The Temple Dancing Girl

A poem by Violet Nicolson, Lawrence Hope, Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (1865 – 1904)

You will be mine; those lightly dancing feet,

Falling as softly on the careless street

As the wind-loosened petals of a flower,

Will bring you here, at the Appointed Hour.

And all the Temple’s little links and laws

Will not for long protect your loveliness.

I have a stronger force to aid my cause,

Nature’s great Law, to love and to possess!

Throughout those sleepless watches, when I lay

Wakeful, desiring what I might not see,

I knew (it helped those hours, from dusk to day),

In this one thing, Fate would be kind to me.

You will consent, through all my veins like wine

This prescience flows; your lips meet mine above,

Your clear soft eyes look upward into mine

Dim in a silent ecstasy of love.

The clustered softness of your waving hair,

That curious paleness which enchants me so,

And all your delicate strength and youthful air,

Destiny will compel you to bestow!

Refuse, withdraw, and hesitate awhile,

Your young reluctance does but fan the flame;

My partner, Love, waits, with a tender smile,

Who play against him play a losing game.

I, strong in nothing else, have strength in this,

The subtlest, most resistless, force we know

Is aiding me; and you must stoop and kiss:

The genius of the race will have it so!

Yet, make it not too long, nor too intense

My thirst; lest I should break beneath the strain,

And the worn nerves, and over-wearied sense,

Enjoy not what they spent themselves to gain.

Lest, in the hour when you consent to share

That human passion Beauty makes divine,

I, over worn, should find you over fair,

Lest I should die before I make you mine.

You will consent, those slim, reluctant feet,

Falling as lightly on the careless street

As the white petals of a wind-worn flower,

Will bring you here, at the Appointed Hour.

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• For My Young Friends Who Are Afraid by William Stafford by William Stafford
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• Across Kansas by William Stafford by William Stafford
• A Ritual To Read To Each Other by William Stafford by William Stafford
• Sonnet 127: In the old age black was not counted fair by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 126: O thou, my lovely boy, who in thy power by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 125: Were’t aught to me I bore the canopy by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 124: If my dear love were but the child of state by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 123: No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 122: Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 121: Tis better to be vile than vile esteemed by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 120: That you were once unkind befriends me now by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 11: As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow’st by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 119: What potions have I drunk of Siren tears by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 118: Like as to make our appetite more keen by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 117: Accuse me thus: that I have scanted all by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare
• Sonnet 116: Let me not to the marriage of true minds by William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

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