Love in the Guise of Friendship
written in 1788
Love in the Guise of Friendship - meaning Summary
Love Hidden as Friendship
The speaker addresses a friend whose romantic feelings threaten their close bond. They plead that if love exists, it be kept secret rather than voiced, because revealing it would force the speaker to refuse and lose the friendship they value. The poem expresses the painful trade-off between honesty and preserving intimacy: better a concealed love than a confessed one that destroys an important relationship. The tone is pleading and pragmatic, focused on protecting the existing companionship even at the cost of denying or denying knowledge of deeper desire.
Read Complete AnalysesYour friendship much can make me blest, O why that bliss destroy! Why urge the only, one request You know I will deny! Your thought, if Love must harbour there, Conceal it in that thought; Nor cause me from my bosom tear The very friend I sought.
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