Helen of Troy, and Other Poems

“Stephen kissed me in the spring,Robin in the fall,But Colin only looked at meAnd never kissed at all.Stephen’s kiss was lost in jest,Robin’s lost in play,But the kiss in Colin’s eyesHaunts me night and day.””

— Sara Teasdale

“It is strange how often a heart must be broken Before the years can make it wise.””

— Sara Teasdale

“Places I love come back to me like music,Hush me and heal me when I am very tired;I see the oak woods at Saxton's flamingIn a flare of crimson by the frost newly fired;And I am thirsty for the spring in the valleyAs for a kiss ungiven and long desired.I know a bright world of snowy hills at Boonton,A blue and white dazzling light on everything one sees,The ice-covered branches of the hemlocks sparkleBending low and tinkling in the sharp thin breeze,And iridescent crystals fall and crackle on the snow-crustWith the winer sun drawing cold blue shadows from the trees.Violet now, in veil on veil of evening,The hills across from Cromwell grow dreamy and far;A wood-thrush is singing soft as a violIn the heart of the hollow where the dark pools are;The primrose has opened her pale yellow flowersAnd heaven is lighting star after star.Places I love come back to me like music–Mid-ocean, midnight, the eaves buzz drowsily;In the ship's deep churning the eerie phosphorescenceIs like the souls of people who were drowned at sea,And I can hear a man's voice, speaking, hushed , insistent,At midnight, in mid-ocean, hour on hour to me.””

— Sara Teasdale

“When I am not with youI am alone,For there is no one elseAnd there is nothingThat comforts me but you.When you are gone Suddenly I am sick,Blackness is round me,There is nothing left.I have tried many things,Music and cities,Stars in their constellationsAnd the sea,But there is nothingThat comforts me but you;And my poor pride bows downLike grass in a rain-stormDrenched with my longing.The night is unbearable,Oh let me go to youFor there is no one,There is nothingTo comfort me but you.””

— Sara Teasdale

“Come, then, and let us walkSince we have reached the park. It is our garden,All black and blossomless this winter night,But we bring April with us, you and I;We set the whole world on the trail of spring.””

— Sara Teasdale

“How many times we must have metHere on the street as strangers do,Children of chance we were, who passedThe door of heaven and never knew.””

— Sara Teasdale

“I must have passed the crest a while ago And now I am going down-- Strange to have crossed the crest and not to know, But the brambles were always grabbing at the hem of my gown. All the morning I thought how proud I should be To stand there straight as a queen, Wrapped in the wind and the sun with the world under me-- But the air was dull, there was little I could have seen. It was nearly level along the beaten track And the brambles caught in my gown-- But it's no use now to think of turning back, The rest of the way will be only going down.””

— Sara Teasdale

“I have no riches but my thoughts,Yet these are wealth enough for me;My thoughts of you are golden coinsStamped in the mint of memory;And I must spend them all in song,For thoughts, as well as gold, must beLeft on the hither side of deathTo gain their immortality.””

— Sara Teasdale

“On a midsummer night, on a night that was eerie with stars,In a wood too deep for a single star to look through,You led down a path whose turnings you knew in the darkness,But the scent of the dew-dripping cedars was all that I knew.I drank of the darkness, I was fed with the honey of fragrance,I was glad of my life, the drawing of breath was sweet;I heard your voice, you said, 'Look down, see the glow-worm!'It was there before me, a small star white at my feet.””

— Sara Teasdale