And yet, because I love thee, I obtain From that same love this vindicating grace, To live on still in love, and yet in vain

My sun sets to raise again.

The Holy Night We sate among the stalls at Bethlehem; The dumb kine from their fodder turning them, Softened their horned faces To almost human gazes Toward the newly Born: The simple shepherds from the star-lit brooks Brought visionary looks, As yet in their astonied hearing rung The strange sweet angel-tongue: The magi of the East, in sandals worn, Knelt reverent, sweeping round, With long pale beards, their gifts upon the ground, The incense, myrrh, and gold These baby hands were impotent to hold: So let all earthlies and celestials wait Upon thy royal state. Sleep, sleep, my kingly One!

The world's male chivalry has perished out, but women are knights-errant to the last; and, if Cervantes had been greater still, he had made his Don a Donna.

My love for him was so exquisitely pure that if we all were capable of giving and receiving such a beautiful gift the world would be a far more brilliant place; I think we'd all be poets.

The critics could never mortify me out of heart - because I love poetry for its own sake, - and, tho' with no stoicism and some ambition, care more for my poems than for my poetic reputation.

The least flower, with brimming cup, may stand and share its dew drop with another near.