Sara Teasdale Quotes

The Net

I made you many and many a song,
Yet never one told all you are — It was as though a net of words
Were flung to catch a star;

It was as though I curved my hand
And dipped sea-water eagerly,
Only to find it lost the blue
Dark splendor of the sea.

Now at last I have come to see what life is,
Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun,
And the brave victories that seem so splendid
Are never really won.

Even love that I built my spirit's house for,
Comes like a brooding and a baffled guest,
And music and men's praise and even laughter
Are not so good as rest.

Love me with your whole heart
Or give no love to me,
Half-love is a poor thing,
Neither bond nor free.

You must love me gladly
Soul and body too,
Or else find a new love,
And good-by to you.

It will not change now
After so many years;
Life has not broken it
With parting or tears;
Death will not alter it,
It will live on
In all my songs for you
When I am gone.

If I can sing, I still am free.

She must be rich who can forego
An hour so jewelled with delight,
She must have teasuries of joy
That she can draw on day and night,
She must be very sure of heaven–
Or is it only that she feels
How much more safe it is to lack
A thing that time so often steals.

We are two eagles
Flying together
Under the heavens,
Over the mountains,
Stretched on the wind.
Sunlight heartens us,
Blind snow baffles us,
Clouds wheel after us
Ravelled and thinned.

We are like eagles
But when Death harries us,
Human and humbled
When one of us goes,
Let the other follow,
Let the flight be ended,
Let the fire blacken,
Let the book close.

You bound strong sandals on my feet,
You gave me bread and wine,
And sent me under sun and stars,
For all the world was mine.

Oh, take the sandals off my feet,
You know not what you do;
For all the world is in your arms,
My sun and stars are you.

I have come to bury Love
Beneath a tree,
In the forest tall and black
Where none can see.
I shall put no flowers at his head,
Nor stone at his feet,
For the mouth I loved so much
Was bittersweet.
I shall go no more to his grave,
For the woods are cold.
I shall gather as much of joy
As my hands can hold.
I shall stay all day in the sun
Where the wide winds blow, — But oh, I shall cry at night
When none will know.

Oh, I could let the world go by,
Its loud new wonders and its wars,
BUt how will I give up the sky
When winter dusk is set with stars?

And I could let the cities go,
Their changing customs and their creeds,–
In silver on the jewel-weeds!

Never again the music blown as brightly
Off of my heart as foam blown off a wave;
Never again the melody that lightly
Caressed my grief and healed the wounds it gave.

Never again–I hear my dark thoughts clashing
Sullen and blind as waves that beat a wall–
Age that is coming, summer that is going,
All I have lost or never found at all.

Those who love the most,
Do not talk of their love,
Francesca, Guinevere,
Deirdre, Iseult, Heloise,
In the fragrant gardens of heaven
Are silent, or speak if at all
Of fragile inconsequent things.

And a woman I used to know
Who loved one man from her youth,
Against the strength of the fates
Fighting in somber pride
Never spoke of this thing,
But hearing his name by chance,
A light would pass over her face. — Sara Teasdale, “Those Who Love,” The Poems of Sara Teasdale (Neeland Media LLC, July 1, 2004)

"I came at last to the ocean
And found it wild and black,
And I cried to the windless valleys,
"Be kind and take me back!

I would beat with your heart as it beats, I would follow your soul
as it leads.

I hoped that he would love me,
And he has kissed my mouth,
But I am like a stricken bird
That cannot reach the south.
For though I know he loves me,
To-night my heart is sad;
His kiss was not so wonderful
As all the dreams I had.