Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.

Maria

Anonymous

(From Songs, Comic, and Satyrical, by George Alexander Stevens, 1782)

ONE day, by appointment, Maria I met,
That day of delight I remember it yet;
As the meadow we cross’d to avoid the town’s crowd,
The sun seem’d eclips’d by a black spreading cloud:
Escaping the shower, to barn we fast fled,	5
There safe heard the pattering rain overhead.
Some moments I suffer’d my fair to take breath,
Then, sighing, she cry’d, “Lord! I’m frighted to death;
Suppose, now, by any one I should be seen?”
“Nay, nay, now,—nay, pray now—dear—what do you mean?”	10
“Had I thought you’d be half so rude—fie! for shame!
I wish I’d been wet to the skin e’er I came.
“You will have a kiss, then!—why, take one or two!
I beg you won’t tease me!—Lord! what wou’d you do?
You’ll tear all one’s things—I ne’er saw such a man!	15
I will hold both your hands!—Aye, do if you can:
Is this your love for me?—Is this all you care?
I’ll never come near you again,—now, I swear!”
As she push’d me away, love explain’d by her eyes,
Resistance was only to heighten the prize;	20
Her face chang’d, alternate, from scarlet to snow,
Her neck rose and fell fast, her language was low:
Such beauty! but more of that scene was not shown—
For decency here bid her curtain drop down.
The storm being over, all sunshine the air,	25
When instant rose up, the yet love-looking fair,
Crying, hark! there’s one listens—do look out, my dear,
I must be bewitch’d, I am sure, to come here.
My things how they’re rumpled!—Lord, let me begone;
What have you been doing? and what have I done?	30
Into this fatal place, I most solemnly vow,
I innocent enter’d—but am I so now?
I’m ruin’d,—I never myself can forgive—
I’ll leap in the brook,—for I’m sure I can’t live!—
If I do, my whole life will be wasted in grief,	35
Unless here tomorrow you’ll give me relief.