T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
From “The Book of Love”
By Blanche Shoemaker Wagstaff (1888–1959)(1917) I WALK alone and cry out under the stars. | |
| As one in a desert I hunger for refreshment. | |
| I have need of the coolness of some azure pool. | |
| O, I would anoint my bosom with the clear water! | |
| O, I would immerse myself in the emulous depths! | 5 |
| O, I would drink of ineffable dreams. | |
| You, Beloved, are the silvery lake shimmering in the desert of my youth. | |
| You only can allay the fever of my spirit! | |
| On your lips I should drain the fountain of life. | |
| On your white breast I shall breath the perfume of numberless lilies. | 10 |
| Therein I shall die a thousand deaths and arise reborn in the awful splendor of your love…. * * * * * | |
| LAY your hands,—softer than dove’s wings,—in my hands so I may feel your young life flowing into mine thro’ your finger-tips. | |
| Lay your eyes upon my eyes that I may grow tremulous beneath the flutter of your eyelids. | |
| Lay your heart against my heart that I may hear your love summoning me to forgetfulness. | |
| Lay your tresses about me that I may feel their warm sun streaming thro’ my veins. | 15 |
| Lay your mouth on my mouth until all dissolves in mist about me…. | |
| (Is it life? Is it death?) * * * * * | |
| YOU are as a million birds that sing unto my heart, O, Beloved. | |
| Thro’ the long nights I hear the chanting of blithe voices. | |
| What divine minstrelsy! what ravishment…. | 20 |
| Is this multitudinous melody the rapture of your kiss? | |
| Come to me, press upon my brow the coolness of your young lips that I may hear the thunder of your love in the night…. * * * * * | |
| When will it end, the long vigil…. | |
| What dawn will bring you forever unto me, O, my Beloved? | |
| Life is but shadow. | 25 |
| Only you, my Beloved, are more real than shadow. | |
| Beneath your caresses I am as one awakened unto life. | |
| Your finger-tips bear presage of divinity. Your heart-beats are a threnody sublime. | |
| O, Beloved, you are as a white nenuphar lifting its snowy breast on a stream. In your bosom are all the treasures of Elysium. The scent of your skin is like jasmine and honeysuckle. | |
| Why is such loveliness withheld from me, O, Beloved? | 30 |
| When can I look upon you and say: “Beloved! all this beauty is mine forever.” | |
| When will it end, the long vigil…. * * * * * | |
| O, MIRACLE of love! | |
| You whom I adore unto delirium, | |
| Your arms are white lilies upon my bosom. | 35 |
| Stars encircle me when your lips lean down to mine. There is the sound of many waters falling. There is the murmur of a million nightingales,—and the flash of brilliant lightning. | |
| Caress celestial! | |
| Moon-path of my dreams! | |
| O, miracle of Love—my divinity and my crucifixion…. * * * * * | |
| WHEN the young moon silvers the sky, the earth is ours, | 40 |
| We shall go into the forest and wander in the shadow of the pines. | |
| I shall cover you with leaves, and we shall lie on the soft moss entwined like sisters. | |
| And all the while I will know that the fragrance of your skin is sweeter to me than the perfumes of a million roses…. * * * * * | |
| LET me enfold you in my hair. | |
| Let me wind you as in a golden skein. | 45 |
| Give me the curve of your throat, milky white and rose, that I may place about it the glossy fillets of my hair. | |
| Don it as a shining mantilla…. | |
| Let my hair shower about you until you are radiant with perfume; | |
| Let it ripple over you like the wind on summer wheat. | |
| Then give me your lips that we may stand united beneath the downpour of its sunlight. | 50 |
| Let us be intermingled as two trees that have bent one single root…. * * * * * | |
| IT rains, Beloved…. | |
| The dripping of the rain is like the cool kisses of your mouth…. | |
| I faint beneath the rapture of your lips. | |
| Be no longer tender. | 55 |
| Cover me with frenzied kisses,—even as I would drench my body in the cruel torrents of the rain. | |
| Envelop me from throat to ankle in delirium intolerable…. | |
* * * * * | |
| TO love you like the midnight storm! | |
| To take you swooning unto death as the wind sweeps the waves in tempest! | 60 |
| To transport you unto delirium! | |
| To hear the wild beating of your veins; to feel flame shuddering your blood and to agonize you with my ardor. | |
| To crush you as a flower upon my breast, | |
| To bear you away to some secret valley where I would love you unto insensibility…. * * * * * | |
| IF I think of you, I quiver from head to foot. | 65 |
| If I think of you tears flood my eyes. | |
| If I pass you my heart quickens to suffocation and the blood seems to leave my body. | |
| If I look into your eyes a sudden fire burns in my veins. | |
| If I touch you I am as one possessed with madness; my arms tremble and my limbs totter beneath me. | |
| To love you is to suffer the pangs of an intolerable agony. * * * * * | 70 |
| I SEE you coming toward me…. | |
| Silently you take me in your arms. | |
| Our lips meet and our eyes close. | |
| I feel the shuddering of your breast and the beating of your throat against mine. | |
| We are enveloped in darkness. | 75 |
| We know nothing but the thunder of our veins…. | |
| We are swept out into a sea of infinite oblivion. | |