Fountainhead

I did not delight in love so much
As in a kiss like linnets’ wings,
The flutterings of a pulse so soft
The heart remembers, as it sings:
To bathe there was its transport, brushed
By marble lips, or porcelain,–
One liquid kiss, one cool outburst
From pale rosettes. What did it mean…

To float awhirl on minute tides
Within the compass of your eyes,
To feel your alabaster bust
Grow cold within? Ecstatic sighs
Seem hisses now; your eyes, serene,
Reflect the sun’s pale tourmaline.

Originally published by Romantics Quarterly

Similar poems:

So, so, rock-a-by so! So, so, rock-a-by so! Off to the garden where dreamikins grow; And here is a kiss on your winkyblink eyes, […]...

Love’s Nearness I think of thee, when golden sunbeams shimmer Across the sea; And when the waves reflect the moon’s pale glimmer, […]...

The Fan LOVELY Semiramis Closes her slanting eyes: Dead is she long ago. From her fan, sliding slow, Parrot-bright fire’s feathers, Gilded […]...

Dead Men’s Love There was a damned successful Poet; There was a Woman like the Sun. And they were dead. They did not […]...

The Kiss Returned AS WILLIAM walking with his wife was seen, A man of rank admired her lovely mien. Who gave you such […]...

In A Gondola The moth’s kiss, first! Kiss me as if you made believe You were not sure, this eve, How my face, […]...

O Beauty, Passing Beauty! O beauty, passing beauty! Sweetest sweet! How can thou let me waste my youth in sighs? I only ask to […]...

Mismet He was leaning by a face, He was looking into eyes, And he knew a trysting-place, And he heard seductive […]...

I Live, I Die, I Burn, I Drown I live, I die, I burn, I drown I endure at once chill and cold Life is at once too […]...

Long Sight In Age They say eyes clear with age, As dew clarifies air To sharpen evenings, As if time put an edge Round […]...

Unforgotten I know a garden where the lilies gleam, And one who lingers in the sunshine there; She is than white-stoled […]...

Growing Old What is it to grow old? Is it to lose the glory of the form, The lustre of the eye? […]...

A Song Of Winter Weather It isn’t the foe that we fear; It isn’t the bullets that whine; It isn’t the business career Of a […]...

The Night Dance Strike the gay harp! see the moon is on high, And, as true to her beam as the tides of […]...

Sonnet XXII: Love, Banish’d Heav’n Love, banish’d Heav’n, on Earth was held in scorn, Wand’ring abroad in need and beggary, And wanting friends, though of […]...

Sign-Post Civilized, crying: how to be human again; this will tell you how. Turn outward, love things, not men, turn right […]...

Love Will Wane When your love begins to wane, Spare me from the cruel pain Of all speech that tells me so – […]...

If If there were more than one of me I’d shave my head and grow my beard I’d be a Doctor […]...

At Melville’s Tomb Often beneath the wave, wide from this ledge The dice of drowned men’s bones he saw bequeath An embassy. Their […]...

Dream tryst The breaths of kissing night and day Were mingled in the eastern Heaven, Throbbing with unheard melody, Shook Lyra all […]...

A Man Young And Old: XI. From Oedipus At Colonus Endure what life God gives and ask no longer span; Cease to remember the delights of youth, travel-wearied aged man; […]...

TO ELECTRA I dare not ask a kiss, I dare not beg a smile; Lest having that, or this, I might grow […]...

Sonnet 36 – When we met first and loved, I did not build When we met first and loved, I did not build Upon the event with marble. Could it mean To last, […]...

The Washing and Dressing Ah! why will my dear little girl be so cross, And cry, and look sulky, and pout? To lose her […]...

Herman Altman Did I follow Truth wherever she led, And stand against the whole world for a cause, And uphold the weak […]...

To Caroline Think’st thou I saw thy beauteous eyes, Suffus’d in tears, implore to stay; And heard unmov’d thy plenteous sighs, Which […]...

To disappear enhances To disappear enhances The Man that runs away Is tinctured for an instant With Immortality But yesterday a Vagrant Today […]...

Om FAINT grew the yellow buds of light Far flickering beyond the snows, As leaning o’er the shadowy white Morn glimmered […]...

Qua Cursum Ventus As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay With canvas drooping, side by side, Two towers of sail at dawn of […]...

CHRISTEL My senses ofttimes are oppress’d, Oft stagnant is my blood; But when by Christel’s sight I’m blest, I feel my […]...