You cannot love, my pretty heart, and why? There was a time you told me that you would; But now again you will the same deny, If it might please you, would to God you could. What, will you hate? Nay, that you will not, neither. Nor love nor hate, how then? What will you do? What, will you keep a mean then betwixt either, Or will you love me and yet hate me, too? Yet serves this not. What next? What other shift? You will, and will not; what a coil is here. I see your craft, now I perceive your drift, And all this while I was mistaken there; Your love and hate is this, I now do prove you: You love in hate, by hate to make me love you. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...TO CERTAIN JOURNEYMEN by CARL SANDBURG THE BELEAGUERED CITY by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW ON THE SLAIN AT CHICKAMAUGA by HERMAN MELVILLE FELISE by ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE THE WANDERER: 1. IN ITALY: ONCE by EDWARD ROBERT BULWER-LYTTON SKETCH - PORTRAIT OF CREECH THE BOOKSELLER by ROBERT BURNS TO LADY B- W-, PRESENTING THE AUTHOR WITH A MOIETY OF A LOTTERY TICKET by JOHN BYROM |