ALL loves have frailer roots than loves that start From one ancestral blood. The friends we find In youth pass on before us, or behind Are dropped, or on diverging paths depart, While branches from one trunk still own one heart, And bud and bear from one maternal mind. Sister and brother need no vows to bind Their pre-ordained alliance, nor the art Of lovers plotting through a thousand fears Lest love, of passion born, should fade or change; Nor dread the undermining drip of years; Nor stand on forms that other souls estrange. Such love is ours, and theirs who bear our name, Born in the honored home from which we came. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE ARCHITECT AT THE EDGE OF THE SEA by KAREN SWENSON TO THE SHADE OF PO CHU-I by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS TOM'S GARLAND: UPON THE UNEMPLOYED by GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS CHILD OF THE ROMANS by CARL SANDBURG THE SWAN SONG OF PARSON AVERY by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER LILIES: 20. 'SOME DAY I WILL TELL YOU' by GEORGE BARLOW (1847-1913) THE FISHERMAN by GAMALIEL BRADFORD EPITAPH ON MR. JOHN SMYTH, CHAPLAIN TO THE EARL OF PEMBROKE by WILLIAM BROWNE (1591-1643) |