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Home  »  The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse  »  John Addington Symonds (1840–1893)

Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. 1922.

[Koina ta ton philon]

John Addington Symonds (1840–1893)

GIVE freely to the friend thou hast;

Unto thyself thou givest:

On barren soil thou canst not cast,

For by his life thou livest.

Nay, this alone doth trouble me—

That I should still be giving

Through him unto myself, when he

Is love within me living.

I fain would give to him alone,

Nor let him guess the giver;

Like dews that drop on hills unknown,

To feed a lordly river.