The Oblation

By Algernon Charles Swinburne 1837–1909

Ask nothing more of me, sweet;

All I can give you I give.

Heart of my heart, were it more,

More would be laid at your feet—

Love that should help you to live,

Song that should spur you to soar.

All things were nothing to give,

Once to have sense of you more,

Touch you and taste of you, sweet,

Think you and breathe you and live,

Swept of your wings as they soar,

Trodden by chance of your feet.

I that have love and no more

Give you but love of you, sweet.

He that hath more, let him give;

He that hath wings, let him soar;

Mine is the heart at your feet

Here, that must love you to live.

Biography

Swinburne was one of the most accomplished lyric poets of the Victorian era and was a preeminent symbol of rebellion against the conservative values of his time. The explicit and often pathological sexual themes of his most important collection of poetry, Poems and Ballads (1866), delighted some, shocked many, and became the dominant feature of Swinburne's image as both an artist and an individual. Nevertheless, critics have . . .

Continue reading this biography