“ O shepherds, tell me, have you seen
This banished Love come wandering by?
Why shines the sun, regret to mock,
Why flaunt the flowers in hues so gay,
Why skip with joy the snowy flock,
When poor lost Love is far away? ”

“ Home turning for the noonday rest;
Yet here he lingers many a day. [26]
His gold curls gleam, his lips are gay,
His eyes through tears smile loveliest;
I did not dream that love would stay.
He sometimes sighs when far away
The low red sun makes fair the west,
Yet here he lingers many a day.
Thrice blest of all men am I! yea,
Although of all unworthiest;
I did not dream that Love would stay,
Yet here he lingers many a day.
Graham R. Tomson.
CUPID
Selfish rogue, did Psyche dream,
When her lamp she held above him,
How the oil would downward stream,
Wake the rogue and make her love him? ”

“ Where Honour Cupid’s rival is,
There miracles are seen of his.
If Cynthia crave her ring of me,
I blot her name out of the tree;
If doubt do darken things held dear,
Then well-fare nothing, once a year;
For many run, but one must win,
Fools only hedge the cuckoo in. [76]
The worth that worthiness should move,
Is Love, that is the bow of Love;
And love as well the foster can,
As can the mighty noble-man:—
Sweet saint, ’tis true, you worthy be,
Yet, without love, nought worth to me.
Fulke Greville.
A KISS
You ask me what’s a kiss? ”

“ Cupid plague thee for thy treason! [32]
Now I see, O seemly cruel,
Others warm them at my fuel,
Wit shall guide me in this durance
Since in love is no assurance:
Change thy pasture, take thy pleasure,
Beauty is a fading treasure.
Siren, pleasant foe to reason,
Cupid plague thee for thy treason! ”

“ For very wilfulness. Love hath no heart!
If he should wake, these red-ripe lips would part
In laughter low to see this ravished rose.
Love lies a-sleeping: so the full-blown rose
Falls to the earth a dead unpitied thing;
The grasses ’neath the breeze deep-sighing part
And sway; and as thy warm breath comes and goes
In motion with the red tides of thy heart,
The song is hushed which Love was wont to sing.
Love lies a-sleeping: thus in dreams he goes;
Strive not to waken him, but tell thy heart.
“Love lies a-sleeping, and he may not sing.”
Charles W. Coleman, Jun.
[53]
CUPID’S ARROWS ”

“ My love is fair, my love is gay,
As fresh as are the flowers in May;
And of my love the roundelay,
My merry, merry roundelay,
Concludes with Cupid’s curse:
They that do change old love for new,
Pray gods they change for worse!
My love can pipe, my love can sing,
My love can many a pretty thing,
And of his lovely praises ring
My merry, merry roundelays.
Amen to Cupid’s curse!
They that do change old love for new,
Pray gods they change for worse!
George Peele.
[12]
LOVE’S FLITTING
When Love is coming, coming,
Meet him with songs and joy,
Bid him alight and enter,
Flatter and feast the boy ”

“ And lurk in the flowers that swing in the breeze;
There counting the kisses, the sweet stolen blisses,
Of Strephon and Phyllis in languorous ease.
We trifle and putter, our hearts in a flutter,
In a tangled skein spun by the toiletted fair,
The weary hours whiling, and dull care beguiling—
Lo! dimpled and smiling, you’re loitering there!
O wary elf Cupid, O cunning, coy Cupid,
Are lovers all stupid, dear, rollicking boy?
While maidens are sighing and love-knots are tying,
The snap of your bow-string bodes sorrow and joy!
Harold Van Santvoord.
[16]
BANISHED LOVE
O shepherds! ”

“ Though beauty be a killing dart,
It is no armour for the heart.
Sir George Etherege.
[71]
LOVE AND MISCHIEF
One sunny day Love chose to stray
Adown a rosy path forbidden,
Where Mischief deep in ambush lay,
And watched his snare ’neath flowers hidden:
Love tumbling in, began to shout
For Mischief’s aid, lest he should smother:
“You little demon, let me out,
Or I’ll report you to my mother.”
Said Mischief, “I’ll not set you free
Unless you share your power with me,
And give of every heart you gain,
One-half to joy and half to pain.”
Love struggled, but in vain, alas! ”

“ Poor little maid, she’d let the witches in with Love.
Mary E. Wilkins.
[40]
LOVE AND DREAM
Cupid, wandering one May-day,
Met with loitering Death by chance;
No aged carl as many say,
But young as he, as fair and gay,
As fond of boyish sport or dance.
“Come, wrestle,” and, so saying, Love,
Loos’ning the quiver at his breast,
Hung it upon the bough above.
“These arrows,” quoth he, “when they rove,
Make youth a slave at my behest.”
Among the tender-blooming leaves
Death made his quiver sure and fast,
“My arrows bring rest when age grieves,”
And down unwary Love he heaves ”

“ And upon the maid he gazes,
Grasps an arrow at his side,
And his silver bow upraises.
Swift the maiden turns to flee;
Swift the arrow follows after,
Wounding in its flight a tree:
Hark! how rings the maid’s clear laughter.
Cupid, with sleep-dazzled eyes,
Stares a moment through the bushes
Where the laughing maid still flies,
Then adown the wood he rushes.
Now the shaft o’ertakes the quarry,
Now it cleaves poor Phœbe’s heart—
Maidens, ere you wake Love, tarry
First to filch his every dart.
James B. Kenyon.
[54]
THE GROWTH OF LOVE
Ah, Chloris! ”

“ Is he a god,—why doth he men deride?
No one of these, but one compact of all:
A wilful boy, a man still dealing blows,
Of purpose blind to lead men to their thrall:
A god that rules unruly—God, he knows. ”

“ If I love you, and you love me,
’Tis for substantial reasons, sweet—
For something other than we see,
That satisfies, though incomplete;
Or, if not satisfies, is yet
Not mutable, where so much dies:
Who love, as we, do not regret
There is a fillet on Love’s eyes!
Richard Henry Stoddard.
[67]
[68]
THE ARCHERY MATCH
She fits the arrow to its place,
She bends the bow with skill and grace,
The feathered shaft lets fly;
A look of triumph lights her face—
The score’s a tie!
Dan Cupid, who’s a bowman true,
Then boldly tries what he can do
To bind the tie fore’er ”

“ Love looks aloft, and laughs to scorn all such as griefs annoy,
The more extreme their passions be, the greater is his joy,
Thus Love, as victor of the field, triumphs above the rest,
And joys to see his subjects lie with living death in breast;
But dire Disdain lets drive a shaft, and galls this bragging fool,
He plucks his plumes, unbends his bow, and sets him new to school; [46]
Whereby this boy that bragged late, as conqueror over all,
Now yields himself unto Disdain, his vassal and his thrall.
William Hunnis.
CUPID RELIEVED
As once young Cupid went astray,
The little god I found ”

“ Southeast and southwest of it, shoulders I note—
No curves are more graceful, or lighter.
In the south of her bosom, a bit to the west,
Is the greatest of all of her beauties:
My loadstar’s the heart that is hid in her breast;
To obey it’s my sweetest of duties.
S. D. Smith, Jr.
[60]
LOVE IS DEAD
Ring out your bells! ”

“ The beleaguering little rogue never quits the field defeated,—to him no suit is hopeless.
If some of the verses are not of high value as compositions they are all-important when considered relative to the subject, and a majority of the poems are of unquestionable literary merit.
I beg to acknowledge the gracious favor of The Century Co., Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Life Publishing Co., Frederick A. Stokes Co., G. P. Putnam’s Sons, Charles Scribner’s Sons, Cassell Publishing Co., and D. Appleton & Co., for the use of copyright poems. ”