A ghost, that loved a lady fair, Ever in the starry air Of midnight at her pillow stood; And, with a sweetness skies above The luring words of human … - Thomas Lovell Beddoes

If thou wilt ease thine heart
Of love and all its smart, Then sleep, dear, sleep;
And not a sorrow Hang any tear on your eyelashes; Lie still and deep, Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes
The rim o’ the sun to-morrow, In eastern sky.But wilt thou cure thine heart
Of love and all its smart, Then die, dear, die;
’Tis deeper, sweeter, Than on a rose-bank to lie dreaming With folded eye; And there alone, amid the beaming
Of Love’s stars, thou’lt meet her In eastern sky.

Why, Rome was naked once, a bastard smudge,
Tumbled on straw, the denfellow of whelps,
Fattened on roots, and, when a-thirst for milk,
He crept beneath and drank the swagging udder
Of Tyber’s brave she-wolf; and Heaven’s Judea
Was folded in a pannier.

How many times do I love thee, dear? Tell me how many thoughts there be In the atmosphere Of a new-fall’n year,
Whose white and sable hours appear The latest flake of Eternity:
So many times do I love thee, dear.How many times do I love again? Tell me how many beads there are In a silver chain Of evening rain,
Unravell’d from the tumbling main, And threading the eye of a yellow star:
So many times do I love again.