Classic Love Poems
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John Keats (1795-1821) was an English poet who, along with George Gordon, Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, became one of the key figures of the Romantic movement. During his short life, his work was not well received by critics; but his posthumous influence on poets, such as Alfred, Lord Tennyson and Wilfred Owen, was significant. Keats’ poetry was characterized by elaborate word choice and sensual imagery. His odes, including Ode on a Grecian Urn and Ode to a Nightingale, which many consider to be his most distinctive poetical achievements, were all composed in 1819.
“The Stroll”
by Claude Monet, 1875
—John Keats
Frances “Fanny” Brawne, 1850s
Jane Campion’s stunning film, “Bright Star,” (2009) tells the story of John Keats and the love affair with Fanny Brawne that inspired his finest poetry. Read more
Asleep! O Sleep a Little While, White Pearl!
Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl!
And let me kneel, and let me pray to thee,
And let me call Heaven’s blessing on thine eyes,
And let me breathe into the happy air,
That doth enfold and touch thee all about,
Vows of my slavery, my giving up,
My sudden adoration, my great love!
Sharing Eve’s Apple
O Blush not so! O blush not so!
Or I shall think you knowing;
And if you smile the blushing while,
Then maidenheads are going.
There’s a blush for want, and a blush for shan’t,
And a blush for having done it;
There’s a blush for thought, and a blush for nought,
And a blush for just begun it.
O sigh not so! O sigh not so!
For it sounds of Eve’s sweet pippin;
By these loosen’d lips you have tasted the pips
And fought in an amorous nipping.
Will you play once more at nice-cut-core,
For it only will last our youth out,
And we have the prime of the kissing time,
We have not one sweet tooth out.
There’s a sigh for aye, and a sigh for nay,
And a sigh for “I can’t bear it!”
O what can be done, shall we stay or run?
O cut the sweet apple and share it!
I Cry Your Mercy—Pity—Love!—Ay, Love!
I cry your mercy—pity—love!—ay, love!
Merciful love that tantalises not
One-thoughted, never-wandering, guileless love,
Unmask’d, and being seen—without a blot!
O! let me have thee whole,—all—all—be mine!
That shape, that fairness, that sweet minor zest
Of love, your kiss,—those hands, those eyes divine,
That warm, white, lucent, million-pleasured breast,—
Yourself—your soul—in pity give me all,
Withhold no atom’s atom or I die,
Or living on, perhaps, your wretched thrall,
Forget, in the mist of idle misery,
Life’s purposes,—the palate of my mind
Losing its gust, and my ambition blind!
You Say You Love Me
You say you love; but with a voice
Chaster than a nun’s, who singeth
The soft Vespers to herself
While the chime-bell ringeth—
O love me truly!
You say you love; but with a smile
Cold as sunrise in September,
As you were Saint Cupid ’s nun,
And kept his weeks of Ember.
O love me truly!
You say you love but then your lips
Coral tinted teach no blisses,
More than coral in the sea
They never pout for kisses
O love me truly!
You say you love; but then your hand
No soft squeeze for squeeze returneth,
It is like a statue’s dead
While mine to passion burneth
O love me truly!
O breathe a word or two of fire!
Smile, as if those words should bum me,
Squeeze as lovers should O kiss
And in thy heart inurn me!
O love me truly!
on “Keats, John”
