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O Tell Me The Truth About Love

The poem explores the many different perspectives and understandings of love that exist. The speaker asks others for insight into love's nature but receives vague, contradictory, or unhelpful responses. They search for love in various places without success, leaving them still uncertain of love's true characteristics and how it will impact their life. In the end, the speaker remains unsure of love's nature and wants a straightforward answer to their question of "O tell me the truth about love."

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Hussain Ali
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602 views2 pages

O Tell Me The Truth About Love

The poem explores the many different perspectives and understandings of love that exist. The speaker asks others for insight into love's nature but receives vague, contradictory, or unhelpful responses. They search for love in various places without success, leaving them still uncertain of love's true characteristics and how it will impact their life. In the end, the speaker remains unsure of love's nature and wants a straightforward answer to their question of "O tell me the truth about love."

Uploaded by

Hussain Ali
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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O Tell Me the Truth About Love

W.H. Auden

Some say love's a little boy,


And some say it's a bird,
Some say it makes the world go round,
And some say that's absurd,
And when I asked the man next door,
Who looked as if he knew,
His wife got very cross indeed,
And said it wouldn't do.

Does it look like a pair of pyjamas,


Or the ham in a temperance hotel?
Does its odour remind one of llamas,
Or has it a comforting smell?
Is it prickly to touch as a hedge is,
Or soft as eiderdown fluff?
Is it sharp or quite smooth at the edges?
O tell me the truth about love.

Our history books refer to it


In cryptic little notes,
It's quite a common topic on
The Transatlantic boats;
I've found the subject mentioned in
Accounts of suicides,
And even seen it scribbled on
The backs of railway guides.

Does it howl like a hungry Alsatian,


Or boom like a military band?
Could one give a first-rate imitation
On a saw or a Steinway Grand?
Is its singing at parties a riot?
Does it only like Classical stuff?
Will it stop when one wants to be quiet?
O tell me the truth about love.

I looked inside the summer-house;


It wasn't ever there;
I tried the Thames at Maidenhead,
And Brighton's bracing air,
I don't know what the blackbird sang,
Or what the tulip said;
But it wasn't in the chicken-run,
Or underneath the bed.

Can it pull extraordinary faces?


Is it usually sick on a swing?
Does it spend all its time at the races,
Or fiddling with pieces of string?
Has it views of its own about money?
Does it think Patriotism enough?
Are its stories vulgar but funny?
O tell me the truth about love.

When it comes, will it come without warning,


Just as I'm picking my nose?
Will it knock on my door in the morning,
Or tread in the bus on my toes?
Will it come like a change in the weather?
Will its greeting be courteous or rough?
Will it alter my life altogether?
O tell me the truth about love.

from Tell Me the Truth About Love (Faber & Faber, 1999); A
Little, Aloud with Love (Chatto & Windus, 2016)

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