Gay Love Poetry

by Neil Powell (ed)

  With plaints he proved, and with tears he moved.

  But her an old man had been suitor to,

  That in his age began to dote again.

  Her would he often pray, and often woo,

  When through old age enfeebled was his brain.

  But she before had loved a lusty youth

  That now was dead, the cause of all her ruth.

  And thus it happened. Death and Cupid met

  Upon a time at swilling Bacchus’ house,

  Where dainty cates upon the board were set

  And goblets full of wine to drink carouse:

  Where Love and Death did love the liquor so

  That out they fall and to the fray they go.

  And having both their quivers at their back

  Filled full of arrows; th’one of fatal steel,

  The other all of gold; Deaths shaft was black,

  But Love’s was yellow: Fortune turned her wheel;

  And from Death’s quiver fell a fatal shaft,

  That under Cupid by the wind was waft.

  And at the same time by ill hap there fell

  Another arrow out of Cupid’s quiver;

  The which was carried by the wind at will,

  And under Death the amorous shaft did shiver.

  They being parted, Love took up Death’s dart,

  And Death took up Love’s arrow, for his part.

  Thus as they wandered both about the world,

  At last Death met with one of feeble age;

  Wherewith he drew a shaft and at him hurled

  The unknown arrow, with a furious rage,

  Thinking to strike him dead with Death’s black dart,

  But he (alas) with Love did wound his heart.

  This was the doting fool, this was the man

  That loved fair Gwendolena Queen of Beauty.

  She cannot shake him off, do what she can,

  For she hath vowed to her his soul’s last duty,

  Making him trim upon the holy-days,

  And crowns his love with garlands made of bays.

  Now doth he stroke his beard, and now (again)

  He wipes the drivel from his filthy chin;

  Now offers he a kiss; but high disdain

  Will not permit her heart to pity him:

  Her heart more hard than adamant or steel,

  Her heart more changeable than Fortune’s wheel.

  But leave we him in love (up to the ears)

  And tell how Love behaved himself abroad;

  Who seeing one that mourned still in tears

  (A young man groaning under love’s great load)

  Thinking to ease his burden, rid his pains:

  For men have grief as long as life remains.

  Alas the while, that unawares he drew

  The fatal shaft that Death had dropped before;

  By which deceit great harm did then issue,

  Staining his face with blood and filthy gore.

  His face, that was to Gwendolen more dear

  Than love of lords, of any lordly peer.

  This was that fair and beautiful young man

  Whom Gwendolena so lamented for;

  This is that love whom she doth curse and ban,

  Because she doth that dismal chance abhor;

  And if it were not for his mother’s sake,

  Even Ganymede himself she would forsake.

  Oh would she would forsake my Ganymede,

  Whose sugared love is full of sweet delight,

  Upon whose forehead you may plainly read

  Loves pleasure, graved in ivory tablets bright;

  In whose fair eye-balls you may clearly see

  Base love still stained with foul indignity.

  Oh would to God he would but pity me,

  That love him more than any mortal wight:

  Then he and I with love would soon agree,

  That now cannot abide his suitors’ sight.

  Oh would to God (so I might have my fee)

  My lips were honey, and thy mouth a bee.

  Then shouldst thou suck my sweet and my fair flower

  That now is ripe and full of honey-berries;

  Then would I lead thee to my pleasant bower

  Filled full of grapes, of mulberries, and cherries;

  Then shouldst thou be my wasp or else my bee,

  I would thy hive, and thou my honey be.

  I would put amber bracelets on thy wrests,

  Crownets of pearl about thy naked arms;

  And when thou sit st at swilling Bacchus’ feasts,

  My lips with charms should save thee from all harms;

  And when in sleep thou took’st thy chiefest pleasure,

  Mine eyes should gaze upon thine eye-lids’ treasure.

  And every morn by dawning of the day,

  When Phoebus riseth with a blushing face,

  Sylvanus’ chapel-clerks shall chaunt a lay,

  And play thee hunts-up in thy resting place;

  My cote thy chamber, my bosom thy bed,

  Shall be appointed for thy sleepy head.

  And when it pleaseth thee to walk abroad

  (Abroad into the fields to take fresh air),

  The meads with Flora’s treasure should be strowed

  (The mantled meadows and the fields so fair),

  And by a silver well, with golden sands,

  I’ll sit me down, and wash thine ivory hands.

  And in the sweltering heat of summer time,

  I would make cabinets for thee, my love:

  Sweet-smelling arbours made of eglantine

  Should be thy shrine, and I would be thy dove.

  Cool cabinets of fresh green laurel boughs

  Should shadow us, o’er-set with thick-set yews.

  Or if thou list to bathe thy naked limbs

  Within the crystal of a pearl-bright brook,

  Paved with the dainty pebbles to the brims,

  Or clear, wherein thyself thyself mayst look,

  We’ll go to Ladon, whose still trickling noise

  Will lull thee fast alseep amidst thy joys.

  Or if thou’lt go unto the river side

  To angle for the sweet fresh-water fish,

  Armed with thy implements that will abside

  (Thy rod, hook, line) to take a dainty dish;

  Thy rods shall be of cane, thy lines of silk,

  Thy hooks of silver, and thy baits of milk.

  Or if thou lov’st to hear sweet melody,

  Or pipe a round upon an oaten reed,

  Or make thyself glad with some mirthful glee,

  Or play them music whilst thy flock doth feed;

  To Pan’s own pipe I’ll help my lovely lad,

  Pan’s golden pipe which he of Syrinx had.

  Or if thou dar’st to climb the highest trees

  For apples, cherries, medlars, pears, or plums,

  Nuts, walnuts, filberts, chestnuts, services,

  The hoary peach, when snowy winter comes;

  I have fine orchards full of mellowed fruit,

  Which I will give thee to obtain my suit.

  Not proud Alcinous himself can vaunt

  Of goodlier orchards or of braver trees

  Than I have planted; yet thou wilt not grant

  My simple suit; but like the honey bees

  Thou suck’st the flower till all the sweet be gone,

  And lov’st me for my coin till I have none.

  Leave Gwendolen (sweet-heart). Though she is fair

  Yet is she light; not light in virtue shining,

  But light in her behaviour, to impair

  Her honour in her chastity’s declining.

  Trust not her tears, for they can wantonise,

  When tears in pearl are trickling from her eyes.

  If thou wilt come and dwell with me at home,

  My sheep-cote shall be strowed with new green rushes;

  We’ll haunt the trembling prickets as they roam

  About t
he fields, along the hawthorn bushes.

  I have a piebald cur to hunt the hare:

  So we will live with dainty forest fare.

  Nay more than this, I have a garden-plot,

  Wherein there wants nor herbs, nor roots, nor flowers

  (Flowers to smell, roots to eat, herbs for the pot),

  And dainty shelters where the welkin lowers:

  Sweet-smelling beds of lilies and of roses,

  Which rosemary banks and lavender encloses.

  There grows the gillyflower, the mint, the daisy

  (Both red and white), the blue-veined violet;

  The purple hyacinth, the spike to please thee;

  The scarlet-dyed carnation bleeding yet;

  The sage, the savory, and sweet marjoram,

  Hyssop, thyme, and eye-bright, good for the blind and dumb.

  The pink, the primrose, cowslip, and daffadilly,

  The harebell blue, the crimson columbine,

  Sage, lettuce, parsley, and the milk-white lily,

  The rose, and speckled flowers called sops-in-wine,

  Fine pretty king-cups, and the yellow boots

  That grows by rivers and by shallow brooks.

  And many thousand moe I cannot name

  Of herbs and flowers that in gardens grow

  I have for thee; and coneys that be tame,

  Young rabbits, white as swan and black as crow,

  Some speckled here and there with dainty spots;

  And more I have two milch and milk-white goats.

  All these, and more, I’ll give thee for thy love,

  If these, and more, may tice thy love away.

  I have a pigeon-house, in it a dove,

  Which I love more than mortal tongue can say.

  And last of all, I’ll give thee a little lamb

  To play withal, new-weaned from her dam.

  But if thou wilt not pity my complaint,

  My tears, nor vows, nor oaths, made to thy beauty,

  What shall I do? But languish, die, or faint,

  Since thou dost scorn my tears and my soul’s duty;

  And tears contemned, vows and oaths must fail,

  For where tears cannot, nothing can prevail.

  Compare the love of fair Queen Gwendolin

  With mine, and thou shalt see how she doth love thee:

  I love thee for thy qualities divine,

  But she doth love another swain above thee.

  I love thee for thy gifts, she for her pleasure;

  I for thy virtue, she for beauty’s treasure.

  And always (I am sure) it cannot last,

  But sometime Nature will deny those dimples:

  Instead of beauty (when thy blossoms past)

  Thy face will be deformed, full of wrinkles.

  Then she that loved thee for thy beauty’s sake,

  When age draws on, they love will soon forsake.

  But I that loved thee for thy gifts divine,

  In the December of thy beauty’s waning,

  Will still admire, with joy, those lovely eyne,

  That now behold me with their beauties baning.

  Though January will never come again,

  Yet April years will come in showers of rain.

  When will my May come, that I may embrace thee?

  When will the hour be of my soul’s joying?

  Why dost thou seek in mirth still to disgrace me?

  Whose mirth’s my health, whose grief’s my heart’s annoying.

  Thy bane my bale, thy bliss my blessedness,

  Thy ill my hell, thy weal my welfare is.

  Thus do I honour thee that love thee so,

  And love thee so, that so do honour thee

  Much more than any mortal man doth know

  Or can discern by love or jealousy.

  But if that thou disdain’st my loving ever,

  Oh happy I, if I had loved never.

  WALT WHITMAN

  from Calamus

  In paths untrodden,

  In the growth by margins of pond-waters,

  Escaped from the life that exhibits itself,

  From all the standards hitherto publish’d, from the pleasures, profits, conformities,

  Which too long I was offering to feed my soul,

  Clear to me now standards not yet publish’d, clear to me that my soul,

  That the soul of the man I speak for rejoices in comrades,

  Here by myself away from the clank of the world,

  Tallying and talk’d to here by tongues aromatic,

  No longer abash’d, (for in this secluded spot I can respond as I would not dare elsewhere,)

  Strong upon me the life that does not exhibit itself, yet contains all the rest,

  Resolv’d to sing no songs today but those of manly attachment, Projecting them along that substantial life,

  Bequeathing hence types of athletic love,

  Afternoon this delicious Ninth-month in my forty-first year,

  I proceed for all who are or have been young men,

  To tell the secret of my nights and days,

  To celebrate the need of comrades.

  * * *

  from Calamus

  When I heard at the close of the day how my name had been receiv’d with plaudits in the capitol, still it was not a happy night for me that follow’d,

  And else when I carous’d, or when my plans were accomplish’d, still I was not happy,

  But the day when I rose at dawn from the bed of perfect health, refresh’d, singing, inhaling the ripe breath of autumn,

  When I saw the full moon in the west grow pale and disappear in the morning light,

  When I wander’d alone over the beach, and undressing bathed, laughing with the cool waters, and saw the sun rise,

  And when I thought how my dear friend my lover was on his way coming, O then I was happy,

  O then each breath tasted sweeter, and all that day my food nourish’d me more, and the beautiful day pass’d well,

  And the next came with equal joy, and with the next at evening came my friend,

  And that night while all was still I heard the waters roll slowly continually up the shores,

  1 heard the hissing rustle of the liquid and sands as directed to

  me whispering to congratulate me,

  For the one I love most lay sleeping by me under the same cover in the cool night,

  In the stillness in the autumn moonbeams his face was inclined toward me,

  And his arm lay lightly around my breast — and that night I was happy.

  JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS

  from Ithocles

  That night, when storms were spent and tranquil heaven,

  Clear-eyed with stars and fragrant with fresh air,

  Slept after thunder, came a sound of song,

  And a keen voice that through the forest cried

  On Ithocles, and still on Ithocles,

  Persistent, till the woods and caverns rang.

  He in his lair close-lying and tear-tired

  Heard, knew the cry, and trembled. Nearer still

  And nearer vibrated the single sound.

  Yet, though much called for, Ithocles abode

  Prone, deeming that the gods had heard his prayer,

  And spake not. Till at the cave-door there stayed

  The feet of him who one month since had trodden

  Toward that path beneath another moon,

  Then Ithocles, thick-throated, ‘Who calls me?’

  Cried, knowing well the voice of him who called.

  ‘It is Lysander.’ ‘If indeed it be he,

  Let him forgive; strike deep; I ask no more.

  Thy coming, youth, long looked for, sets me free;

  For now the storm of love and life is o’er,

  And I go conquering and conquered down

  To darkness and inevitable doom —

  Conquered by Kupris who hath had her will,

  But having slain within my soul the sin


  That made a desert of her garden-ground.

  Live happy in the light of holier Love:

  Forget the man who willed thee that great wrong.’

  ‘Nay, not so, Ithocles, if this hold good!

  For I have left my kith and kin for thee,

  And, pricked by sharp stings of importunate love,

  Am come to cure thy hurt and heal thy soul.’

  ‘Can this be true? for I do lie as one

  Who long hath ta’en a dark and doleful dream:

  Waking he shudders, and dim shadowy shapes

  Still threaten and weigh down his labouring soul.’

  ‘Rise, Ithocles, and we will speak of Love;

  Fierce-eyed, fire-footed, yet most mild of gods

  And musical and holy and serene.

  Dear to his spirit are deep-chested sighs,

  Pitiful pleadings of woe-wearied men,

  And the anguish of unutterable things:

  Bur dearer far when heart with heart is wedded,

  Body with body, strength with strength; when passion,

  Not raging like wild fire in lustful veins,

  But centred in the head and heart, doth steady

  Twin wills and wishes to a lofty end.

  I come to save thee, Ithocles, or die:

  Better is death than shame or loveless life.

  I love thee as I love this land we tread,

  This dear land of our fathers and our gods;

  I love thee as I love the light of heaven

  Or the sweet life that nourisheth my soul;

  Nay, better than all these I love thee, friend;

  And wouldst thou have me die, dishonoured die,

  In the fair blossom of my April days,

  Disconsolate and disinherited,

  With all my hopes and happiness undone?’

  ‘What will men say, Lysander, if we love?’

  ‘Let men say what they will. Let us be pure

  And faithful to each other to the end.

  Life is above and round us, and her dome

  Is studded thick with stars of noble deeds,