I walked beside the evening sea
And dreamed a dream that could not be;
The waves that plunged along the shore
Said only: "Dreamer, dream no more!"
- - - -George William Curtis

And with tears of blood he cleansed the hand,
The hand that held the steel:
For only blood can wipe out blood,
And only tears can heal.
- - - -Oscar Wilde "The Ballad of Reading Gaol"

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.
- - - -William Shakespeare "Sonnet 18"

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy, golden storm,
yes many loved before us, I know we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but now it's come to distances and both of us must try,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
- - - - Leonard Cohen "Hey That's No Way to Say Good-bye"

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness -
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!
- - - -Edward Fitzgerald "The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam"

Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.
- - - -Ben Johnson "To Celia"

By the time you swear you're his,
Shivering and sighing,
And he vows his passion is
Infinite, undying -
Lady make note of this:
One of you is lying.
- - - -Dorothy Parker "Unfortunate Coincidence"

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
- - - -William Butler Yeats

I have loved many, the more and the few -
I have loved many that I might love you.
- - - -Grace Fallow Norton