It’s that time of the year again (Valentine’s Day) when awkward swains and self-conscious partners must express their devotion to a chosen one. If any of you heeded my suggestion in an earlier blog post to read to each other every week, you’ll have found plenty of material for voicing your feelings. If not, poets.org, interestingliterature.com, reedsy.com, and The Norton Guide of English Literature helped me winnow my top five love poems out of many for you.
#5 Vivien’s Song–Alfred Lord Tennyson
Tennyson wrote a great deal of romantic poetry laden with overt and repressed feelings for his friends, countrymen, and nation–Idylls of the King being one example–but few love poems. This sonnet, which begins “In love, if love be L ove, if Love be ours . . .” moves from tentative uncertainty to an all-or-nothing roll of the dice hope in seeking fulfillment.
#4 How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)–Elizabeth Barrett Browning
This may be the most direct expression of love in the English language. Ms. Browning’s poem ranges over space, time, and creation in the expansiveness of the poet’s feelings. She and Robert Browning may be the Victorian poster children of star-crossed lovers, but she leaves no doubt regarding the breadth and depth of her feelings for her husband.
#3 Love Sonnet XI–Pablo Neruda
If Browning’s sonnet describes the intellectual depth of feeling for one’s lover, Neruda’s poem provides its earthy opposite. Seldom has the passion of love in the lusty dynamism of a prowling puma been described more viscerally than in this poem.
#2 The Good Morrow–John Donne
This poem, written before the author became a clergyman, depicts his amazement at the void in his life before he met his loved one. Love is so transformative that it makes their “one little room an everywhere” and so complete that he is forced to make the ultimate affirmation “If our two loves be one, or thou and I Love so alike that none do slacken, none can die.”
Runners-up
Before introducing my top choice of this count-down, let me add that restricting my choices to five short poems (sonnets) eliminated several poems that might would have cracked this top-ten listing. Sir Philip Sydney, Rainer Maria Rilke, Maya Angelou, Rumi, and Lord Byron (among others) could have made this list. But rather than broach the brink of uncertainty and second-guessing, I limited the list to a manageable, worthy handful.
#1 Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? (Sonnet 18)–William Shakespeare
Who else but the Bard? Several other of his sonnets are almost as fine, but his extended metaphor in this one plays out in a way that’s sensuous, direct, and cerebral all at the same time. And this during a period right after the Gunpowder Plot which shook England to its core. No surprise the Brits voted this their greatest poem. And after taking the Discovery page’s five-question personality quiz whose algorhythm matched my personality to the Bard’s masterpiece. who am I to doubt that kismet guided my selection?
Wrapping It Up
I hope this list proves helpful. If you choose any of the five, your chosen one should be pleased when reading your choice. Links to my sources are included in the text which allow you examine my omissions and make your own decisions. If none of these prove suitable, their inadequqcy may inspire you to write your own declaration of love. After all, the 21st century needs its moments of loving self -expression, too. We all do.
If you do decide to take the plunge, let me know, and we’ll present your love-sonnet in our March posting. Good luck to all of you on February 14th!