| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895. |
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| Love’s Spite |
| | | Aubrey Thomas De Vere (b. 1814) |
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| YOU take a town you cannot keep; | |
| And, forced in turn to fly, | |
| O’er ruins you have made shall leap | |
| Your deadliest enemy! | |
| Her love is yours—and be it so— | 5 |
| But can you keep it? No, no, no! | |
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| Upon her brow we gaz’d with awe, | |
| And lov’d, and wish’d to love, in vain; | |
| But when the snow begins to thaw | |
| We shun with scorn the miry plain. | 10 |
| Women with grace may yield: but she | |
| Appear’d some Virgin Deity. | |
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| Bright was her soul as Dian’s crest | |
| Whitening on Vesta’s fane its sheen: | |
| Cold look’d she as the waveless breast | 15 |
| Of some stone Dian at thirteen. | |
| Men lov’d: but hope they deem’d to be | |
| A sweet Impossibility! | |
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