Christina Rossetti Quotes

“Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.”

“Fair as the moon and joyful as the light;
Tot wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim; Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;
Not as she is, but as she fills his dreams.”

“What are heavy? sea-sand and sorrow.
What are brief? today and tomorrow.
What are frail? spring blossoms and youth.
What are deep? the ocean and truth.”

“Lie still, lie still, my breaking heart;
My silent heart, lie still and break:
Life, and the world, and mine own self, are changed
For a dream's sake.”

“My heart is breaking for a little love”

“Love came down at Christmas,
Love all lovely, Love Divine;
Love was born at Christmas;
Star and angels gave the sign.”

“Hope is like a harebell, trembling from its birth,
Love is like a rose, the joy of all the earth,
Faith is like a lily, lifted high and white,
Love is like a lovely rose, the world’s delight.
Harebells and sweet lilies show a thornless growth,
But the rose with all its thorns excels them both.”

“The birthday of my life
Is come, my love is come to me.”

“For there is no friend like a sister
In calm or stormy weather;
To cheer one on the tedious way,
To fetch one if one goes astray,
To lift one if one totters down,
To strengthen whilst one stands.”

“Ah me, but where are now the songs I sang
When life was sweet because you call’d them sweet?”

“We must not look at goblin men,
We must not buy their fruits:
Who knows upon what soil they fed
Their hungry thirsty roots?”

“Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I:
But when the trees bow down their heads
The wind is passing by.”

“In the bleak mid-winter
Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak mid-winter
Long ago.”

“Does the road wind up-hill all the way?
Yes, to the very end.
Will the day's journey take the whole long day?
From morn to night, my friend.”

“My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a water'd shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit.”

“I lock my door upon myself,
And bar them out; but who shall wall
Self from myself, most loathed of all?”

“All things that pass
Are wisdom's looking-glass.”

“And all the winds go sighing,
For sweet things dying”

“Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land.”

“Tread softly! All the earth is holy ground.”

“Promise me no promises,
So will I not promise you:
Keep we both our liberties,
Never false and never true:
Let us hold the die uncast,
Free to come as free to go:
For I cannot know your past,
And of mine what can you know?”

“Silence more musical than any song.”

“Sleeping at last, the trouble and tumult over,
Sleeping at last, the struggle and horror past,
Cold and white, out of sight of friend and of lover,
Sleeping at last.”

“All earth’s full rivers can not fill
The sea that drinking thirsteth still.”

“When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.”

“Oh roses for the flush of youth,
And laurel for the perfect prime;
But pluck an ivy branch for me
Grown old before my time.”

“He feeds upon her face by day and night, And she with true kind eyes looks back on him, Fair as the moon and joyful as the light.”