Poem - Betrayal

May

Sara Teasdale

The wind is tossing the lilacs,

The new leaves laugh in the sun,

And the petals fall on the orchard wall,

But for me the spring is done.

Beneath the apple blossoms

I go a wintry way,

For love that smiled in April

Is false to me in May.

La Belle Dame sans Merci

John Keats

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

Alone and palely loitering?

The sedge has withered from the lake,

And no birds sing.

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

So haggard and so woe-begone?

The squirrel's granary is full,

And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,

With anguish moist and fever-dew,

And on thy cheeks a fading rose

Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,

Full beautiful - a faery's child,

Her hair was long, her foot was light,

And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,

And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;

She looked at me as she did love,

And made sweet moan.

I set her on my pacing steed,

And nothing else saw all day long,

For sidelong would she bend, and sing

A faery's song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,

And honey wild, and manna-dew,

And sure in language strange she said -

'I love thee true'.

She took me to her elfin grot,

And there she wept and sighed full sore,

And there I shut her wild wild eyes

With kisses four.

And there she lulled me asleep

And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! -

The latest dream I ever dreamt

On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,

Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;

They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci

Hath thee in thrall!'

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,

With horrid warning gaped wide,

And I awoke and found me here,

On the cold hill's side.

And this is why I sojourn here

Alone and palely loitering,

Though the sedge is withered from the lake,

And no birds sing.

There is a tavern in the town

Anonymous

There is a tavern in the town, in the town,

And there my true love sits him down, sits him down,

And drinks his wine 'mid laughter free,

And never, never thinks of me.

Fare thee well, for I must leave thee,

Do not let this parting grieve thee,

And remember that the best of friends must part, must part.

Adieu, adieu, kind friends, adieu, adieu, adieu!

I can no longer stay with you, stay with you,

I'll hang my harp on a weeping willow tree,

And may the world go well with thee.

The Time When I First Fell in Love

Anonymous

The time when first I fell in love,

Which now I must lament;

The year wherein I lost such time

To compass my content.

The day wherein I saw too late

The follies of a lover;

The hour wherein I found such loss

As care cannot recover.

And last, the minute of mishap,

Which makes me thus to plain

The doleful fruits of lover's suits,

Which labour lose in vain:

Doth make me solemnly protest,

As I with pain do prove,

There is no time, year, day, nor hour,

Nor minute, good to love.

To my Inconstant Mistress

Thomas Carew

When thou, poor excommunicate

From all the joys of love, shalt see

The full reward and glorious fate

Which my strong faith shall purchase me,

Then curse thine own inconstancy.