T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Two Sonnets
By Arthur Symons (18651945)(From Amoris Victima, 1897) ALL that I know of love I learnt of you,II. | |
And I know all that lover ever knew, | |
Since, passionately loving to be loved, | |
The subtlety of your wise body moved | |
My senses to a curiosity, | 5 |
And your wise heart adorned itself for me. | |
Did you not teach me how to love you, how | |
To win you, how to suffer for you now, | |
Since you have made, as long as life endures, | |
My very nerves, my very senses, yours? | 10 |
I suffer for you now with that same skill | |
Of self-consuming ecstasy, whose thrill | |
(May Death some day the thought of it remove!) | |
You gathered from the very hands of Love. | |
VI. I CANNOT do without you: you have been | 15 |
Too long my only slave, my only queen. | |
I cannot do without you: you have grown | |
Part of my flesh, and nearer than my own. | |
I need you! Speak, be silent, frown or smile, | |
Only be with me for a little while, | 20 |
And let your face and hands and hair be kissed, | |
And let me feel your fingers on my wrist. | |
I cannot do without you. Other men | |
Love, bid good-bye, and turn to love again; | |
I only know I want you, only you, | 25 |
Only because I want you. If you knew | |
How much I want you! If you knew how much | |
I hunger, should I hunger, for your touch? | |