Hilda Doolittle, known as H.D., wrote “Epigrams 2” in the early 1920s, when she was at the centre of London’s avant-garde Imagist movement. Imagism prized clear, direct language, vivid imagery, and the musical phrase, and H.D. often looked to ancient Greece for models. “Epigrams 2” belongs to her 1921 collection *Hymen*, where classical references and sharply voiced personal feeling meet. The poem speaks as a lover who refuses to let love be cheapened, and its speaker addresses someone who has started to wound rather than inspire.
The plea begins with a command: “Torture me not with this or that or this.” That repeated phrase catches the sound of a petty, nagging relationship, full of small demands and grievances. The speaker then draws a sharp distinction: “Love is my master, / you his lesser self.” Love itself is divine, a force larger than any one person. The beloved can represent that force, but only if he remains faithful to its high nature. “While you are Love, / I love you generously,” the speaker says, making generosity the condition of true devotion. The problem is that the beloved risks becoming “a tyrannous, bitter mate,” bringing Love down to the level of ordinary cruelty. The central idea is uncompromising: love must be kept elevated, or it stops being love at all.
The poem’s construction mirrors that argument through free verse and tightly controlled line breaks. There is no regular rhyme scheme, but the rhythm works through short, emphatic phrases. Lines such as “Love is my master” and “be Eros” land with declarative force, while the opening “this or that or this” creates a stumbling, irritated movement. H.D. arranges the lines so that the fall and rise of love become visible. When the speaker describes what the beloved would destroy, the lines run downhill: “Love has no charm / when Love is swept to earth.” Then the final image turns upward again, with a late enjambment pushing from “god up-darting” to “winged for passionate flight.” The lack of punctuation at line endings allows the thought to lift, as if the poem itself is trying to stay airborne.
The imagery draws on Eros, the Greek god of love, not as a chubby cherub but as a serious winged force. The speaker warns that a petty, punishing lover would “make a lop-winged god, / frozen and contrite.” That phrase “lop-winged” is deliberately awkward and painful; it suggests a wing cut unevenly, a creature that can no longer fly straight. “Frozen and contrite” adds stiffness and shame, the opposite of “up-darting.” The contrast between “swept to earth” and “passionate flight” runs through the whole poem. Key words such as “generously,” “master,” “tyrannous,” and “bitter” build a moral vocabulary: love should be a free, soaring gift, not a relationship of control, guilt, or small torments.
The poem is significant because it treats love as a discipline of elevation. H.D. does not present the speaker as weak or passive; instead, she issues a warning and sets a standard. The beloved is told to “be Eros,” to become worthy of the god he temporarily represents. In a period when women poets were often expected to write sentimental or decorative verse, H.D.’s voice is direct, demanding, and intellectually aware. The poem also revives the classical epigram as a form for modern emotional argument. Its brevity gives it a sharp edge, while its mythological imagery gives it scale. The final message is not about romantic failure but about the responsibility of anyone who is loved: do not drag the winged god into the mud. Keep love in the air, or it loses its power to transform.