Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

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

A Woman’s Death Wound

By Helen Hunt Jackson (1830–1885)

(American, 1895) IT left upon her tender flesh no trace.
The murderer is safe. As swift as light
The weapon fell, and, in the summer night,
Did scarce the silent, dewy air displace;
’Twas but a word. A blow had been less base.	5
Like dumb beast branded by an iron white
With heat, she turned in blind and helpless flight,
But then remembered, and with piteous face,
Came back.             Since then, the world has nothing missed
In her in voice, or smile; but she—each day	10
She counts until her dying be complete.
One moan she makes, and ever doth repeat:
“O lips which I have loved and kissed and kissed,
Did I deserve to die this bitterest way?”