A poem by Alexander Pope (1688-1744)
Semichorus.
Oh Tyrant Love! hast thou possest
The prudent, learn’d, and virtuous breast?
Wisdom and wit in vain reclaim,
And Arts but soften us to feel thy flame.
Love, soft intruder, enters here,
But ent’ring learns to be sincere.
Marcus with blushes owns he loves,
And Brutus tenderly reproves.
Why, Virtue, dost thou blame desire,
Which Nature has imprest?
Why, Nature, dost thou soonest fire
The mild and gen’rous breast?
Chorus.
Love’s purer flames the Gods approve;
The Gods and Brutus bent to love:
Brutus for absent Portia sighs,
And sterner Cassius melts at Junia’s eyes.
What is loose love? a transient gust,
Spent in a sudden storm of lust,
A vapour fed from wild desire,
A wand’ring, self-consuming fire,
But Hymen’s kinder flames unite;
And burn for ever one;
Chaste as cold Cynthia’s virgin light,
Productive as the Sun.
Semichorus.
Oh source of ev’ry social tie,
United wish, and mutual joy!
What various joys on one attend,
As son, as father, brother husband, friend?
Whether his hoary sire he spies,
While thousand grateful thoughts arise;
Or meets his spouse’s fonder eye;
Or views his smiling progeny;
What tender passions take their turns,
What home-felt raptures move?
His heart now melts, now leaps, now burns,
With rev’rence, hope, and love.
Chorus.
Hence guilty joys, distastes, surmises,
Hence false tears, deceits, disguises,
Dangers, doubts, delays, surprises;
Fires that scorch, yet dare not shine
Purest love’s unwasting treasure,
Constant faith, fair hope, long leisure,
Days of ease, and nights of pleasure;
Sacred Hymen! these are thine.
A few random poems:
- The Blackbird by William Barnes
- Afternoon Rain in State Street poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- A Silent Song by Pamela Griffiths
- Artegal And Elidure by William Wordsworth
- Василий Жуковский – Теснятся все к тебе во храм
- Teignmouth: “Some Doggerel,” Sent In A Letter To B. R. Haydon poem – John Keats poems
- The Morning Half-Life Blues by Marge Piercy
- The Sheep and the Bush by William Somervile
- Sohni and her love Mahinwal by Raj Arumugam
- Man was made to Mourn: A Dirge by Robert Burns
- The Lent Lily by A. E. Housman
- Miscast I poem – Amy Lowell poems | Poems and Poetry
- Flower by Rabindranath Tagore
- Lune de Miel by T. S. Eliot
- Alone in the Wind, on the Prairie by Vachel Lindsay
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- No, Love Is Not Dead by Robert Desnos
- Lying Down by Robert Desnos
- Long Long Ago by Robert Desnos
- If You Only Knew by Robert Desnos
- Identity of Images by Robert Desnos
- Fairy Tale by Robert Desnos
- Zero by Robert Creeley
- Water Music by Robert Creeley
- The Way by Robert Creeley
- The Warning by Robert Creeley
- The Rain by Robert Creeley
- The Mirror by Robert Creeley
- The Innocence by Robert Creeley
- The Conspiracy by Robert Creeley
- The Carnival by Robert Creeley
- Song by Robert Creeley
- Something by Robert Creeley
- Other by Robert Creeley
- Myself by Robert Creeley
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
