Analysis of Love Sonnets

I.
HOW beautiful doth the morning rise
       O’er the hills, as from her bower a bride
       Comes brightened—blushing with the shame-faced pride
Of love that now consummated supplies
All her full heart can wish, and to the eyes
       Dear are the flowers then, in their green haunts spied,
       Glist ning with dew: pleasant at noon the side
Of shadowy mountains ridging to the skies:
At eve ’tis sweet to hear the breeze advance
   Through the responding forest dense and tall;
And sweeter in the moonlight is the dance
       And natural music of the waterfall:
       And yet we feel not the full charm of all,
Till love be near us with his magic glance.

II.
WHY tower my spirits, and what means this wild
       Commotion at my heart—this dreamy chase
       Of possible joys that glow like stars in space?
Now feel I even to all things reconciled,
As all were one in spirit. Rudely up-piled
       Brown hills grow beautiful; a novel grace
       Exalts the moorland’s once unmeaning face;
The river that, like a pure mind beguiled,
       Grows purer for its errors, and the trees
That fringe its margin with a dusky shade,
       Seem robed in fairy wonder; and are these
Exalted thus because with me surveyed
       By one sweet sould whom well they seem to please
Here at my side—an almost stranger maid?

III.
NOW sunny, as the noontide heavens, are
       The eyes of my sweet friend, and now serene
       And chastely shadowy in their maiden mien;
Or dream-power, sparkling like a brilliant star
Fills all their blue depths, taking me afar
       To where, in the rich past, through song is seen
       Some sovereign beauty, knighthood’s mystic queen,
Pluming with love the iron brows of war!
Bright eyes before, with subtle lightning glance
   Have kindled all my being into one
Wild tumult; but a charm thus to enhance
   My heart’s love-loyalty till now had none!
And can this witchery be the work of chance?
   I know not—I but know my rest is gone.

IV.
A VAST and shadowy hope breaks up my rest
       Unspoken; nor dares even my pen to write
       How my pent spirit pineth day and night
For one fair love with whom I might be blest!
And ever with vague jealousies possessed
       The more I languish, feeling these may so
       Oppress affection that for very woe
She longs at last to die deep buried in my breast!
O for a beaker of the wine of love,
   Or a deep draught of the Lethèan wave!
The power a mutual passion to emove,
   Or that repose which sealeth up the grave!
Yet these my bonds are blameless; one more wise
Had dreamt away his freedom, dreaming of her eyes.

V.
HER image haunts me! Lo! I muse at even,
       And straight it gathers from the gloom, to make
       My soul its mirror; which (as some still lake
Holds pictured in its depths the face of heaven)
Through the hushed night retains it: when ’tis given
       To take a warmer presence and incline
       A glowing cheek burning with love to mine,
Saying—“The heart for which thou long hast stiven
With looks so fancy-pale, I grant thee now;
   And if for ruth, yet more for love’s sweet sake,
My lips shall seal this promise on thy brow. ”
       Thus blest in sleep—oh! Who would care to wake,
       When the cold real from his belief must shake
Such vows, like blossoms from a shattered bough?

VI.
SHE loves me! From her own bliss-breathing lips
       The live confession came, like rich perfume
       From crimson petals bursting into bloom!
And still my heart at the remembrance skips
Like a young lion, and my tongue too trips
       As drunk with joy! While very object seen
       In life’s diurnal round wears in its mien
A clear assurance that no doubts eclipse.
And if the common things of nature now
       Are like old faces flushed with new delight,
Much more the consciousness of that rich vow
       Deepens the beauteous, and refines the bright,
       While throned I seem on love’s div