Love is the only duty that we know.

For this is wisdom- to love and live To take what fate or the Gods may give, To ask no question, to make no prayer, To kiss the lips and caress the hair, Speed passion's ebb as we greet its flow, To have and to hold, and, in time--let go.

One bitter time of mourning, I remember, When day, and night, my sad heart did complain, My life, I said, was one cold, bleak December, And all its pleasures, were but whited pain.

A day which passed without a poem from my pen I considered lost and misused.

Talk happiness. The world is sad enough without your woe. No path is wholly rough.

That each sorrow has its purpose, By the sorrowing oft unguessed, But as sure as the sun brings morning, Whatever is-is best.

Ah, lady! it is hardly what you thought it, This life of luxury and social power; You gave yourself as principal, and bought it, But God extracts the interest hour by hour.