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Inscribed: Riley Love-Lyrics

By James Whitcomb Riley

Topics: classic

To the Elect of Love, - or side-by-side     In raptest ecstasy, or sundered wide     By seas that bear no message to or fro     Between the loved and lost of long ago.     So were I but a minstrel, deft      At weaving, with the trembling strings     Of my glad harp, the warp and weft      Of rondels such as rapture sings, -         I'd loop my lyre across my breast,         Nor stay me till my knee found rest         In midnight banks of bud and flower         Beneath my lady's lattice-bower.     And there, drenched with the teary dews,      I'd woo her with such wondrous art     As well might stanch the songs that ooze      Out of the mockbird's breaking heart;         So light, so tender, and so sweet         Should be the words I would repeat,         Her casement, on my gradual sight,         Would blossom as a lily might.

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"To the Elect of Love, - or side-by-side..."

This evocative piece by James Whitcomb Riley, titled "Inscribed: Riley Love-Lyrics", represents a masterful exploration of classic. The lines capture a profound emotional resonance... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

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Author:James Whitcomb Riley

"To the Elect of Love, - or side-by-side..." by James Whitcomb Riley

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

James Whitcomb Riley

About James Whitcomb Riley

James Whitcomb Riley (1849–1916) was an American poet known as the "Hoosier Poet." His dialect poems—including "Little Orphant Annie" and "When the Frost Is on the Punkin"—celebrate rural Indiana life and childhood nostalgia.

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"Writ in between the lines of his life-deed        ..."

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