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Home  »  The Oxford Book of English Verse  »  723. In a Gondola

Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.

Robert Browning. 1812–1889

723. In a Gondola

THE moth’s kiss, first! 
Kiss me as if you made me believe 
You were not sure, this eve, 
How my face, your flower, had pursed 
Its petals up; so, here and there         5
You brush it, till I grow aware 
Who wants me, and wide ope I burst. 
 
The bee’s kiss, now! 
Kiss me as if you enter’d gay 
My heart at some noonday,  10
A bud that dares not disallow 
The claim, so all is render’d up, 
And passively its shatter’d cup 
Over your head to sleep I bow.