2.14.2007

for Nick

Out of your whole life give but a moment!
All of your life that has gone before,
All to come after it, --so you ignore,
So you make perfect the present, --condense,
In a rapture of rage, for perfection's endowment,
Thought and feeling and soul and sense --
Merged in a moment which gives me at last
You around me for once, you beneath me, above me --
Me --sure that despite of time future, time past, --
This tick of our life-time's one moment you love me!
How long such suspension may linger? Ah, Sweet --
The moment eternal --just that and no more --
When ecstasy's utmost we clutch at the core
While cheeks burn, arms open, eyes shut and lips meet!

[Robert Browning, 'Now']

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