Nearer Than You (Poem)

How can a woman tell when love is gone

From love that merely sleeps but deep inside

Has still the root the stem and flower grow on

And so dreams not to die but sleeps to hide

Perhaps when the clouds drifting by make more noise

Than amorous whispers you aimlessly breathe

And croakings of paddocks speak with greater poise

Than lilypad speeches with nothing beneath

And so I'll confess what I know to be true

That bullfrogs have more eloquence than do you

When days are longer than they used to be

And nights are maddening eternity

With only forced sighs to interrupt

The same repose your lips would once corrupt

I'll steal me away so your soul shall not wake

Though more than my absence to rouse it would take

Across from the meadow and down to the pond

To sink myself up to the waist then beyond

For water knows better in love what to do

And plays with its prey with more passion than you

In dreaming one may oft' release his grasp

On what to conscious minds is naught but clear

That once the time of questioning is near

Chance there is none to hide the fatal asp

Who follows me silently onto the shore

Where I learn to cherish my new solitude

And feel with precision what ere had been rude

Yes I shall return to thy bed nevermore

Born was I with one heart I ask not for two

When rushes and lilies press nearer than you