Love

Insomnia

Gill Washington Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Dreams, Love, Poems, Spirituality , , , 0 Comment

By Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Thin are the night-skirts left behind
By daybreak hours that onward creep,
And thin, alas! the shred of sleep
That wavers with the spirit’s wind:
But in half-dreams that shift and roll
And still remember and forget,
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Our lives, most dear, are never near,
Our thoughts are never far apart,
Though all that draws us heart to heart
Seems fainter now and now more clear.
To-night Love claims his full control,
And with desire and with regret
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Is there a home where heavy earth
Melts to bright air that breathes no pain,
Where water leaves no thirst again
And springing fire is Love’s new birth?
If faith long bound to one true goal
May there at length its hope beget,
My soul that hour shall draw your soul
For ever nearer yet.

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Twice

Gill Washington Christina Rossetti, God, Love, Poems, Spirituality , , , 0 Comment

By Christina Rossetti

I took my heart in my hand
(O my love, O my love),
I said: Let me fall or stand,
Let me live or die,
But this once hear me speak
(O my love, O my love) –
Yet a woman’s words are weak;
You should speak, not I.

You took my heart in your hand
With a friendly smile,
With a critical eye you scann’d,
Then set it down,
And said, ‘It is still unripe,
Better wait awhile;
Wait while the skylarks pipe,
Till the corn grows brown.’
As you set it down it broke –
Broke, but I did not wince;
I smiled at the speech you spoke,
At your judgement I heard:
But I have not often smiled
Since then, nor question’d since,
Nor cared for cornflowers wild,
Nor sung with the singing bird.

I take my heart in my hand,
O my God, O my God,
My broken heart in my hand:
Thou hast seen, judge Thou.
My hope was written on sand,
O my God, O my God:
Now let thy judgement stand –
Yea, judge me now.

This contemn’d of a man,
This marr’d one heedless day,
This heart take thou to scan
Both within and without:
Refine with fire its gold,
Purge Thou its dross away –
Yea, hold it in Thy hold,
Whence none can pluck it out.

I take my heart in my hand –
I shall not die, but live –
Before Thy face I stand;
I, for Thou callest such:
All that I have I bring,
All that I am I give,
Smile Thou and I shall sing,
But shall not question much.

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Once More, the Round

Gill Washington Life, Love, Poems, Spirituality, Theodore Roethke , , , 0 Comment

By Theodore Roethke

What’s greater, Pebble or Pond?
What can be known? The Unknown.
My true self runs toward a Hill
More! O More! visible.

Now I adore my life
With the Bird, the abiding Leaf,
With the Fish, the questing Snail,
And the Eye altering All;
And I dance with William Blake
For love, for Love’s sake;

And everything comes to One,
As we dance on, dance on, dance on.

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Spirit

Gill Washington Chris Roe, Life, Love, Poems, Spirituality , 0 Comment

By Chris Roe

Keeper of the morning light,
Guardian of the flame,
White knight of my soul.

Given at the beginning,
As a last defence,
At the centre of life.

Never beaten or destroyed,
Never taken or confined
Never traded or lost,

And shared only
For love.

The above poem is from

In Search of Silence

a collection of 45 poems written by Chris Roe including 7 watercolour prints by his brother Paul

Visit Silent Flight Publications for more details

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Girl in Love

Gill Washington Life, Love, Poems, Rainer Maria Rilke, Spirituality , , 0 Comment

By Rainer Maria Rilke

That’s my window. This minute
So gently did I alight
From sleep–was still floating in it.
Where has my life its limit
And where begins the night?

I could fancy all things around me
Were nothing but I as yet;
Like a crystal’s depth, profoundly
Mute, translucent, unlit.

I have space to spare inside me
For the stars, too: so full of room
Feels my heart; so lightly
Would it let go of him, whom

For all I know I have started
To love, it may be to hold.
Strange, as if never charted,
Stares my fortune untold.

Why is it I am bedded
Beneath this infinitude,
Fragrant like a meadow,
Hither and thither moved,

Calling out, yet fearing
Someone might hear the cry,
Destined to disappearing
Within another I.

Translated by Walter Arndt

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Love

Gill Washington Love, Poems, Rabia, Spirituality , , , 0 Comment

 By Rabia

I have loved Thee with two loves –
a selfish love and a love that is worthy of Thee.
As for the love which is selfish,
Therein I occupy myself with Thee,
to the exclusion of all others.
But in the love which is worthy of Thee,
Thou dost raise the veil that I may see Thee.
Yet is the praise not mine in this or that,
But the praise is to Thee in both that and this.

Translator unknown

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The Revelation

Gill Washington Coventry Patmore, Love, Poems, Spirituality , 0 Comment

By Coventry Patmore

AN idle poet, here and there,
Looks round him, but, for all the rest,
The world, unfathomably fair,
Is duller than a witling’s jest.
Love wakes men, once a lifetime each;
They lift their heavy lids, and look;
And, lo, what one sweet page can teach,
They read with joy, then shut the book.
And give some thanks, and some blaspheme,
And most forget, but, either way,
That and the child’s unheeded dream
Is all the light of all their day.

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