Here are my favorite Valentine’s Day poems for him categorized:
- Valentine’s Day poems
- Valentine’s poems for the love of my life
- Famous love poems for Valentine’s Day
So if you want the best Valentine’s Day poems for him, then you’re in the right place.
Let’s get started!
Heartfelt Valentine’s Day Poems for Him
Celebrate love with our handpicked selection of the best Valentine’s Day poems for him, carefully categorized for easy browsing.
From classic Valentine’s Day poems to verses dedicated to the love of your life, this collection offers the most beautiful and heartfelt expressions of love in one place.
Whether you’re looking for inspiration to write your own poem or simply want to revel in the beauty of love through poetry, you’ll find everything you need right here.
Let’s jump right in!
My #1 Favorite Valentine’s Day Poem for Him
“You” by Ruth Guthrie Harding
Deep in the heart of me,
Nothing but You!
See through the art of me—
Deep in the heart of me
Find the best part of me,
Changeless and true.
Deep in the heart of me,
Nothing but You!
Valentine’s Day Poems
“I Am Thine” by Anonymous
I am thine, thou art mine,
And this shall be a sure sign:
Locked fast thou art
Within my heart,
And lost forever is the key;
So thou inside must ever be.
“A Valentine” by Frank Dempster Sherman
Awake, awake, O gracious heart,
There’s some one knocking at the door;
The chilling breezes make him smart;
His little feet are tired and sore.
Arise and welcome him before
Adown his cheeks the big tears start;
Awake, awake, O gracious heart,
There’s some one knocking at the door!
’Tis Cupid come with loving art
To honor, worship, and implore;
And lest, unwelcomed, he depart
With all his wise, mysterious lore,
Awake, awake, O gracious heart,
There’s some one knocking at the door!
“Valentine” by John Charles Mcneill
This is the time for birds to mate;
To-day the dove
Will mark the ancient amorous date
With moans of love;
The crow will change his call to prate
His hopes thereof.
The starling will display the red
That lights his wings;
The wren will know the sweet things said
By him who swings
And ducks and dips his crested head
And sings and sings.
They are obedient to their blood,
Nor ask a sign,
Save buoyant air and swelling bud,
At hands divine,
But choose, each in the barren wood,
His valentine.
In caution’s maze they never wait
Until they die;
They flock the season’s open gate
Ere time steals by.
Love, shall we see and imitate,
You, love, and I?
“Love Song” by Dorothy Parker
My own dear love, he is strong and bold
And he cares not what comes after.
His words ring sweet as a chime of gold,
And his eyes are lit with laughter.
He is jubilant as a flag unfurled—
Oh, a girl, she’d not forget him.
My own dear love, he is all my world,—
And I wish I’d never met him.
My love, he’s mad, and my love, he’s fleet,
And a wild young wood-thing bore him!
The ways are fair to his roaming feet,
And the skies are sunlit for him.
As sharply sweet to my heart he seems
As the fragrance of acacia.
My own dear love, he is all my dreams,—
And I wish he were in Asia.
My love runs by like a day in June,
And he makes no friends of sorrows.
He’ll tread his galloping rigadoon
In the pathway of the morrows.
He’ll live his days where the sunbeams start,
Nor could storm or wind uproot him.
My own dear love, he is all my heart,—
And I wish somebody’d shoot him.
“Where Love Is” by Amelia Josephine Burr
By the rosy cliffs of Devon, on a green hill’s crest,
I would build me a house as a swallow builds its nest;
I would curtain it with roses, and the wind should breathe to me
The sweetness of the roses and the saltness of the sea.
Where the Tuscan olives whiten in the hot blue day,
I would hide me from the heat in a little hut of gray,
While the singing of the husbandman should scale my lattice green
From the golden rows of barley that the poppies blaze between.
Narrow is the street, Dear, and dingy are the walls
Wherein I wait your coming as the twilight falls.
All day with dreams I gild the grime till at your step I start—
Ah Love, my country in your arms—my home upon your heart!
“A Love Song” by Theodosia Garrison
My love it should be silent, being deep—
And being very peaceful should be still—
Still as the utmost depths of ocean keep—
Serenely silent as some mighty hill.
Yet is my love so great it needs must fill
With very joy the inmost heart of me,
The joy of dancing branches on the hill
The joy of leaping waves upon the sea.
“In a Boat” by D. H. Lawrence
See the stars, love,
In the water much clearer and brighter
Than those above us, and whiter,
Like nenuphars.
Star-shadows shine, love,
How many stars in your bowl?
How many shadows in your soul,
Only mine, love, mine?
When I move the oars, love,
See how the stars are tossed,
Distorted, the brightest lost.
—So that bright one of yours, love.
The poor waters spill
The stars, waters broken, forsaken.
—The heavens are not shaken, you say, love,
Its stars stand still.
There, did you see
That spark fly up at us; even
Stars are not safe in heaven.
—What of yours, then, love, yours?
What then, love, if soon
Your light be tossed over a wave?
Will you count the darkness a grave,
And swoon, love, swoon?
“Night of Love” by Paul Laurence Dunbar
The moon has left the sky, love,
The stars are hiding now,
And frowning on the world, love,
Night bares her sable brow.
The snow is on the ground, love,
And cold and keen the air is.
I’m singing here to you, love;
You’re dreaming there in Paris.
But this is Nature’s law, love,
Though just it may not seem,
That men should wake to sing, love;
While maidens sleep and dream.
Them care may not molest, love,
Nor stir them from their slumbers,
Though midnight find the swain, love.
Still halting o’er his numbers.
I watch the rosy dawn, love,
Come stealing up the east,
While all things round rejoice, love,
That Night her reign has ceased.
The lark will soon be heard, love,
And on his way be winging;
When Nature’s poets wake, love,
Why should a man be singing?
“Since Feeling Is First” by E. E. Cummings
since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don’t cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids’ flutter which says
we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life’s not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
“The Rainbow” by Effie Waller Smith
Love is a rainbow that appears
When heaven’s sunshine lights earth’s tears.
All varied colors of the light
Within its beauteous arch unite:
There Passion’s glowing crimson hue
Burns near Truth’s rich and deathless blue;
And Jealousy’s green lights unfold
‘Mid Pleasure’s tints of flame and gold.
O dark life’s stormy sky would seem,
If love’s clear rainbow did not gleam!
“Love Is Blind” by John Le Gay Brereton
And can you tell me Love is blind
Because your faults he will not find,
Because the image that he sees
Is one of splendid mysteries?
And if he lack the power to look
On what he will, as on a book,
And read therein the heart of it,
Why are his ways with wonder lit?
Why think you he should bind his eyes
And hide the many-tinted skies,
But that he sees too well to trust
The shadows on an orb of dust?
For he hath vision keener far
Than poring Thought’s and Fancy’s are
An inward vision, full and clear
When night has flung her mantle sheer
Across the world we stumble through
In search of Truth’s evasive clue.
He looks, and straight there fall away
The flutt’ring rags of your array,
The far-fet gem, th’ indecent drape,
The pads that mar the perfect shape,
And naked to his reverent view
Is beauty’s self, essential you.
“To My First Love” by Crowquill
This heart has beat to many a one,
To many, passing fair;
But oh! the Love which first it knew,
Still lingers fondly there;—
Though brighter eyes have beamed on me,—
And rosier lips I’ve prest,
The Love which first I felt for thee—
Yet dwells within my breast.
Tho’ softer skies are o’er me now,
And stars shine brighter here;
Tho’ Nature wears a sunny smile
And birds sing all the year,
Yet I would fain them all resign,
To dwell once more with thee,
For one sweet smile from lips like thine,
Were dearer far to me.
As memory clings around the spot,
Where first the breath we drew,
And all our kindlier thoughts are placed
On scenes that first we knew—
So earliest Love still twines around
The heart which beats to ours,
As Summer’s sweetest dew is found
“Love Me” by Sara Teasdale
Brown-thrush singing all day long
In the leaves above me,
Take my love this April song,
“Love me, love me, love me!”
When he harkens what you say,
Bid him, lest he miss me,
Leave his work or leave his play,
And kiss me, kiss me, kiss me!
“Love’s Victory” by Thomas Moore
Sing to Love–for, oh, ’twas he
Who won the glorious day;
Strew the wreaths of victory
Along the conqueror’s way.
Yoke the Muses to his car,
Let them sing each trophy won;
While his mother’s joyous star
Shall light the triumph on.
Hail to Love, to mighty Love,
Let spirits sing around;
While the hill, the dale, and grove,
With “mighty Love” resound;
Or, should a sigh of sorrow steal
Amid the sounds thus echoed o’er,
‘Twill but teach the god to feel
His victories the more.
See his wings, like amethyst
Of sunny Ind their hue;
Bright as when, by Psyche kist,
They trembled thro’ and thro’.
Flowers spring beneath his feet;
Angel forms beside him run;
While unnumbered lips repeat
“Love’s victory is won!”
Hail to Love, to mighty Love,
etc,
“The Garden of Dreams” by Bliss Carman
My heart is a garden of dreams
Where you walk when day is done,
Fair as the royal flowers,
Calm as the lingering sun.
Never a drouth comes there,
Nor any frost that mars,
Only the wind of love
Under the early stars,—
The living breath that moves
Whispering to and fro,
Like the voice of God in the dusk
Of the garden long ago.
“My Lover Asks Me” by Nizar Qabbani
My lover asks me:
“What is the difference between me and the sky?”
The difference, my love,
Is that when you laugh,
I forget about the sky.
“Love Me at Last” by Alice Corbin
Love me at last, or if you will not,
Leave me;
Hard words could never, as these half-words,
Grieve me:
Love me at last—or leave me.
Love me at last, or let the last word uttered
Be but your own;
Love me, or leave me—as a cloud, a vapor,
Or a bird flown.
Love me at last—I am but sliding water
Over a stone.
“The Crown of Love” by Emily Pfeiffer
I would be a goddess in
The light of those dear eyes
Apt to hold you as to win,
All-beautiful, all-wise.
Pray you wherefore should you deem
This a vain and idle dream?
Purblind love that cannot see
That woman still to man may be
Whatever she can seem!
I would win your tender trust,
But not to keep you still
Kneeling lowly in the dust,
Obedient to my will;
Nor to surfeit all my days
On the nectar of your praise;
Or to hear it sung so high
That the idle passer-by
Paused to hear your lays.
I but ask you for your faith
That, wounded by the herd,
I may bring you healing with
The magic of a word.
Pray you to believe me so
That in darkness, doubt, or woe,
I may guide you when you grope,
Light you with my stronger hope,
Warm you with my glow.
I would have you love me well,
That, fainting in the strife,
Kiss of mine should be a spell,
To win you back to life;
Love me so that day or night,
I could hide the world from sight,
Keep it out with woven arms,
Or subdue it with my charms,
As a goddess might!
Love! my worth will wax or wane
As your light shall shine,
Now a homely thing, or vain,
Now almost divine.
Lorn of love, my hands hang down,
I am nothing when you frown;
Hold me fair, and keep me great,
With your faithfulness for state,
And your love for crown!
“Love” by Emily Dickinson
XLVII
Heart, we will forget him!
You and I, to-night!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.
When you have done, pray tell me,
That I my thoughts may dim;
Haste! lest while you’re lagging,
I may remember him!
“Love’s Springtide” by Frank Dempster Sherman
My heart was winter-bound until
I heard you sing;
O voice of Love, hush not, but fill
My life with Spring!
My hopes were homeless things before
I saw your eyes;
O smile of Love, close not the door
To paradise!
My dreams were bitter once, and then
I found them bliss;
O lips of Love, give me again
Your rose to kiss!
Springtide of Love! The secret sweet
Is ours alone;
O heart of Love, at last you beat
Against my own!
“Romance” by Robert Louis Stevenson
I will make you brooches and toys for your delight
Of bird-song at morning and star-shine at night.
I will make a palace fit for you and me,
Of green days in forests and blue days at sea.
I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your room,
Where white flows the river and bright blows the broom,
And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white
In rainfall at morning and dewfall at night.
And this shall be for music when no one else is near,
The fine song for singing, the rare song to hear!
That only I remember, that only you admire,
Of the broad road that stretches and the roadside fire.
“Ah, How Sweet” by John Dryden
Ah, how sweet it is to love!
Ah, how gay is young desire!
And what pleasing pains we prove
When we first approach love’s fire!
Pains of love be sweeter far
Than all other pleasures are.
Sighs which are from lovers blown
Do but gently heave the heart:
E’en the tears they shed alone
Cure, like trickling balm, their smart.
Lovers, when they lose their breath,
Bleed away in easy death.
Love and Time with reverence use,
Treat them like a parting friend;
Nor the golden gifts refuse
Which in youth sincere they send:
For each year their price is more,
And they less simple than before.
Love, like spring-tides full and high,
Swells in every youthful vein;
But each tide does less supply,
Till they quite shrink in again.
If a flow in age appear,
’T is but rain, and runs not clear.
“Cupid Swallowed” by Leigh Hunt
T’ other day, as I was twining
Roses for a crown to dine in,
What, of all things, midst the heap,
Should I light on, fast asleep,
But the little desperate elf,
The tiny traitor,—Love himself!
By the wings I pinched him up
Like a bee, and in a cup
Of my wine I plunged and sank him;
And what d’ ye think I did?—I drank him!
Faith, I thought him dead. Not he!
There he lives with tenfold glee;
And now this moment, with his wings
I feel him tickling my heart-strings.
“When Will Love Come?” by Pakenham Beatty
Some find Love late, some find him soon,
Some with the rose in May,
Some with the nightingale in June,
And some when skies are gray;
Love comes to some with smiling eyes,
And comes with tears to some;
For some Love sings, for some Love sighs,
For some Love’s lips are dumb.
How will you come to me, fair Love?
Will you come late or soon?
With sad or smiling skies above,
By light of sun or moon?
Will you be sad, will you be sweet,
Sing, sigh, Love, or be dumb?
Will it be summer when we meet,
Or autumn ere you come?
“Love” by Susanna Moodie
Oh Love! how fondly, tenderly enshrined
In human hearts, how with our being twined!
Immortal principle, in mercy given,
The brightest mirror of the joys of heaven.
Child of Eternity’s unclouded clime,
Too fair for earth, too infinite for time:
A seraph watching o’er Death’s sullen shroud,
A sunbeam streaming through a stormy cloud;
An angel hovering o’er the paths of life,
But sought in vain amidst its cares and strife;
Claimed by the many–known but to the few
Who keep thy great Original in view;
Who, void of passion’s dross, behold in thee
A glorious attribute of Deity!
“The Lover” by Walter Savage Landor
Now thou art gone, tho’ not gone far,
It seems that there are worlds between us;
Shine here again, thou wandering star!
Earth’s planet! and return with Venus.
At times thou broughtest me thy light
When restless sleep had gone away;
At other times more blessed night
Stole over, and prolonged thy stay.
“The Evening Time” by A. C. C.
Together we walked in the evening time,
Above us the sky spread golden and clear,
And he bent his head and looked in my eyes,
As if he held me of all most dear.
Oh! it was sweet in the evening time!
Grayer the light grew and grayer still,
The rooks flitted home through the purple shade ;
The nightingales sang where the thorns stood high,
As I walked with him in the woodland glade.
Oh! it was sweet in the evening time!
And our pathway went through fields of wheat ;
Narrow that path and rough the way,
But he was near and the birds sang true,
And the stars came out in the twilight gray.
Oh! it was sweet in the evening time!
Softly he spoke of the days long past,
Softly of blessed days to be ;
Close to his arm and closer I prest,
The cornfield path was Eden to me.
Oh! it was sweet in the evening time!
And the latest gleams of daylight died ;
My hand in his enfolded lay ;
We swept the dew from the wheat as we passed,
For narrower, narrower, wound the way.
Oh! it was sweet in the evening time.
He looked in the depths of my eyes, and said,
“Sorrow and gladness will come for us, sweet ;
But together we’ll walk through the fields oflife
Close as we walked through the fields ofwheat. “
Valentine’s Poems for the Love of My Life
“Ever Faithful to You” by Lucian B. Watkins
When e’er I read these words, Dear Heart, of your sweet valentine,
I’m sure no heart can ever feel a sweeter joy than mine.
“Faithful!” no word can e’er express a truer, greater love—
No truer constancy than this have angels up above!
“Ever!” ah, then eternally you pledge that you’ll be true!
For love’s sweet sake, alone, I choose a happy life with you.
Through every sorrow, joy or pain that we in life may meet,
In sweet companionship we’ll share—the bitter with the sweet.
We’ll live with these words of faithfulness, what e’er our lot may be.
And live that we may after death from earthly stains be free.
“Evening Song” by Willa Cather
Dear love, what thing of all the things that be
Is ever worth one thought from you or me,
Save only Love,
Save only Love?
The days so short, the nights so quick to flee,
The world so wide, so deep and dark the sea,
So dark the sea;
So far the suns and every listless star,
Beyond their light—Ah! dear, who knows how far,
Who knows how far?
One thing of all dim things I know is true,
The heart within me knows, and tells it you,
And tells it you.
So blind is life, so long at last is sleep,
And none but Love to bid us laugh or weep,
And none but Love,
And none but Love.
“This Much and More” by Djuna Barnes
If my lover were a comet
Hung in air,
I would braid my leaping body
In his hair.
Yea, if they buried him ten leagues
Beneath the loam,
My fingers they would learn to dig
And I’d plunge home!
“Love’s Inspiration” by William Henry Davies
Give me the chance, and I will make
Thy thoughts of me, like worms this day,
Take wings and change to butterflies
That in the golden light shall play;
Thy cold, clear heart, the quiet pool
That never heard Love’s nightingale,
Shall hear his music night and day,
And in no seasons shall it fail.
I’ll make thy happy heart my port,
Where all my thoughts are anchored fast;
Thy meditations, full of praise,
The flags of glory on each mast.
I’ll make my Soul thy shepherd soon,
With all thy thoughts my grateful flock;
And thou shalt say, each time I go,
How long, my Love, ere thou’lt come back?
“Love in the Winds” by Richard Hovey
When I am standing on a mountain crest,
Or hold the tiller in the dashing spray,
My love of you leaps foaming in my breast,
Shouts with the winds and sweeps to their foray;
My heart bounds with the horses of the sea,
And plunges in the wild ride of the night,
Flaunts in the teeth of tempest the large glee
That rides out Fate and welcomes gods to fight.
Ho, love, I laugh aloud for love of you,
Glad that our love is fellow to rough weather,—
No fretful orchid hothoused from the dew,
But hale and hardy as the highland heather,
Rejoicing in the wind that stings and thrills,
Comrade of ocean, playmate of the hills.
“First Time He Kissed Me, He but Only Kissed” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
First time he kissed me, he but only kissed
The fingers of this hand wherewith I write;
And, ever since, it grew more clean and white,
Slow to world-greetings, quick with its “O list!”
When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst
I could not wear here, plainer to my sight
Than that first kiss. The second passed in height
The first, and sought the forehead, and half missed,
Half falling on the hair. O, beyond meed!
That was the chrism of love, which love’s own crown,
With sanctifying sweetness, did precede.
The third upon my lips was folded down
In perfect, purple state; since when, indeed,
I have been proud, and said, “My love, my own!”
“Seven times Three” by Jean Ingelow
Love
I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover,
Dark, dark was the garden, I saw not the gate;
“Now, if there be footsteps, he comes, my one lover—
Hush, nightingale, hush! O sweet nightingale, wait
Till I listen and hear
If a step draweth near,
For my love he is late!
“The skies in the darkness stoop nearer and nearer,
A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree,
The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer:
To what art thou listening, and what dost thou see?
Let the star-clusters glow,
Let the sweet waters flow,
And cross quickly to me.
“You night-moths that hover where honey brims over
From sycamore blossoms, or settle or sleep;
You glow-worms, shine out, and the pathway discover
To him that comes darkling along the rough steep.
Ah, my sailor, make haste,
For the time runs to waste,
And my love lieth deep,—
“Too deep for swift telling; and yet, my one lover,
I ’ve conned thee an answer, it waits thee to-night.”
By the sycamore passed he, and through the white clover;
Then all the sweet speech I had fashioned took flight;
But I ’ll love him more, more
Than e’er wife loved before,
Be the days dark or bright.
“Last Night” by Christian Winther (Théophile Julius Henry Marzials,Translator)
Last night the nightingale waked me,
Last night when all was still;
It sang in the golden moonlight
From out the woodland hill.
I opened the window gently,
And all was dreamy dew—
And oh! the bird, my darling,
Was singing, singing of you!
I think of you in the day-time;
I dream of you by night—
I wake—would you were near me,
And hot tears blind my sight.
I hear a sigh in the lime-tree,
The wind is floating through,
And oh! the night, my darling,
Is longing, longing for you.
Nor think I can forget you!
I could not though I would!
I see you in all around me,—
The stream, the night, the wood;
The flowers that sleep so gently,
The stars above the blue,
Oh! heaven itself, my darling,
Is praying, praying for you.
“Till Death Us Part” by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley
“Till death us part,”
Thus speaks the heart
When each to each repeats the words of doom;
For better and for worse,
Through blessing and through curse,
We shall be one, till life’s last hour shall come.
Life with its myriad grasp
Our yearning souls shall clasp
By ceaseless love and still expectant wonder;
In bonds that shall endure
Indissolubly sure
Till God in death shall part our paths asunder.
Till death us join!
Oh, word yet more divine,
Which to the breaking heart breathes hope sublime!
Through wasted hours,
And shattered powers,
We still are one, despite the change and time.
Death with his healing hand
Shall knit once more the band,
Which needs but that one link that none may sever;
Till, through the only Good,
Seen, felt, and understood,
The life in God shall make us one forever.
“My Heart Is a Lute” by Lady Blanche Elizabeth Fitzroy Lindsay
Alas, that my heart is a lute,
Whereon you have learned to play!
For a many years it was mute,
Until one summer’s day
You took it, and touched it, and made it thrill,
And it thrills and throbs, and quivers still!
I had known you, dear, so long!
Yet my heart did not tell me why
It should burst one morn into song,
And wake to new life with a cry,
Like a babe that sees the light of the sun,
And for whom this great world has just begun.
Your lute is enshrined, cased in,
Kept close with love’s magic key,
So no hand but yours can win
And wake it to minstrelsy;
Yet leave it not silent too long, nor alone,
Lest the strings should break, and the music be done.
“A Decade” by Amy Lowell
When you came, you were like red wine and honey,
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with its sweetness.
Now you are like morning bread,
Smooth and pleasant.
I hardly taste you at all for I know your savour,
But I am completely nourished.
“Bond” by Juana de Ibarbourou (Muna Lee, Translator)
I grew
Only for you.
Cut the acacia boughs that demand
Only destruction at your hand!
My blossom blew
Only for you.
Uproot me—in its natal hour
My lily doubted were it candle or flower.
My waters blue
Flow for you.
Drink me—never crystal knows
So pure a tide as in this channel flows.
Wings I knew
Only for you.
Pursue me! (Quivering firefly,
Veil your flame from every eye!)
I shall suffer for you.
Blessed be the evil that your love will do!
Blessed be the blade, the net I shall feel!
Blessed be thirst and steel!
My heart’s blood will flow
That my love you may know.
What fairer gem, what rarer jewel could be found
Than this offering of a scarlet wound?
Instead of diadems in my hair,
Seven long thorns I shall wear.
Instead of ear-rings I shall don
Two burning coals of vermilion.
When you see me suffering
You will hear my laughter ring.
And you will weep and pity me:
Then more than ever mine you will be.
“Silence” by Babette Deutsch
Silence with you is like the faint delicious
Smile of a child asleep, in dreams unguessed:
Only the hinted wonder of its dreaming,
The soft, slow-breathing miracle of rest.
Silence with you is like a kind departure
From iron clangor and the engulfing crowd
Into a wide and greenly barren meadow,
Under the bloom of some blue-bosomed cloud;
Or like one held upon the sands at evening,
When the drawn tide rolls out, and the mixed light
Of sea and sky enshrouds the far, wind-bellowed
Sails that move darkly on the edge of night.
“Together” by Carrie Williams Clifford
O, come, Love, let us take a walk,
Down the Way-of-Life together;
Storms may come, but what care we,
If be fair or foul the weather.
When the sky overhead is blue,
Balmy, scented winds will after
Us, adown the valley blow
Haunting echoes of our laughter.
When Life’s storms upon us beat
Crushing us with fury, after
All is done, there’ll ringing come
Mocking echoes of our laughter.
So we’ll walk the Way-of-Life,
You and I, Love, both together,
Storm or sunshine, happy we
If be foul or fair the weather.
“The Homestead” by Bliss Carman
Here we came when love was young.
Now that love is old,
Shall we leave the floor unswept
And the hearth acold?
Here the hill-wind in the dusk.
Wandering to and fro,
Moves the moonflowers, like a ghost
Of the long ago.
Here from every doorway looks
A remembered face,
Every sill and panel wears
A familiar grace.
Let the windows smile again
To the morning light,
And the door stand open wide
When the moon is bright.
Let the breeze of twilight blow
Through the silent hall,
And the dreaming rafters hear
How the thrushes call.
Oh, be merciful and fond
To the house that gave
All its best to shelter love,
Built when love was brave!
Here we came when love was young,
Now that love is old,
Never let its day be lone,
Nor its heart acold!
“My Love Do Not Ask Me” by Nizar Qabbani
Do not ask me, the name of my love
I fear for you, from the fragrance of perfume
contained in a bottle, if you smashed it,
drowning you, in spilled scent
By God, if you even croaked a letter,
Lilacs would pile up on the paths
Do not look for it here in my chest
I have left it to run with the sunset
You can see it in the laughter of doves
In the flutter of butterflies
In the ocean, in the breathing of dales
and in the song of every nightingale
in the tears of winter, when winter cries
in the giving of a generous cloud
Do not ask about his lips…as elegant as the sunset
And his eyes, a shore of purity
And his waist, the sway of a branch
Charms…which no book has contained
Nor described by a literate’s feather
And his chest, his throat, enough for you
I won’t breath his name, my lover…
“Love’s Omnipresence” by Joshua Sylvester
Were I as base as is the lowly plain,
And you, my Love, as high as heaven above,
Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain
Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love.
Were I as high as heaven above the plain,
And you, my Love, as humble and as low
As are the deepest bottoms of the main,
Whereso’er you were, with you my love should go.
Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies,
My love should shine on you like to the sun,
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes
Till heaven wax’d blind, and till the world were done.
Whereso’er I am, below, or else above you,
Whereso’er you are, my heart shall truly love you.
“Fairest Days” by Kate Louise Wheeler
The sun is flooding all the land and sky,
The waves are dancing o’er the deep blue sea;
The world is gay and yet, they say, not I—
Since absence makes a gulf ’tween you and me.
When you were here the clouds were in the sky,
The rain-drops fell, the sun was hid from view;
The world was dull and yet, they say, not I—
For my gay world is centred, love, in you.
When you are near no matter what the sky,
No matter what the sea nor what the weather;
The world is gay and so, my love, am I—
The days are fairest when we are together.
“Love” by Emily Dickinson
LIV
I live with him, I see his face;
I go no more away
For visitor, or sundown;
Death’s single privacy,
The only one forestalling mine,
And that by right that he
Presents a claim invisible,
No wedlock granted me.
I live with him, I hear his voice,
I stand alive to-day
To witness to the certainty
Of immortality
Taught me by Time,—the lower way,
Conviction every day,—
That life like this is endless,
Be judgment what it may.
“Is Love, Then, so Simple” by Irene Rutherford Mcleod
Is love, then, so simple my dear?
The opening of a door,
And seeing all things clear?
I did not know before.
I had thought it unrest and desire
Soaring only to fall,
Annihilation and fire:
It is not so at all.
I feel no desperate will,
But I think I understand
Many things, as I sit quite still,
With Eternity in my hand.
“Love Thee, Dearest!” by George Pope Morris
Love thee, dearest?–Hear me.–Never
Will my fond vows be forgot!
May I perish, and for ever,
When, dear maid, I love thee not!
Turn not from me, dearest!–Listen!
Banish all thy doubts and fears!
Let thine eyes with transport glisten!
What hast thou to do with tears?
Dry them, dearest!–Ah, believe me,
Love’s bright flame is burning still!
Though the hollow world deceive thee,
Here’s a heart that never will!
Dost thou smile?–A cloud of sorrow
Breaks before Joy’s rising sun!
Wilt thou give thy hand?–To-morrow,
Hymen’s bond will make us one!
“Love That Lives” by George Parsons Lathrop
Dear face — bright, glinting hair;
Dear life, whose heart is mine —
The thought of you is prayer,
The love of you divine.
In starlight, or in rain;
In the sunset’s shrouded glow;
Ever, with joy or pain,
To you my quick thoughts go
Like winds or clouds, that fleet
Across the hungry space
Between, and find you, sweet,
Where life again wins grace.
Now, as in that once young
Year that so softly drew
My heart to where it clung,
I long for, gladden in you.
And when in the silent hours
I whisper your sacred name,
Like an altar-fire it showers
My blood with fragrant flame!
Perished is all that grieves;
And lo, our old-new joys
Are gathered as in sheaves,
Held in love’s equipoise.
Ours is the love that lives;
Its springtime blossoms blow
‘Mid the fruit that autumn gives,
And its life outlasts the snow.
Famous Love Poems for Valentine’s Day
“How Do I Love Thee?” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
“Love Song” by Rainer Maria Rilke
When my soul touches yours a great chord sings!
How shall I tune it then to other things?
O! That some spot in darkness could be found
That does not vibrate when’er your depth sound.
But everything that touches you and me
Welds us as played strings sound one melody.
Where is the instrument whence the sounds flow?
And whose the master-hand that holds the bow?
O! Sweet song—
“The Might of One Fair Face” by Michaelangelo (John Edward Taylor, Translator)
The might of one fair face sublimes my love,
For it hath weaned my heart from low desires;
Nor death I heed, nor purgatorial fires.
Thy beauty, antepast of joys above,
Instructs me in the bliss that saints approve;
For O, how good, how beautiful, must be
The God that made so good a thing as thee,
So fair an image of the heavenly Dove!
Forgive me if I cannot turn away
From those sweet eyes that are my earthly heaven,
For they are guiding stars, benignly given
To tempt my footsteps to the upward way;
And if I dwell too fondly in thy sight,
I live and love in God’s peculiar light.
“Meeting at Night” by Robert Browning
The gray sea and the long black land;
And the yellow half-moon large and low:
And the startled little waves that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep,
As I gain the cove with pushing prow,
And quench its speed i’ the slushy sand.
Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach;
Three fields to cross till a farm appears;
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch
And blue spurt of a lighted match,
And a voice less loud, through joys and fears,
Than the two hearts beating each to each!
“Wild Nights—Wild Nights!” by Emily Dickinson
Wild Nights – Wild Nights!
Were I with thee
Wild Nights should be
Our luxury!
Futile – the winds –
To a heart in port –
Done with the compass –
Done with the chart!
Rowing in Eden –
Ah, the sea!
Might I moor – Tonight –
In thee!
“Restless Love” by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Through rain, through snow,
Through tempest go!
‘Mongst streaming caves,
O’er misty waves,
On, on! still on!
Peace, rest have flown!
Sooner through sadness
I’d wish to be slain,
Than all the gladness
Of life to sustain
All the fond yearning
That heart feels for heart,
Only seems burning
To make them both smart.
How shall I fly?
Forestwards hie?
Vain were all strife!
Bright crown of life.
Turbulent bliss,–
Love, thou art this!
“Love’s Philosophy” by Percy Bysshe Shelley
The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the ocean,
The winds of heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single,
All things by a law divine
In one another’s being mingle—
Why not I with thine?
See the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdain’d its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea—
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me?
“Love” by Emily Dickinson
XI
My river runs to thee:
Blue sea, wilt welcome me?
My river waits reply.
Oh sea, look graciously!
I ’ll fetch thee brooks
From spotted nooks,—
Say, sea,
Take me!
“Longing” by Matthew Arnold
Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again.
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.
Come, as thou cam’st a thousand times,
A messenger from radiant climes,
And smile on thy new world; and be
As kind to others as to me. 2
Or, as thou never cam’st in sooth,
Come now, and let me dream it truth.
And part my hair, and kiss my brow,
And say—My love! why sufferest thou?
Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again.
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.
“Love Is Enough” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Love is enough. Let us not ask for gold;
Wealth breeds false aims, and pride and selfishness.
In those serene, arcadian days of old
Men gave no thought to princely homes and dress,
The gods who dwelt on fair Olympia’s height
Lived only for dear love and love’s delight.
Love is enough.
Love is enough. Why should we care for fame?
Ambition is a most unpleasant guest.
It lures us with the glory of a name
Far from the happy haunts of peace and rest.
Let us stay here in this secluded place,
Made beautiful by love’s endearing grace!
Love is enough.
Love is enough. Why should we strive for power?
It brings men only envy and distrust.
The poor world’s homage pleases but an hour
And earthly honours vanish in the dust.
The proudest kinds are ofttimes desolate;
Let me be loved, and let who will be great.
Love is enough.
Love is enough. Why should we ask for more?
What greater gift have gods vouchsafed to men?
What better boon of all their precious store
Than our fond hearts, that love and love again?
Love is the only sweet that grows more sweet.
Sweet Love is ours, and life is all complete.
Love is enough.
“Love’s Way” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Love gives us curious potions of delight,
Of pain and ecstacy, and peace and care,
Love leads us upward, to the mountain height
And, like an angel, stands beside us there.
Then thrusts us, demon-like, in some abyss
Where, in the darkness of despair, we grope
Till, suddenly, love greets us with a kiss
And guides us back to flowery fields of hope.
Love makes all wisdom seem but poorest folly,
And yet the simplest mind, with love grows wise.
The gayest heart, he teaches melancholy;
Yet glorifies the erstwhile brooding eyes.
Love lives on change, and yet at change love mocks,
For love’s whole life, is one great paradox.