Love
Let me but love my love without disguise,Nor wear a mask of fashion old or new,Nor wait to speak till I can hear a clue,Nor play a part to shine in others' eyes,Nor bow my knees to what my heart denies;But what I am, to that let me be true,And let me worship where my love is due,And so through love and worship let me rise.
For love is but the heart's immortal thirstTo be completely known and all forgiven,Even as sinful souls that enter Heaven:So take me, dear, and understand my worst,And freely pardon it, because confessed,And let me find in loving thee, my best.
Words in this poem
- clue n.
- A ball of thread, yarn, or cord; also, The thread itself. [OE. clewe, clowe, clue, AS. cleowen, cliwen, clywe ball of thread; akin to D. kluwen, OHG. chliwa, chliuwa, G. dim. kleuel, knäuel, and perch. to L. gluma hull,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Love is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Henry Van Dyke, Project Gutenberg ebook #16229; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry Van Dyke, Love, in The Poems of Henry Van Dyke (1925), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #16229, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/van-dyke-poems/love.html, id L22801.
Form and metre
Love is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 95%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAABBA disguiseA · newB · clueB · eyesA · deniesA · trueB · dueB · riseA
- 2 A--ABB thirstA · forgiven · heaven · worstA · confessedB · bestB
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Let me but love my love without disguise, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Nor wear a mask of fashion old or new, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Nor wait to speak till I can hear a clue, | 10 | ·········· |
| Nor play a part to shine in others' eyes, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Nor bow my knees to what my heart denies; | 10 | ········˘/ |
| But what I am, to that let me be true, | 10 | ·········· |
| And let me worship where my love is due, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| And so through love and worship let me rise. | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| For love is but the heart's immortal thirst | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| To be completely known and all forgiven, | 11 | ··˘/˘···˘/˘ |
| Even as sinful souls that enter Heaven: | 11 | /˘·/˘··/˘/˘ |
| So take me, dear, and understand my worst, | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| And freely pardon it, because confessed, | 10 | ·/˘/˘···˘/ |
| And let me find in loving thee, my best. | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.