To My Valentines

In honor of Valentine's Day I wanted to share a few of my favorite poems and/or verses from some of my favorite poets.  Whatever your circumstances are today, I hope you love.  I wish you love.  I hope you enjoy the poems and as a bonus, an original from me. Meh, it's sappy and trite and sugary sweet, but I wrote it and I am a lover of love.  Ever the hopeless romantic, even when I don't have a beloved.
So sit back and enjoy the words my lovelies.

-peace

Immortal Beloved
“Though still in bed, my thoughts go out to you, my Immortal Beloved, Be calm–love me–today–yesterday–what tearful longings for you–you–you–my life–my all–farewell. Oh continue to love me–never misjudge the most faithful heart of your beloved. Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours.”
- Ludwig van Beethoven

Sonnet XVIII
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's leaves hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

-William Shakespeare

Sonnet XLIII

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

-Elizabeth Barret Browning

Song of the Open Road

"I give you my love more precious than money,

I give you myself before preaching or law;

Will you give me yourself? will you come travel with me?

Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?"

-Walt Whitman

For You
In all my dreams
I never imagined
what loving you could do to me
How deep I would fall
or the immeasurable happiness
my heart could feel

At times I wondered if you even existed
While all along
you were right there

Your heart
your tenderness
your kind soul
showed me what I had been longing for
How sweet, my love
you are to me
The world on a platter
you give to me

I love you beyond measure
from my heart
to the moon
to the stars
deeper than the oceans
higher than the skies

My eyes well up with tears
but not of sadness
only love
only peace
only happiness

Only you.
-Yvonne J. Salvatierra