Plea
Secrets, you said, would hold us two apart;
You’d have me know of you your least transgression,
And so the intimate places of your heart,
Kneeling, you bared to me, as in confession.
Softly you told of loves that went before-
Of clinging arms, of kisses gladly given;
Luxuriously clean of heart once more,
You rose up, then, and stood before me, shriven.
When this, my day of happiness, is through,
And love, that bloomed so fair, turns brown and brittle,
There is a thing that I shall ask of you-
I, who have given so much, and asked so little.
Some day, when there’s another in my stead,
Again you’ll feel the need of absolution,
And you will go to her, and bow your head,
And offer her your past, as contribution.
When with your list of loves you overcome her,
For Heaven’s sake, keep this one secret from her!
Related poetry:
- Cosmopolities without a plea Cosmopolities without a plea Alight in every Land The compliments of Paradise From those within my Hand Their dappled Journey to themselves A compensation fair Knock and it shall be opened Is their Theology...
- The Seeker I sought for my happiness over the world, Oh, eager and far was my quest; I sought it on mountain and desert and sea, I asked it of east and of west. I sought it in beautiful cities of men, On shores that were sunny and blue, And laughter and lyric and pleasure were mine […]...
- Take Back the Virgin Page Written on Returning a Blank Book Take back the virgin page, White and unwritten still; Some hand, more calm and sage, The leaf must fill. Thoughts come, as pure as light Pure as even you require; But, oh! each word I write Love turns to fire. Yet let me keep the book: Oft shall my […]...
- Infelice Walking swiftly with a dreadful duchess, He smiled too briefly, his face was pale as sand, He jumped into a taxi when he saw me coming, Leaving my alone with a private meaning, He loves me so much, my heart is singing. Later at the Club when I rang him in the evening They said: […]...
- The Plea of the Simla Dancers Too late, alas! the song To remedy the wrong; The rooms are taken from us, swept and garnished for their fate. But these tear-besprinkled pages Shall attest to future ages That we cried against the crime of it too late, alas! too late! “What have we ever done to bear this grudge?” Was there no […]...
- A Plea Why need we newer arms invent, Poor peoples to destroy? With what we have let’s be content And perfect their employ. With weapons that may millions kill, Why should we seek for more, A brighter spate of blood to spill, A deeper sea of gore? The lurid blaze of atom light Vast continents will blind, […]...
- Love's Deity I long to talk with some old lover’s ghost, Who died before the God of Love was born: I cannot think that he, who then loved most, Sunk so low as to love one which did scorn. But since this god produced a destiny, And that vice-nature, Custom, lets it be, I must love her […]...
- Happiness for kelly Happiness is the stuff of birthdays And the coming of sweet things When they are not expected Happiness is when the moment Catches the sunlight and a giggle Comes out of darkness to take a look Happiness is when the body Rhymes with the heart and the whole Self flows like a mountain […]...
- PLEA FOR A HISTORY OF WORKING-CLASS LEEDS I want a true history of my city FUCK THE DE LACY FAMILY AND DOUBLE FUCK JOHN OF GAUNT ESPECIALLY And all his descendants With their particular vilenesses – I met one in the sixties Who had all the coldness of Himmler So svelte and adored by the cognoscenti. I want a history responsive To […]...
- "Secrets" is a daily word “Secrets” is a daily word Yet does not exist Muffled it remits surmise Murmured it has ceased Dungeoned in the Human Breast Doubtless secrets lie But that Grate inviolate Goes nor comes away Nothing with a Tongue or Ear Secrets stapled there Will emerge but once and dumb To the Sepulchre...
- Brown Penny I whispered, ‘I am too young,’ And then, ‘I am old enough’; Wherefore I threw a penny To find out if I might love. ‘Go and love, go and love, young man, If the lady be young and fair.’ Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny, I am looped in the loops of her hair. O […]...
- A Very Short Song Once, when I was young and true, Someone left me sad- Broke my brittle heart in two; And that is very bad. Love is for unlucky folk, Love is but a curse. Once there was a heart I broke; And that, I think, is worse....
- The Beginning “Where have I come from, where did you pick me up?” the baby asked Its mother. She answered, half crying, half laughing, and clasping the Baby to her breast- “You were hidden in my heart as its desire, my darling. You were in the dolls of my childhood’s games; and when with Clay I made […]...
- LOVE DISLIKES NOTHING Whatsoever thing I see, Rich or poor although it be, ‘Tis a mistress unto me. Be my girl or fair or brown, Does she smile, or does she frown; Still I write a sweet-heart down. Be she rough, or smooth of skin; When I touch, I then begin For to let affection in. Be she […]...
- Other Children “Little child of my five senses And of my tenderness.” Let us cradle our loves, We will have good children. Well cared for, We will fear nothing on earth, Happiness, good fortune, prudence, Our loves And this leap from age to age, From the order of a child to that of an old man, Will […]...
- It bloomed and dropt, a Single Noon It bloomed and dropt, a Single Noon The Flower distinct and Red I, passing, thought another Noon Another in its stead Will equal glow, and thought no More But came another Day To find the Species disappeared The Same Locality The Sun in place no other fraud On Nature’s perfect Sum Had I but lingered […]...
- 262. Delia: An Ode FAIR the face of orient day, Fair the tints of op’ning rose; But fairer still my Delia dawns, More lovely far her beauty shows. Sweet the lark’s wild warbled lay, Sweet the tinkling rill to hear; But, Delia, more delightful still, Steal thine accents on mine ear. The flower-enamour’d busy bee The rosy banquet loves […]...
- The Search Happiness, a-roving round For a sweet abiding place, In a stately palace found Symmetry and gilded grace; Courtliness and table cheer, All that chimes with evening dress. . . “I could never stick it here,” Swift decided Happiness. Happiness a-seeking still, In a mansion of the town, Comfort-crammed to overspill, Sought in vain to settle […]...
- Somebody's Song This is what I vow; He shall have my heart to keep, Sweetly will we stir and sleep, All the years, as now. Swift the measured sands may run; Love like this is never done; He and I are welded one: This is what I vow. This is what I pray: Keep him by me […]...
- Old Crony Said she: ‘Although my husband Jim Is with his home content, I never should have married him, We are so different. Oh yes, I know he loves me well, Our children he adores; But he’s so dull, and I rebel Against a life that bores. ‘Of course there is another man, Quite pennyless is he; […]...
- Kingdom of Love In the dawn of the day when the sea and the earth Reflected the sunrise above, I set forth with a heart full of courage and mirth To seek for the Kingdom of Love. I asked of a Poet I met on the way Which cross-road would lead me aright. And he said: “Follow me, […]...
- Over the Banisters Over the banisters bends a face, Daringly sweet and beguiling. Somebody stands in careless grace, And watches the picture, smiling. The light burns dim in the hall below, Nobody sees her standing, Saying good-night again, soft and slow, Half way up to the landing. Nobody only the eyes of brown, Tender and full of meaning, […]...
- Sweethearts of the Year Sweetheart Spring Our Sweetheart, Spring, came softly, Her gliding hands were fire, Her lilac breath upon our cheeks Consumed us with desire. By her our God began to build, Began to sow and till. He laid foundations in our loves For every good and ill. We asked Him not for blessing, We asked Him not […]...
- The Indifferent I can love both fair and brown, Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays, Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays, Her whom the country formed, and whom the town, Her who believes, and her who tries, Her who still weeps with spongy eyes, And her who is dry […]...
- Self-Love He that cannot choose but love, And strives against it still, Never shall my fancy move, For he loves ‘gainst his will; Nor he which is all his own, And can at pleasure choose, When I am caught he can be gone, And when he list refuse. Nor he that loves none but fair, For […]...
- Careers I knew three sisters, all were sweet; Wishful to wed was I, And wondered which would mostly meet The matrimonial tie. I asked the first what fate would she Wish joy of life to bring to her. She answered: ‘I would like to be A concert singer.’ I asked the second, for my mind Was […]...
- Old Boy Scout A bonny bird I found today Mired in a melt of tar; Its silky breast was silver-grey, Its wings were cinnabar. So still it lay right in the way Of every passing car. Yet as I gently sought to pry It loose, it glared at me; You would have thought its foe was I, It […]...
- Rose Leaves When they shall close my careless eyes And look their last upon my face, I fear that some will say: “her lies A man of deep disgrace; His thoughts were bare, his words were brittle, He dreamed so much, he did so little. When they shall seal y coffin lid And this worn mask I […]...
- Desertion So light we were, so right we were, so fair faith shone, And the way was laid so certainly, that, when I’d gone, What dumb thing looked up at you? Was it something heard, Or a sudden cry, that meekly and without a word You broke the faith, and strangely, weakly, slipped apart. You gave […]...
- Mother, Summer, I My mother, who hates thunder storms, Holds up each summer day and shakes It out suspiciously, lest swarms Of grape-dark clouds are lurking there; But when the August weather breaks And rains begin, and brittle frost Sharpens the bird-abandoned air, Her worried summer look is lost, And I her son, though summer-born And summer-loving, none […]...
- The Fury Of Guitars And Sopranos This singing Is a kind of dying, A kind of birth, A votive candle. I have a dream-mother Who sings with her guitar, Nursing the bedroom With a moonlight and beautiful olives. A flute came too, Joining the five strings, A God finger over the holes. I knew a beautiful woman once Who sang with […]...
- Daybreak In Alabama When I get to be a composer I’m gonna write me some music about Daybreak in Alabama And I’m gonna put the purtiest songs in it Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist And falling out of heaven like soft dew. I’m gonna put some tall tall trees in it And the scent […]...
- Sonnet 21: So is it not with me as with that muse So is it not with me as with that muse, Stirred by a painted beauty to his verse, Who heaven it self for ornament doth use And every fair with his fair doth rehearse, Making a couplement of proud compare With sun and moon, with earth and sea’s rich gems, With April’s first-born flowers, and […]...
- Sonnet XXI So is it not with me as with that Muse Stirr’d by a painted beauty to his verse, Who heaven itself for ornament doth use And every fair with his fair doth rehearse Making a couplement of proud compare, With sun and moon, with earth and sea’s rich gems, With April’s first-born flowers, and all […]...
- Happiness There’s just no accounting for happiness, Or the way it turns up like a prodigal Who comes back to the dust at your feet Having squandered a fortune far away. And how can you not forgive? You make a feast in honor of what Was lost, and take from its place the finest Garment, which […]...
- Meg Merrilies Old Meg she was a Gipsy, And liv’d upon the Moors: Her bed it was the brown heath turf, And her house was out of doors. Her apples were swart blackberries, Her currants pods o’ broom; Her wine was dew of the wild white rose, Her book a churchyard tomb. Her Brothers were the craggy […]...
- Unlyric Love Song It is time to give that-of-myself which I could not at first: To offer you now at last my least and my worst: Minor, absurd preserves, The shell’s end-curves, A document kept at the back of a drawer, A tin hidden under the floor, Recalcitrant prides and hesitations: To pile them carefully in a desparate […]...
- Paths I shall tread, another year, Ways I walked with Grief, Past the dry, ungarnered ear And the brittle leaf. I shall stand, a year apart, Wondering, and shy, Thinking, “Here she broke her heart; Here she pled to die.” I shall hear the pheasants call, And the raucous geese; Down these ways, another Fall, I […]...
- Song The Spring will come when the year turns, As if no Winter had been, But what shall I do with a locked heart That lets no new year in? The birds will go when the Fall goes, The leaves will fade in the field, But what shall I do with an old love Will neither […]...
- Barefoot Loving me with my shows off Means loving my long brown legs, Sweet dears, as good as spoons; And my feet, those two children Let out to play naked. Intricate nubs, My toes. No longer bound. And what’s more, see toenails and All ten stages, root by root. All spirited and wild, this little Piggy […]...