dots-menu
×

Home  »  The World’s Best Poetry  »  The Exchange

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

IV. Wooing and Winning

The Exchange

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)

WE pledged our hearts, my love and I,—

I in my arms the maiden clasping;

I could not tell the reason why,

But, O, I trembled like an aspen!

Her father’s love she bade me gain;

I went, and shook like any reed!

I strove to act the man,—in vain!

We had exchanged our hearts indeed.