I Would Have Kissed Her

 

 

I would have kissed her, then and there,

   Had Passion leave to go,

Where blossomed, full and red and fair,

   Love’s sweetest cameo.

When near she brushed, she, Venus, blushed

   (So dear!)—and yet so far;

My heart, full-flushed, in one beat, rushed

   To kiss this distant star.

 

A pulsing race! A hushed embrace!

   A stealing (kissed!) as she

So near in space (Love’s radiant face)

   Fair hovered over me.

I would have wrapped her to my breast,

   And soft-caressed her face;

And, in my rapture, warm-compressed

   All beauty, time, and space.

 

Oh, might she not have tearful melted,

   Weeping, in my arms?

Oh! might we not, as one, have melded

   Deep into Love’s charms?

Heart, what if I had spoken soft

   And sweetly-rendered vows,

In vocal splendor, broken oft

   With tender “thee”s and “thou”s?

Might she not, then, her raven hair,

   Have let down—wild and free!

For that I’d kissed her, fair and square?

   But Fear was quick to see:

 

“Oh, what if she—with plaintive screams—

   Should libel you—a thief?

And in the Court of Broken Dreams,

   Life-sentence you—to grief?

Can love, in spite of Passion’s play,

   Bloom from a stolen kiss?

Might you—from prison!—rue the day

   You stole one moment’s bliss?”

 

I would have kissed her, then and there

   (Fear’s grip I’d overcome)

But Panic filled me with despair,

   And struck me still and dumb!

My heart, in swelling throbs, cried out

   (But every sob was mute);

For Terror, Dread, and crippling Doubt

   Had crushed Love’s tenderest lute.

 

                             

O Passion! what might Love have been,

   Had Caution let you go?

O Love! what might have Fervor seen,

   Had Fear not cowered so?

O Venus! what pure ecstasy

   Might we have found above,

Had Modesty permitted me

   One sweet, soft touch of love?…

 

 

I would have kissed her, then and there,

   But Prudence dared not, so

I sat, numb, in that dental chair…

   And we shall never know.