Adela Florence Cory Nicolson Short Poems
Famous Short Adela Florence Cory Nicolson Poems. Short poetry by famous poet Adela Florence Cory Nicolson. A collection of the all-time best Adela Florence Cory Nicolson short poems
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
When first I loved, I gave my very soul
Utterly unreserved to Love's control,
But Love deceived me, wrenched my youth away
And made the gold of life for ever grey.
Long I lived lonely, yet I tried in vain
With any other Joy to stifle pain;
There is no other joy, I learned to know,
And so returned to Love, as long ago.
Yet I, this little while ere I go hence,
Love very lightly now, in self-defence.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
A little breeze blew over the sea,
And it came from far away,
Across the fields of millet and rice,
All warm with sunshine and sweet with spice,
It lifted his curls and kissed him thrice,
As upon the deck he lay.
It said, "Oh, idle upon the sea,
Awake and with sleep have done,
Haul up the widest sail of the prow,
And come with me to the rice fields now,
She longs, oh, how can I tell you how,
To show you your first-born son!"
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
You never loved me, and yet to save me,
One unforgetable night you gave me
Such chill embraces as the snow-covered heights
Receive from clouds, in northern, Auroral nights.
Such keen communion as the frozen mere
Has with immaculate moonlight, cold and clear.
And all desire,
Like failing fire,
Died slowly, faded surely, and sank to rest
Against the delicate chillness of your breast.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
When I am dying, lean over me tenderly, softly,
Stoop, as the yellow roses droop in the wind from the South.
So I may, when I wake, if there be an Awakening,
Keep, what lulled me to sleep, the touch of your lips on my mouth.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
Give me your self one hour; I do not crave
For any love, or even thought, of me.
Come, as a Sultan may caress a slave
And then forget for ever, utterly.
Come! as west winds, that passing, cool and wet,
O'er desert places, leave them fields in flower
And all my life, for I shall not forget,
Will keep the fragrance of that perfect hour!
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
Dear is my inlaid sword; across the Border
It brought me much reward; dear is my Mistress,
The jewelled treasure of an amorous hour.
Dear beyond measure are my dreams and Fancies.
These I adore; for these I live and labour,
Holding them more than sword or jewelled Mistress,
For this indeed may rust, and that prove faithless,
But, till my limbs are dust, I have my Fancies.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
As one may sip a Stranger's Bowl
You gave yourself but not your soul.
I wonder, now that time has passed,
Where you will come to rest at last.
You gave your beauty for an hour,
I held it gently as a flower.
You wished to leave me, told me so,—
I kissed your feet and let you go.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
My life was like an Aloe flower, beneath an orient sky,
Your sunshine touched it for an hour; it blossomed but to die.
Torn up, cast out, on rubbish heaps where red flames work their will
Each atom of the Aloe keeps the flower-time fragrance still.
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
Song of Khan Zada
Only in August my heart was aflame,
Catching the scent of your Wind-stirred hair,
Now, though you spread it to soften my sleep
Through the night, I should hardly care.
Only last August I drank that water
Because it had chanced to cool your hands;
When love is over, how little of love
Even the lover understands!
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
You are my God, and I would fain adore You
With sweet and secret rites of other days.
Burn scented oil in silver lamps before You,
Pour perfume on Your feet with prayer and praise.
Yet are we one; Your gracious condescension
Granted, and grants, the loveliness I crave.
One, in the perfect sense of Eastern mention,
"Gold and the Bracelet, Water and the Wave."
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
This passion is but an ember
Of a Sun, of a Fire, long set;
I could not live and remember,
And so I love and forget.
You say, and the tone is fretful,
That my mourning days were few,
You call me over forgetful—
My God, if you only knew!
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
Just in the hush before dawn
A little wistful wind is born.
A little chilly errant breeze,
That thrills the grasses, stirs the trees.
And, as it wanders on its way,
While yet the night is cool and dark,
The first carol of the lark,—
Its plaintive murmurs seem to say
"I wait the sorrows of the day."
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
As those who eat a Luscious Fruit, sunbaked,
Full of sweet juice, with zest, until they find
It finished, and their appetite unslaked,
And so return and eat the pared-off rind;—
We, who in Youth, set white and careless teeth
In the Ripe Fruits of Pleasure while they last,
Later, creep back to gnaw the cast-off sheath,
And find there is no Rival like the Past.