Like Robin Williamsâ character, Professor John Keating, muses in Dead Poets Society: âLanguage was invented for one reasons, boys, to woo women. And in that endeavor, laziness will not do.â Nowadays we can just say that language was invented to woo the human soul. Here is a small collection of verses and classic quotes for the hopeless romantic in all of us.
The modern poem
âI think of you only whenâŠ
   -I am bored
   -I am lonely
   -I have too much red wine
   -I hear âBox of Stonesâ
   -I cry like a baby
   -I write a sad song
   -I feel a bit better
   -I lay down my head
   -I turn off the light
Shit,
I guess I think about you a lotâ
– âOnly WhenâŠâ, John the Ghost
The classicâŠ
âShall I compare thee to a summerâs day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:â
– âSonnet XVIII,â Shakespeare
The great DickinsonâŠ
âIf you were coming in the fall,
Iâd brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.â
– âIf You Were Coming In The Fall,â Emily Dickinson
The eerie yet beautifulâŠ
âIt was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name Annabel Lee;–
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.â
– âAnnabel Lee,â Edgar Allan Poe
From the masterâŠ
âDoubt that the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move, doubt that truth be a liar, but never doubt that I love.â
–Hamlet, Shakespeare
A sweet short oneâŠ
âBefore you kissed me only winds of heaven
Had kissed me, and the tenderness of rain-
Now you have come, how can I care for kisses
like theirs again?…â
– âThe Kiss,â Sara Teasdale
Austen puts it bestâŠ
âIf I loved you less I might be able to talk about it more.â
–Emma, Jane Austen
From the Nobel Peace Prize in LiteratureâŠ
âDile que sĂ, aunque te este muriendo de miedo, aunque despuĂ©s te arrepientas, porque de todos modos te vas a arrepentir toda la vida si le contestas que no.â
-Gabriel GarcĂa MĂĄrquez
And the cheesiest one of allâŠ
The largely worn out and by this point, poem-turned-joke, the âroses are red, violets are blueâ poem actually comes from an extensive epic by Sir Edmund Spencer titled, âThe Faerie Queeneâ. The poem tells the story of several knights on a quest. The original verses go like this:
âIn a fresh Fountain, far from all Mens View,
She bath’d her Breast, the boiling Heat t’ allay;
She bath’d with Roses red, and Violets blue,
And all the sweetest Flowers that in the Forest grew.â
– Excerpt from The Faerie Queene, Sir Edmund Spencer