Ear Candy: Hello World (Belle Perez)

A Woman to her Lover -- Christina Walsh

Do you come to me to bend me to your will
as conqueror to the vanquished
to make of me a bondslave
to bear you children, wearing out my life
in drudgery and silence
no servant will i be
if that be what you ask. O lover i refuse you!

Or if you think to wed with one from heaven sent
whose every deed and word and wish is golden
a wingless angel who can do no wrong
go! - i am no doll to dress and sit for feeble worship
if that be what you ask, fool, i refuse you!

Or if you think in me to find
a creature who will have no greater joy
than gratify your clamorous desire,
my skin soft only for your fond caresses
my body supple only for your sense delight.
Oh shame, and pity and abasement.
Not for you the hand of any wakened woman of our time.

But lover, if you ask of me
that i shall be your comrade, friend, and mate,
to live and work, to love and die with you,
that so together we may know the purity and height
of passion, and of joy and sorrow,
then o husband, i am yours forever
and our co-equal love will make the stars to laugh with joy
and to its circling fugue pass, hand holding hand
until we reach the very heart of god.

The Rose That Grew From Concrete -- Tupac Shakur

Did you hear about the rose that grew
from a crack in the concrete?
Proving nature's law is wrong it
learned to walk with out having feet.
Funny it seems, but by keeping it's dreams,
it learned to breathe fresh air.
Long live the rose that grew from concrete
when no one else ever cared.

I Loved You... -- Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin

I loved you, and I probably still do,
And for a while the feeling may remain...
But let my love no longer trouble you,
I do not wish to cause you any pain.
I loved you; and the hopelessness I knew,
The jealousy, the shyness - though in vain -
Made up a love so tender and so true
As may God grant you to be loved again.

I Carry Your Heart With Me -- EE Cummings

I carry your heart with me
I carry it in my heart

I am never without it
Anywhere I go, you go,my dear.

And whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling

I fear no fate
For you are my fate, my sweet.

I want no world
For beautiful, you are my world, my true

And it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
And whatever a sun will always sing is you

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows
Here is the root of the root
And the bud of the bud
And the sky of the sky of a tree called life
Which grows higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide
And this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

I carry your heart
I carry it in my heart

Sonnet XIV: If Thou Must Love Me -- Elizabeth Barret Browning

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
"I love her for her smile--her look--her way
Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day" -
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,--and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, -
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou may'st love on, through love's eternity.