Poetry
How Do I Love Thee?
By Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
for the ends of Being and Ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right:
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise:
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith;
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, - I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! - and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Love is very patient and kind, never
jealous or envious, never boastful or
proud, never haughty or selfish or rude.
Love does not demand its own way. It
is not irritable or touchy. It does not hold
grudges and will hardly even notice when
others do it wrong. It is never glad about
injustice, but rejoices whenever truth wins out.
If you love someone you will be loyal to
him no matter what the cost. You will always
believe in him, always expect the best of him,
and always stand your ground in defending him.
All the special gifts and powers from God will
someday come to an end, but love goes on forever.
There are three things that remain --- faith,
hope, and love --- and the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8, 13
... the greatest ... is love
Shall I Compare Thee?
-- from Shakespeare's Sonnets
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date;
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade
When in eternal lines to time thou growest.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
This page was created on January 17, 1999 and last updated on August 28, 2000.
