• Had we but world enough, and time,
    This coyness, lady, were no crime.
    We would sit down and think which way
    To walk, and pass our long love's day;
    Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
    Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
    Of Humber would complain. I would
    Love you ten years before the Flood;
    And you should, if you please, refuse
    Till the conversion of the...

  • O Mistress mine, where are you roaming?
    O stay and hear! your true-love’s coming
    That can sing both high and low;
    Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
    Journeys end in lovers’ meeting—
    Every wise man’s son doth know.

    What is love? ‘tis not hereafter;
    Present mirth hath present laughter;
    What’s to come is still unsure:
    In delay there lies no plenty,—...

  • From “Twelfth Night,” Act II. Sc. 3.

    O MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming?
    O, stay and hear! your true-love ’s coming
      That can sing both high and low;
    Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
    Journeys end in lovers’ meeting,—
      Every wise man’s son doth know.

    What is love? ’t is not hereafter;
    Present mirth hath present laughter;...

  • Whoe’er she be,
    That not impossible She
    That shall command my heart and me:

    Where’er she lie,
    Locked up from mortal eye
    In shady leaves of destiny:

    Till that ripe birth
    Of studied Fate stand forth,
    And teach her fair steps tread our earth;

    Till that divine
    Idea take a shrine
    Of crystal flesh, through...

  • Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia
    YOU meaner beauties of the night,
      That poorly satisfy our eyes
    More by your number than your light,—
      You common people of the skies,
      What are you when the moon shall rise?

    You curious chanters of the wood,
      That warble forth Dame Nature’s lays,
    Thinking your passions understood
      By your...