I think two of the greatest segments on the topic from folk songs are these:

There is a ship
She sails the sea.
She's loaded deep,
As deep can be.
But not as deep
As this love I am in,
ANd know not how,
I sink or swim

and:

She was winsome, and fair as the dew on the meadow,
But 't was not her beauty alone that won me;
Oh, no. 'T was the truth in her eyes, ever shining,
That made me love Mary,
The Rose of Tralee.


A.