
Theres no way love can grow
If only one is true
I would think that you should know
After all, I learned this from you
No matter how much ones in love
As long as one is lying
There aint no amount of tears
There aint no amount of trying
Chorus:
You learned that you could dream every night
You can try all you like
You can pray every day that its enough
You can hope all you want
Its something to hang your faith on
But you cant make it love
song performed by by Michael Mcdonald
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Defered Dream
• is hope an infringement of life
where as an inspired metaphor
depleted a reason to grow
Is hope so defile in life
that a dream is deferred
upon the wish to succeed
is only a dream
Is hope so denied
that every time you try
you trying, trying again
to start all over again?
Is hope so bitter
that your dreams are over looked
because no one understood you?
Is hope a simile to believe
in all hope, life and maturity
to succeed
is hope the dream you believed
that dream and it became true
poem by Angela Khristin Brown
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Hymn 88
Life the day of grace and hope.
Eccl. 9:4-6,10.
Life is the time to serve the Lord,
The time t' insure the great reward;
And while the lamp holds out to burn,
The vilest sinner may return.
[Life is the hour that God has giv'n
To 'scape from hell and fly to heav'n;
The day of grace, and mortals may
Secure the blessings of the day.]
The living know that they must die,
But all the dead forgotten lie;
Their mem'ry and their sense is gone,
Alike unknowing and unknown.
[Their hatred and their love is lost,
Their envy buried in the dust;
They have no share in all that's done
Beneath the circuit of the sun.]
Then what my thoughts design to do,
My hands, with all your might pursue;
Since no device nor work is found,
Nor faith, nor hope, beneath the ground.
There are no acts of pardon passed
In the cold grave, to which we haste;
But darkness, death, and long despair,
Reign in eternal silence there.
poem by Isaac Watts
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Rococo
TAKE HANDS and part with laughter;
Touch lips and part with tears;
Once more and no more after,
Whatever comes with years.
We twain shall not remeasure
The ways that left us twain;
Nor crush the lees of pleasure
From sanguine grapes of pain.
We twain once well in sunder,
What will the mad gods do
For hate with me, I wonder,
Or what for love with you?
Forget them till November,
And dream there’s April yet;
Forget that I remember,
And dream that I forget.
Time found our tired love sleeping,
And kissed away his breath;
But what should we do weeping,
Though light love sleep to death?
We have drained his lips at leisure,
Till there’s not left to drain
A single sob of pleasure,
A single pulse of pain.
Dream that the lips once breathless
Might quicken if they would;
Say that the soul is deathless;
Dream that the gods are good;
Say March may wed September,
And time divorce regret;
But not that you remember,
And not that I forget.
We have heard from hidden places
What love scarce lives and hears:
We have seen on fervent faces
The pallor of strange tears:
We have trod the wine-vat’s treasure,
Whence, ripe to steam and stain,
Foams round the feet of pleasure
The blood-red must of pain.
Remembrance may recover
And time bring back to time
The name of your first lover,
The ring of my first rhyme;
But rose-leaves of December
The frosts of June shall fret,
The day that you remember,
The day that I forget.
The snake that hides and hisses
In heaven we twain have known;
The grief of cruel kisses,
The joy whose mouth makes moan;
The pulse’s pause and measure,
Where in one furtive vein
Throbs through the heart of pleasure
The purpler blood of pain.
We have done with tears and treasons
And love for treason’s sake;
Room for the swift new seasons,
The years that burn and break,
Dismantle and dismember
Men’s days and dreams, Juliette;
For love may not remember,
But time will not forget.
Life treads down love in flying,
Time withers him at root;
Bring all dead things and dying,
Reaped sheaf and ruined fruit,
Where, crushed by three days’ pressure,
Our three days’ love lies slain;
And earlier leaf of pleasure,
And latter flower of pain.
Breathe close upon the ashes,
It may be flame will leap;
Unclose the soft close lashes,
Lift up the lids, and weep.
Light love’s extinguished ember,
Let one tear leave it wet
For one that you remember
And ten that you forget.
poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The African Prince
IT was a king in Africa,
He had an only son;
And none of Europe's crowned kings
Could have a dearer one.
With good cane arrows five feet long,
And with a shining bow,
When but a boy, to the palm woods
Would that young hunter go.
And home he brought white ivory,
And many a spotted hide:
When leopards fierce and beautiful
Beneath his arrows died.
Around his arms, around his brow,
A shining bar was rolled;
It was to mark his royal blood,
He wore that bar of gold.
And often at his father's feet,
The evening he would pass;
When, weary of the hunt, he lay
Upon the scented grass.
Alas! it was an evil day,
When such a thing could be:
When strangers, pale and terrible,
Came o'er the distant sea.
They found the young prince mid the woods,
The palm woods deep and dark:
That day his lion-hunt was done,
They bore him to their bark.
They bound him in a narrow hold,
With others of his kind;
For weeks did that accursed ship
Sail on before the wind.
Now shame upon the cruel wind,
And on the cruel sea,
That did not with some mighty storm,
Set those poor captives free:
Or, shame to those weak thoughts, so fain
To have their wilful way:
God knoweth what is best for all—
The winds and seas obey.
At length a lovely island rose
From out the ocean wave;
They took him to the market-place,
And sold him for a slave.
Some built them homes, and in the shade
Of flowered and fragrant trees,
They half forgot the palm-hid huts
They left far o'er the seas.
But he was born of nobler blood,
And was of nobler kind;
And even unto death, his heart
For its own kindred pined.
There came to him a seraph child
With eyes of gentlest blue:
If there are angels in high heaven,
Earth has its angels too.
She cheered him with her holy words,
She soothed him with her tears;
And pityingly she spoke with him
Of home and early years.
And when his heart was all subdued
By kindness into love,
She taught him from this weary earth
To look in faith above.
She told him how the Saviour died
For man upon the tree;
'He suffered,' said the holy child,
'For you as well as me.'
Sorrow and death have need of faith—
The African believed;
As rain falls fertile on the earth
Those words his soul received.
He died in hope as only those
Who die in Christ depart—
One blessed name within his lips,
One hope within his heart.
poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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