Partly because I'm trying to gather a quick compilation for a poetry event at my school, but mostly for fun, why not post your favorite love-type poems here, whether well-known or obscure, canonical or contemporary. I'll start with something nice from Donald Justice (forgive the punctuation, I'm typing from memory):
Speaking of Islands You spoke of islands, where the fishing boats Sleep by the docks like men beside their wives, Content all night, while under them the waves, Arching their backs a little, purr like cats And rub against them peacefully. Some nights, You said, nothing in all that harbor moves Except those boats with motion of those waves And a few sleepy gulls with cries like flutes. You spoke of islands as I speak of you, Sea-circled and remote, an island too; And of such latitudes as islands keep, And languorous airs, and fragrances offshore, And blue approaches to desire and sleep, O my belle harbor, my San Salvador! |
A WHITE ROSE
The red rose whispers of passion, And the white rose breathes of love; O the red rose is a falcon, And the white rose is a dove. But I send you a cream-white rosebud With a flush on its petal tips; For the love that is purest and sweetest Has a kiss of desire on the lips. --John Boyle O'Reilly |
You probably can't beat the white rose poem as a Valentine's poem if it comes with an actual white rose as described! I'm not sure what this says about me, but most of the poems that leap to my mind are anti-Valentine's poems. As Chris started this thread, though, I thought I'd add this one--a perfect Valentine for a Classicist:
Iota Subscript Seek not in me the big I capital, Nor yet the little dotted in me seek. If I have in me any I at all, 'Tis the iota subscript of the Greek. So small am I as an attention beggar. The letter you will find me subscript to Is neither alpha, eta, nor omega, But upsilon which is the Greek for you. --Robert Frost |
Anti-Valentine's poems also welcome!
I think I'm going to be relying on Wendy Cope for my event. Everybody knows this one, I've seen it on the boards a number of times. The Orange At lunchtime I bought a huge orange -- The size of it made us all laugh. I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave -- They got quarters and I had a half. And that orange, it made me so happy, As ordinary things often do Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park. This is peace and contentment. It's new. The rest of the day was quite easy. I did all the jobs on my list And enjoyed them and had some time over. I love you. I'm glad I exist. Wendy Cope |
I love Alicia's Frost poem, which I had never heard, but her comment on anti-Valentine poems brought this one to mind, which I think has something true to say about the contemporary attitude toward love poems.
The New Love Poem The new love poem is known for its honesty. The new love poem says I don't love you. The new love poem remembers the old love poem in which a woman's body was compared to the entire world. The new love poem tries not to feel superior to the old love poem. The new love poem can live on a steady diet of bitter fruit. The new love poem thinks sweets are for children. When the new love poem sleeps, it dreams of getting old, of shrivelling to a chrysalis, of something with wings and color so loud it talks emerging to thrill someone who doesn't know any better and who doesn't want to. --Philip Dacey |
Here's one of my favorites. It appeared in Hellas and I can't remember the author. Wish it was me!
Love Sonnet for the 90s Who would have thought that love and fear could mix? endangering our fragile, personal "not yet" relationship with medical statistics based on public health and sex. Disquietude—reflecting on each "ex": crossed membranes? fluids passed? so casual back when ignorance was bliss, not fatal, and truth more impregnable than latex. Now you and I long to be intimate, but every lover's loved ones crowd our bed. Romance has fled—for three long days we wait while we get tests for HIV instead: thinking of bridges burned, of bridges crossed, of passions long since spent, of passion's cost. |
Sonnets: III
You may grow tired of my incessant tongue, That loves perhaps too well the work of praise. You may turn otherwhere, and search among All men for one who keeps the wordless ways. This you may do, and I admit the fault Of loving you too wakefully to cease. Oh, I have tried to mend me, but the salt Of silence never brought these lips release. Still must they harken to the thoughts behind That form and flow to utter your perfection. Still must they move before a driven mind Marching to death in your unchanged direction. .....Therefore at least I bind them with one thong, .....The reticence that wraps a formal song. Mark Van Doren |
Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy
Not a red rose or a satin heart. I give you an onion. It is a moon wrapped in brown paper. It promises light like the careful undressing of love. Here. It will blind you with tears like a lover. It will make your reflection a wobbling photo of grief. I am trying to be truthful. Not a cute card or a kissogram. I give you an onion. Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips, possessive and faithful as we are, for as long as we are. Take it. Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring, if you like. Lethal. Its scent will cling to your fingers, cling to your knife. |
"The Hummingbird: A Seduction"
by Pattiann Rogers If I were a female hummingbird perched still And quiet on an upper myrtle branch In the spring afternoon and if you were a male Alone in the whole heavens before me, having parted Yourself, for me, from cedar top and honeysuckle stem And earth down, your body hovering in midair Far away from jewelweed, thistle, and bee balm; And if I watched how you fell, plummeting before me, And how you rose again and fell, with such mastery That I believed for a moment you were the sky And the red-marked bird diving inside your circumference Was just the physical revelation of the light's Most perfect desire; And if I saw your sweeping and sucking Performance of swirling egg and semen in the air, The weaving, twisting vision of red petal And nectar and soaring rump, the rush of your wing In its grand confusion of arcing and splitting Created completely out of nothing just for me, Then when you came down to me, I would call you My own spinning bloom of ruby sage, my funnelling Storm of sunlit sperm and pollen, my only breathless Piece of scarlet sky, and I would bless the base Of each of your feathers and touch the tine Of string muscles binding your wings and taste The odor of your glistening oils and hunt The honey in your crimson flare And I would take you and take you and take you Deep into any kind of nest you ever wanted. [This message has been edited by Howard (edited February 13, 2007).] |
These are great! I don't recall any of these except the Cope and O'Reilly poems.
Since today is Valentine's Day, and so time's running out, if you're still looking for just the right poem, the Academy of American Poets has posted a collection of love poems (with links to most of the poems) here: http://www.poets.org/love Or for a more direct approach, they've posted their collection of lust poems here: http://www.poets.org/lust And if (God forbid) the day just isn't going well, their collection of breakup poems is posted here: http://www.poets.org/breakups 'Should be something on one of those sites for just about everyone. The collections span from Catullus and Sappho, through Shakespeare and Marvell, to Yeats and Cavafy, Neruda and Addonizio. (Or you could just find a card shop and a florist who's not cleaned out. But hurry!) Happy Valentine's Day all! |
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