Sir Philip Sidney (1554 – 1586) was one of the Elizabethan Age's most prominent figures and was famous in his day as a poet, courtier and soldier.

My true-love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for the other given.
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss:
There never was a bargain better driven.
His heart in me keeps me and him in one;
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides:
He loves my heart, for once it was his own;
I cherish his because in me it bides.
His heart his wound received from my sight;
My heart was wounded with his wounded heart;
For as from me on him his hurt did light,
So still, methought, in me his hurt did smart:
Both equal hurt, in this change sought our bliss,
My true love hath my heart and I have his.

Sir Philip Sidney

Today's poem is in fact a song, sung by Feste in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.

"O Mistress mine, where are you roaming?"
(Painting by Edwin Austin Abbey 1899)

O mistress mine, where are you roaming?
O, stay and hear! your true-love's coming,
That can sing both high and low.
Trip no further, pretty sweeting;
Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know.

What is love? 'Tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

William Shakespeare

Note: The painting does not depict an actual scene from the play, but rather illustrates the song's theme of carpe diem.

The young man reminds the yielding lady that "Youth's a stuff will not endure" and that we must take our pleasures now, while "Present mirth hath present laughter."

SONNET 137

Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes,
That they behold, and see not what they see?
They know what beauty is, see where it lies,
Yet what the best is take the worst to be.
If eyes corrupt by over-partial looks
Be anchor'd in the bay where all men ride,
Why of eyes' falsehood hast thou forged hooks,
Whereto the judgment of my heart is tied?
Why should my heart think that a several plot
Which my heart knows the wide world's common place?
Or mine eyes seeing this, say this is not,
To put fair truth upon so foul a face?
In things right true my heart and eyes have erred,
And to this false plague are they now transferr'd.

William Shakespeare

SONNET 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

William Shakespeare

SONNET 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

William Shakespeare

Continuing with another of Shakespeare's sonnets

SONNET 29

When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

William Shakespeare

The darling buds of May

SONNET 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

William Shakespeare

Of course there will be some of his well-known sonnets, but also this sea-song, which I found in "The Tempest" and had never noticed before.

The master, the swabber, the boatswain and I,
The gunner and his mate
Loved Mall, Meg and Marian and Margery,
But none of us cared for Kate;
For she had a tongue with a tang,
Would cry to a sailor, "Go hang!"
She loved not the savour of tar nor of pitch,
Yet a tailor might scratch her where'er she did itch:
Then to sea, boys, and let her go hang!

William Shakespeare
The Tempest

A couple of days ago I posted one of my poetry 'party pieces'.

It is still one of my favourite poems.

INVISIBLE KISSES
By Lemn Sissay

If there was ever one
Whom when you were sleeping
Would wipe your tears
When in dreams you were weeping;
Who would offer you time
When others demand;
Whose love lay more infinite
Than grains of sand.

If there was ever one
To whom you could cry;
Who would gather each tear
And blow it dry;
Who would offer help
On the mountains of time;
Who would stop to let each sunset
Soothe the jaded mind.

If there was ever one
To whom when you run
Will push back the clouds
So you are bathed in sun;
Who would open arms
If you would fall;
Who would show you everything
If you lost it all.

If there was ever one
Who when you achieve
Was there before the dream
And even then believed;
Who would clear the air
When it's full of loss;
Who would count love
Before the cost.

If there was ever one
Who when you are cold
Will summon warm air
For your hands to hold;
Who would make peace
In pouring pain,
Make laughter fall
In falling rain.

If there was ever one
Who can offer you this and more;
Who in keyless rooms
Can open doors;
Who in open doors
Can see open fields
And in open fields
See harvests yield.

Then see only my face
In the reflection of these tides
Through the clear water
Beyond the river side.
All I can send is love
In all that this is
A poem and a necklace
Of invisible kisses.

Tomorrow, March 24th, he is presenting a documentary 'The Black Boy' on BBC Radio 4 at 11am.

I only recently found this poem and I was hesitant to post it on this blog.

So I have snuck it in here!

DESIRE

in my dreams
I hold my lovers
next to me all at once
and ask them

what was it I desired?

my hands are full
of their heads
like bunches of cut roses
blond hair, brown hair, red, black,
their eyes are pools of bewilderment
staring up at me
from the bouquet

what was it I desired?
I ask again

was it your bodies?
did I hope by draping
your flesh over me
I could escape
boredom
loneliness
gray hairs shooting
towards me
from the future
like thin arrows?
did I think I could escape,
by taking your breath
into my mouth,
did I think I could escape
the responsibility
of breathing?

what did I desire in you?

sex
knowledge?
power?
love?

did I expect the clouds to
crack
and blue moths to fly out of the stars?
did I expect a voice
to call to me
saying
"Here at last is the answer."

what
I yell at them
shaking my lovers
what did I desire in you?

their ears fall off like petals
they shed their faces
in a pile at my feet
their bewildered eyes
pucker and close
centers of fallen flowers

the last face
floats down
circling in the darkness
at my feet

what did I desire in you? I whisper

the stems of their bodies
dry in my hands

Mary Mackey

Mary Mackey was born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana, and is related through her father's family to Mark Twain. Currently, she is a professor of English and Writer in Residence at California State University, Sacramento.

Mary Mackey's published works include 11 novels and 5 books of poetry and have sold over a million and a half copies. They have been translated into eleven foreign languages including Japanese, Hebrew, and Finnish.

Here is one of the few poems that I have learnt by heart recently.

It has become one of my "party pieces"!

IN PARIS WITH YOU

Don't talk to me of love. I've had an earful
And I get tearful when I've downed a drink or two.
I'm one of your talking wounded.
I'm a hostage. I'm maroonded.
But I'm in Paris with you.

Yes I'm angry at the way I've been bamboozled
And resentful at the mess I've been through.
I admit I'm on the rebound
And I don't care where are we bound.
I'm in Paris with you.

Do you mind if we do not go to the Louvre
If we say sod off to sodding Notre Dame,
If we skip the Champs Elysées
And remain here in this sleazy

Old hotel room
Doing this and that
To what and whom
Learning who you are,
Learning what I am.

Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris,
The little bit of Paris in our view.
There's that crack across the ceiling
And the hotel walls are peeling
And I'm in Paris with you.

Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris.
I'm in Paris with the slightest thing you do.
I'm in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,
I'm in Paris with... all points south.
Am I embarrassing you?
I'm in Paris with you.

James Fenton

James Fenton was born in Lincoln in 1949 and educated at Magdalen College, Oxford where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry.

Take a look at: http://www.jamesfenton.com/

How many times have you been in love - really in love? For some it only happens once in their life. Others claim multiple experiences!

It is probably not very well crafted, but it does reflect the exuberance I felt at the time.



I WANT

I want to stand with you on a mountain
I want to swim with you in the sea.
I want to drink with you at the fountain
I want to walk with you on the quay.

I want to run to where I can find you
I want to sprint every step of the way.
I want to do all the things that you do
I want to hear all the words that you say.

I want to fly to the heights where you fly
I want to climb to the heavens above.
I want to soar with you through the blue sky
I want to glide in the warmth of your love.

I want to savour the tastes that you taste
I want to smell all the smells that you smell.
I want to face all the problems that you face
I want to buy whatever you sell.

I want to lie with you where you're lying
I want to sleep with you by my side.
I want to dream all my dreams without crying
I want to share all the thoughts I now hide.

I want to love without guilt or reflection
I want to kiss without counting the cost.
I want to know what is meant by perfection
I want to capture the peace that I've lost.

I want to live all my life where you live
I want to sing all the songs that you sing.
I want to to give all the gifts that you give
I want to treasure the treasures you bring.

C.H.

Do you remember Jenny Joseph's amusing poem "Warning", which begins 'When I am an old woman I shall wear purple'?

How many of you have ever felt like this?

THE SUN HAS BURST THE SKY

The sun has burst the sky
Because I love you
And the river its banks.

The sea laps the great rocks
Because I love you
And takes no heed of the moon dragging it away
And saying coldly 'Constancy is not for you'.
The blackbird fills the air
Because I love you
With spring and lawns and shadows falling on lawns.

The people walk in the street and laugh
I love you
And far down the river ships sound their hooters
Crazy with joy because I love you.

Jenny Joseph

Regular readers of this blog will have seen this poem by R.S. Thomas before.

However, it is next in my schedule of "Making The World Go By" so here it is again.

A MARRIAGE

We met
under a shower
of bird-notes.

Fifty years passed,
love's moment
in a world in
servitude to time.

She was young;
I kissed with my eyes
closed - and opened
them on her wrinkles.

`Come,' said death,
choosing her as his
partner for
the last dance,

And she,
who in life
had done everything
with a bird's grace,
opened her bill now
for the shedding
of one sigh - no
heavier than a feather.

R.S. Thomas

Stephen Phillips (1864-1915) was an English poet and dramatist who enjoyed considerable popularity in his lifetime.

He was educated at Stratford and Peterborough Grammar Schools, and entered Queens' College, Cambridge; but during his first term at Cambridge, when F.R. Benson's dramatic company visited the town, he joined it, and for six years played various small parts.
(Wikipedia)

A DREAM

My dead love came to me, and said:
God gives me one hour's rest,
To spend with thee on earth again:
How shall we spend it best?'

'Why, as of old,' I said; and so
We quarrelled, as of old:
But, when I turned to make my peace,
That one short hour was told.

Stephen Philips

However, he did write poems too and here is one of them:

ON THE BALCONY

In front of the sombre mountains,
a faint, lost ribbon of rainbow
And between us and it, the thunder;
And down below in the green wheat,
the labourers stand like dark stumps,
still in the green wheat.
You are near to me, and naked feet
In their sandals, and through the
scent of the balcony's naked timber
I distinguish the scent of your hair:
so now the limber
Lightning falls from heaven.
Adown the pale-green glacier river floats
A dark boat through the gloom—
and whither? The thunder roars
But still we have each other!
The naked lightnings in the heavens dither
And disappear—
what have we but each other?
The boat has gone.

D.H. Lawrence

He wrote several poems under the title "Love Song" and here is one of them.

LOVE SONG

Sweep the house clean,
hang fresh curtains
in the windows
put on a new dress
and come with me!
The elm is scattering
its little loaves
of sweet smells
from a white sky!
Who shall hear of us
in the time to come?
Let him say there was
a burst of fragrance
from black branches.

William Carlos Williams

Here a young lady speaks of the difficulties of an old man making love and the assistance she could give.

A SONG OF A YOUNG LADY TO HER ANCIENT LOVER

Ancient Person, for whom I
All the flattering youth defy,
Long be it e'er thou grow old,
Aching, shaking, crazy cold;
But still continue as thou art,
Ancient Person of my heart.

On thy withered lips and dry,
Which like barren furrows lie,
Brooding kisses I will pour,
Shall thy youthful heart restore,
Such kind show'rs in autumn fall,
And a second spring recall;
Nor from thee will ever part,
Ancient Person of my heart.

Thy nobler parts, which but to name
In our sex would be counted shame,
By ages frozen grasp possest,
From their ice shall be released,
And, soothed by my reviving hand,
In former warmth and vigour stand.
All a lover's wish can reach,
For thy joy my love shall teach;
And for thy pleasure shall improve
All that art can add to love.
Yet still I love thee without art,
Ancient Person of my heart.

John Wilmot (Earl of Rochester)

I posted this poem by Thom Gunn here in July last year, but I am also including it in my forthcoming live poetry presentation of "Making The World Go Round" - so here it is again.

It was your birthday, we had drunk and dined
Half of the night with our old friend
Who'd showed us in the end
To a bed I reached in one drunk stride.
Already I lay snug,
And drowsy with the wine dozed on one side.
I dozed, I slept. My sleep broke on a hug,
Suddenly, from behind,
In which the full lengths of our bodies pressed:
Your instep to my heel,
My shoulder-blades against your chest.
It was not sex, but I could feel
The whole strength of your body set,
Or braced, to mine,
And locking me to you
As if we were still twenty-two
When our grand passion had not yet
Become familial.
My quick sleep had deleted all
Of intervening time and place.
I only knew
The stay of your secure firm dry embrace.

Thom Gunn

She has to reject her repulsive suitor by threatening to scream upon the suitor’s further advance. But ironically, the “coy mistress” may really wait until she dies; her true love may turn out to be her rejected constant wooer: Death.

PIAZZA PIECE

-- I am a gentleman in a dustcoat trying
To make you hear. Your ears are soft and small
And listen to an old man not at all,
They want the young men's whispering and sighing.
But see the roses on your trellis dying
And hear the spectral singing of the moon;
For I must have my lovely lady soon,
I am a gentleman in a dustcoat trying.

-- I am a lady young in beauty waiting
Until my truelove comes, and then we kiss.
But what grey man among the vines is this
Whose words are dry and faint as in a dream?
Back from my trellis, Sir, before I scream !
I am a lady young in beauty waiting.

John Crowe Ransom

Tennessee's pre-eminent poet and arguably the South's most influential literary critic and teacher, John Crowe Ransom was educated at Vanderbilt University, where he later taught English.

However, it does not have the same meaning as a square in Italy. The writer is American and in Southern U.S. where Ransom was born it denotes a porch or veranda.

Jane Kenyon (1947-1995) was an American writer who published four collections of poetry. In 1995 she was appointed New Hampshire's Poet Laureate.

In this poem she expresses her thoughts on being parted.

ALONE FOR A WEEK

I washed a load of clothes
and hung them out to dry.
Then I went up to town
and busied myself all day.
The sleeve of your best shirt
rose ceremonious
when I drove in; our night-
clothes twined and untwined in
a little gust of wind.
For me it was getting late;
for you, where you were, not.
The harvest moon was full
but sparse cloud made its light
not quite reliable.
The bed on your side seemed
as wide and flat as Kansas;
your pillow plump, cool,
and allegorical . . .

Today another couple share intimate time together, eating an orange.

STOLEN MOMENTS

What happened, happened once. So now it's best
in memory - an orange he sliced: the skin
unbroken, the knife, the chilled wedge
lifted to my mouth, his mouth, the thin
membrane between us, the exquisite orange,
tongue, orange, my nakedness and his,
the way he pushed me up against the fridge -
Now I get to feel his hands again, the kiss
that didn't last, but sent some neural twin
flashing wildly through the cortex. Love's
merciless, the way it travels in
and keeps emitting light. Beside the stove
we ate an orange. And there were purple flowers
on the table. And we still had hours.

Kim Addonizio

Kim Addonizio was born in Washington, D.C., in 1954. She has written three books of poetry and her latest collection, 'What Is This Thing Called Love', was published in 2004.

She currently teaches private poetry workshops in Oakland, California.

Sujata Bhatt is an Indian poet and was born in Ahmedabad, India, in 1956. She grew up in Pune, India, and in the United States. She received her MFA from the Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa, and now lives in Germany with her husband and daughter. She is the recipient of various awards, including the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (Asia) and the Cholmondeley Award.

Years later we'll remember the bathtub
the position of the taps
the water, slippery
as if a bucketful of eels had joined us ...
we'll be old, our children grown up
but we'll remember the water sloshing out
the useless soap,
the mountain of wet towels.
'Remember the bathtub in Belfast?'
we'll prod each other

Sujata Bhatt

Well, not really.

So here is a short poem, by Mark Strand, about love arriving late in life.

THE COMING OF LIGHT

Even this late it happens:
the coming of love, the coming of light.
You wake and the candles are lit as if by themselves,
stars gather, dreams pour into your pillows,
sending up warm bouquets of air.
Even this late the bones of the body shine
and tomorrow's dust flares into breath.

Mark Strand