Why, My Heart, Do We Love Her So?

Why, my heart, do we love her so?
(Geraldine, Geraldine!)
Why does the great sea ebb and flow? -
Why does the round world spin?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Bid me my life renew:
What is it worth unless I win,
Love - love and you?

Why, my heart, when we speak her name
(Geraldine, Geraldine!)
Throbs the word like a flinging flame? -
Why does the Spring begin?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Bid me indeed to be:
Open your heart, and take us in,
Love - love and me.

William Ernest Henley

William Ernest Henley was an English poet, critic, and editor. Despite battling tuberculosis from a young age, Henley is best known for his resilience and strength, qualities exemplified in his most famous poem, 'Invictus'. Henley was also a notable figure in the literary circles of his time, befriending and influencing key writers, such as Robert Louis Stevenson, who modeled the character Long John Silver after him.

William Ernest Henley

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William Ernest Henley, Simple Poetry

English

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Rhymes And Rhythms - V

Why, my heart, do we love her so?
(Geraldine, Geraldine!)
Why does the great sea ebb and flow?
Why does the round world spin?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Bid me my life renew,
What is it worth unless I win,
Love, love and you?

Why, my heart, when we speak her name
(Geraldine, Geraldine!),
Throbs the word like a flinging flame?
Why does the spring begin?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Bid me indeed to be,
Open your heart and take us in,
Love, love and me.

William Ernest Henley

Why I Love Her

Why do I love my sweetheart?    Well
    I really never tried to tell.
I love her mayhap for her smile,
    So innocent and free from guile.

Perhaps I love her for her mien,
    So calmly cheerful and serene;
Or it may be her silken hair,
    First caught and tangled Cupid there.

And since I came to analyse;
    Her chiefest beauty is her eyes.
Her mouth, too, that is Cupid's bow -
    Perhaps that's why I love her so.

And now I think of it, her voice
    First made my rusty heart rejoice
And then her hand -'tis my belief
    It quite outvies the lily leaf.

Perhaps I love her for her ways
    That blend in with the sunny days.
Tush -to be brief and plain with you,
    I love her just because I do.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Window

ON THE HILL.

The lights and shadows fly!
Yonder it brightens and darkens down on the plain.
A jewel, a jewel dear to a lovers eye!
Oh is it the brook, or a pool, or her window pane,
When the winds are up in the morning?

Clouds that are racing above,
And winds and lights and shadows that cannot be still,
All running on one way to the home of my love,
You are all running on, and I stand on the slope of the hill,
And the winds are up in the morning!

Follow, follow the chase!
And my thoughts are as quick and as quick, ever on, on, on.
O lights, are you flying over her sweet little face?
And my heart is there before you are come, and gone,
When the winds are up in the morning!

Follow them down the slope
And I follow them down to the wi...

Alfred Lord Tennyson

The Spring, My Dear

The spring, my dear,
Is no longer spring.
Does the blackbird sing
What he sang last year?
Are the skies the old
Immemorial blue?
Or am I, or are you,
Grown cold?

Though life be change,
It is hard to bear
When the old sweet air
Sounds forced and strange.
To be out of tune,
Plain You and I . . .
It were better to die,
And soon!

William Ernest Henley

A Midsummer Holiday:- VII. In The Water

The sea is awake, and the sound of the song of the joy of her waking is rolled
From afar to the star that recedes, from anear to the wastes of the wild wide shore.
Her call is a trumpet compelling us homeward: if dawn in her east be acold,
From the sea shall we crave not her grace to rekindle the life that it kindled before,
Her breath to requicken, her bosom to rock us, her kisses to bless as of yore?
For the wind, with his wings half open, at pause in the sky, neither fettered nor free,
Leans waveward and flutters the ripple to laughter and fain would the twain of us be
Where lightly the wave yearns forward from under the curve of the deep dawns dome,
And, full of the morning and fired with the pride of the glory thereof and the glee,
Strike out from the shore as the heart in us bids and bes...

Algernon Charles Swinburne

Geraldine

Just as the sun went bathing in a sea
Of liquid amber, flecked with caps of gold, I told
The sweet old story unto Geraldine, my Queen,
Who long hath made the whole of life for me.

But though she smiled upon me yesterday,
And heaven seemed near because she was so kind, I find
She held me but as one of many men; and then
Dismissed me in her proud, yet gracious way.

Ah, Geraldine! my lady of sweet arts,
There waits for thee not very far away, a day
When thou shalt waken out of tranquil sleep, and weep
Such bitter tears as spring from anguished hearts.

Thou shalt look in thy mirror with dismay
To find upon each feature of thy face, the trace
Of time, the lover who shall follow thee, and see
Thy rare youth slipping suddenly away.

So self-ass...

Ella Wheeler Wilcox