Five Great Love Poems to Charm the Pants Off Your Valentine

Not everyone can express in words what is felt in the heart. Fortunately, the great poets have left us beautiful verse with which to admire, flirt, seduce, and pay tribute to our own great loves. Following is a collection of five of the best, custom written to address your own romantic situation. Also, for your ease and benefit, all of these poems are easily found and obtainable for free on the internet through a quick title search. (Each of these poems is in the public domain--which means they were published long enough ago that there is no legal obligation to pay publishing fees or royalties.)

Seduce Your Reluctant Love
Robert Herrick wrote the ultimate logical argument for shedding inhibitions and undergarments: The Poem, "To the Virgins, Make Much of Time." Beginning with the famous verse, "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may," this poem beautifully reminds the object of desire that life is short, and since we do not know what tomorrow brings, i.e, illness, death, hideous scarring, make the most of your beauty, vitality and desirability and embrace your passion, seize the day, and don't forget to buy sexy undergarments--of course this is slightly paraphrased.

Call Your Distant Love Back Home
Emily Dickinson, a poet known for her intimacy issues, wrote an elegant poem, If You Were Coming in the Fall, designed to beckon her absent love back to her. (Unfortunately, like many romantics, Emily reputedly would lose interest once her loved one would actually show up.) In one of the most powerful stanzas, Dickinson brags, that if she will have to wait for the afterlife to meet her love again, "I'd toss life yonder like a rind/ And taste eternity."

A Generous Wish for a Past Love
In the grand tragic tradition of Russian literature, Alexander Pushkin offers a poignant gem of a poem wishing an ex-love no more pain, simply titled, I Loved You. He admits, "Some embers of my love their fire retain," but the great fire of this love has burned out, at least for him. Gallantly, he concludes with, "I pray God grant another love you so." Personally, the unselfishness expressed in this poem makes it my favorite of the group.

Celebrate Your Engagement
Marriage Morning is a poem of great joy and triumph at the nuptial conquest of a powerful love. Alfred, Lord Tennyson contends that his bride's inner light is bright enough to "send a flash to the sun." He questions: "O' heart are you great enough for love?/ I have heard of thorns and briers," but insists that the light of their love will reach the end of the world and then, continue to "Flash for a million miles."

Flatter the Woman Driving You Mad for Love
Lord Byron knew a bit about passion. He reputedly devoted much of his short life to falling in and out and back in love with wives, girlfriends, boyfriends and blood relatives. Why did his lovers put up with all this nonsense? Well, I have my own theories, but his amazing poetry also had something to do with it. She Walks in Beauty Like the Night, is clear evidence of his genius with romantic poetry. I defy the person to not forgive the poet who writes these words: "Of cloudless climes and starry skies;/ And all that's best of dark and bright/ Meet in her aspect and her eyes." He concludes the poem by honoring his loved one's "smiles that win, the tints that glow/ But tell of days in goodness spent." He may not have been spending his days in goodness, but sure had an amazing gift with which to revere this ability in others.