In a poem everything is possible. Defining the word love is almost impossible. No other word in the English language has so many different connotations and uses. There can be no one true single definition. However, in the poems 'First Love' and 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci' love appears to be a physical attraction to a beautiful woman, leading to physical affliction. In both poems, it appears that the poet (in 'First Love') and the knight (in 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci') fell in love with women at first sight. The glory of these poems is that, both constantly address love, the pain of love, the pain of loss, of parting and lovers' passion. It is as if they have been tortured by falling in love and now they are angry or brokenhearted, painfully sighing and dying for love.

In the poem 'First Love by John Clare' the...