Never give all the Heart

Never give all the heart, for love

Will hardly seem worth thinking of

To passionate women if it seem

Certain, and they never dream

That it fades out from kiss to kiss;

For everything that’s lovely is

But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.

O never give the heart outright,

For they, for all smooth lips can say,

Have given their hearts up to the play.

And who could play it well enough

If deaf and dumb and blind with love?

He that made this knows all the cost,

For he gave all his heart and lost.

 

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Well, this is sound advice. Keep your woman guessing and she’ll think of you more often. Vex her thoughts by making her wonder, making her uncertain.

Love makes you high, and if you’re high, you’re impaired: deaf and dumb and blind! When you’re smitten, you’re stupid! You act like an idiot, and you can’t play the game. Don’t do it, says Yeats.

Easy to say!