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(From Nineveh and Other Poems, 1907)
I LAY beside you … on your lips the while | |
| Hovered, most strange … the mirage of a smile, | |
| Such as a minstrel lover might have seen | |
| Upon the visage of some antique queen— | |
| Flickering like flame, half choked by wind and dust, | 5 |
| Weary of all things saving song and lust. | |
| |
| How many days and years and lovers’ lies | |
| Gave you your knowledge? You are very wise | |
| And tired, yet insatiate to the last. | |
| These things I thought, but said not; and there passed | 10 |
| Before my vision in voluptuous quest, | |
| The pageant of the lovers who possessed | |
| Your soul and body even as I possess, | |
| Who marked your passion in its nakedness | |
| And all your love-sins when your love was new. | 15 |
| |
| They saw as I your quivering breast, and drew | |
| Nearer to the consuming flame that burns | |
| Deep to the marrow of my bone, and turns | |
| My heart to love even as theirs who knew | |
| From head to girdle each sweet curve of you, | 20 |
| Each little way of loving. No caress, | |
| But apes the part of former loves. Ah yes, | |
| Even thus your hand toyed in the locks of him | |
| Who came before me. Was he fair of limb | |
| Or very dark? What matter, with such lures | 25 |
| You snared the hearts of all your paramours! | |
| |
| To-night I feel the presence of the others, | |
| Your lovers were they and are now my brothers, | |
| And I have nothing that has not been theirs, | |
| No single bloom the tree of passion bears. | 30 |
| They have not plucked. Beloved, can it be? | |
| Is there no gift that you reserve for me— | |
| No loving kindness or no subtle sin, | |
| No secret shrine that none has entered in, | |
| Whither no mocking memories pursue | 35 |
| Love’s wistful pilgrim? I am weary too, | |
| With weariness of all your lovers, and when | |
| I follow in the ways of other men, | |
| I know each spot of your sweet body is | |
| A cross, the tombstone of some perished kiss. | 40 |
| My arms embrace you, and a silent host | |
| Of shadows rises—at each side a ghost! | |
| With all its beauty and its faultless grace | |
| Your body, dearest, is a haunted place. | |
| When I did yield to passion’s swift demand, | 45 |
| One of your lovers touched me with his hand. | |
| And in the pang of amorous delight | |
| I hear strange voices calling through the night. | |
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