Virgin Youth long ago

Now and again All my body springs alive,

And the life that is polarised in my eyes,

That shivers between my eyes and mouth,

Flies like a wild thing across my body,

Leaving my eyes half-empty, and clamorous,

Replenishing my still breasts with a flush and a flame,

Summoning the soft ripples below my breast

Into urgent, passionate waves,

And my soft, slumbering belly

Quivering awake with one impulse of desire,

Gathers itself fiercely together;

And my docile, fluent arms

Intertwining themselves with wild strength

To clasp what they have never clasped.

Furthermore, I tremble and go trembling

Beneath the wild, strange tyranny of my body,

Till it has spent itself,

And the relentless modality of my eyes reasserts itself,

Till the bursten flood of life ebbs back to my eyes,

Back from my beautiful, lonely body

Tired and unsatisfied. ~