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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Christina Rossetti
Christina Rossetti was born in London, one of four children of Italian parents. She is best known for her ballads and her mystic religious lyrics. Her poetry is marked by symbolism and intense feeling...
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FURTHER READING
Poems About Love
A Birthday
by Christina Rossetti
A Ditty
by Sir Philip Sidney
A Line-storm Song
by Robert Frost
A Negro Love Song
by Paul Laurence Dunbar
I wish I could remember... (from Monna Innominata)
by Christina Rossetti
In a Boat
by D.H. Lawrence
Love
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Love
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Love in a Life
by Robert Browning
Love's Philosophy
by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Lovers' Infiniteness
by John Donne
Meeting at Night
by Robert Browning
No, Love Is Not Dead
by Robert Desnos
She Walks in Beauty
by George Gordon Byron
The Buried Life
by Matthew Arnold
The Definition of Love
by Andrew Marvell
The Kiss
by Stephen Dunn
The Look
by Sara Teasdale
The Passionate Shepherd to His Love
by Christopher Marlowe
The White Rose
by John Boyle O'Reilly
To Anthea Who May Command Him Any Thing
by Robert Herrick
Wooing Song
by Giles Fletcher
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I loved you first... (from Monna Innominata)  
by Christina Rossetti

I loved you first: but afterwards your love,
Outsoaring mine, sang such a loftier song
As drowned the friendly cooings of my dove.
Which owes the other most? My love was long,
And yours one moment seemed to wax more strong;
I loved and guessed at you, you contrued me
And loved me for what might or might not be—
Nay, weights and measures do us both a wrong.
For verily love knows not 'mine' or 'thine';
With separate 'I' and 'thou' free love has done,
For one is both and both are one in love:
Rich love knows nought of 'thine that is not mine';
Both have the strength and both the length thereof,
Both of us, of the love which makes us one.
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