Algernon Charles Swinburne Love Quotations

Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives.

There lived a singer in France of old By the tideless dolorous midland sea. In a land of sand and rain and gold There shone one woman, and none but she.

Love, till dawn sunder night from day with fire Dividing my delight and my desire...

For the crown of our life as it closes Is darkness, the fruit thereof dust; No thorns go as deep as a rose's, And love is more cruel than lust. Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; And marriage and death and division Make barren our lives.

Love, as is told by the seers of old, Comes as a butterfly tipped with gold, Flutters and flies in sunlit skies, Weaving round hearts that were one time cold.

I that have love and no more Give you but love of you, sweet; He that hath more, let him give; He that hath wings, let him soar; Mine is the heart at your feet Here, that must love you to live.

Love is more cruel than lust.

Marvellous mercies and infinite love.

Time turns the old days to derision, Our loves into corpses or wives; And marriage and death and division Make barren our lives.