The Joy of Touching Lips
Poetry of the Kiss
Patrick O’Day
October 2007
Table of Contents
Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................................................... 3
"April's Amazing Meaning” by George Dillon ...................................................................................................................................... 5
"April Love” by Ernest Dowson ............................................................................................................................................................ 6
"The Bobolink” by Elizabeth Allen Akers .......................................................................................................................................... 7
"Book I. Ode IX.” by Horace ................................................................................................................................................................. 10
"Catullus, Considerable Kisser” by Catullus ..................................................................................................................................... 11
"Deadly Kisses” by Pierre de Ronsard .............................................................................................................................................. 12
"For You” by James Riley Whitcomb ................................................................................................................................................. 13
"A Hymne to Venus, and Cupid” by Robert Herrick .......................................................................................................................... 14
"I Begged a Kiss of a Little Maid” by Robert Johnson Underwood ................................................................................................. 15
"Kisses” by Thomas Campion, ........................................................................................................................................................... 16
Poets ..................................................................................................................................................................................................... 17
Final Kiss: Editors Notes .................................................................................................................................................................... 20
Bibliography ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 21
2
Introduction
Of all the peculiar behaviors inherent to the human condition, perhaps none is as peculiar as “the kiss”. Why should it be
that so simple an action should hold such rich and varied meaning? Whatever the reason a kiss can touch something at the
very heart and soul, unique in its ability to convey deep passion and sexuality or many more innocent natures, “the kiss” is
prime subject matter for the ever soulful and often romantic poets of the world.
Included in this collection are samples of poetry from as far back as the first century B.C. and as recent as the twentieth
century. The reader will notice that although the words of some of the selections were written as far apart in time as two
thousand years, the basic premise is the same. The kiss is good, it has value, it is intimate, perhaps more so than any other
action, and it conveys love.
In George Dillon’s, “April's Amazing Meaning” the poet manages to transport the reader to time of youth, innocence and
desire, set in springtime of course, this poem showcases the power and implications of the kiss while only just barely
mentioning it. Certainly, the reader will notice references to springtime repeated throughout the text, no doubt a result of
spring’s promise (much like the kiss) of things to come, of new experience and new life.
In ancient times when certainly life was more difficult, poets of the age nevertheless placed great value on “the kiss.”
Language, lifestyle and humanity itself have certainly changed dramatically since the times of Catullus and Horace, both from
the first century B.C., but the great value they place on the wonderful action of “the kiss” transcends time and social struc ture.
The value of the kiss is no doubt a result of its unique ability to satisfy and incite desire all at the same time, were such a food
3
or drug to exist, man would doubtless go to great extents to acquire it. Thomas Campion expresses this concept quite well in
his Sixteenth Century poem Kisses.
Another interesting angle many poets have used is objectification of “the kiss”. An example of this is Robert Johnson
Underwood’s “I Begged a Kiss of a Little Maid”, where he expresses his desire to “give her back her kiss” because it has made
a mess of his ability to produce verse.
Love, love of course is often the central theme of many poems, and perhaps no action expresses the true form of
love like a kiss, or more accurately, no action serves better to represent love in verse than does “the kiss”. Even copulatio n,
which is ultimately the result of love and kisses, makes for an awkward subject when trying to express something as soulful as
love.
Perhaps poetry itself, like “the kiss”, is inherently soulful. Perhaps poetry itself, like “the kiss”, is something man has a n
inborn knowledge of, never knowing it is needed until it is discovered, perhaps “the kiss” like poetry makes man what he is.
“In love, in art, in avarice, in politics, in labor, in games, we study to utter our painful secret. The man is only half him self,
the other half is his expression” (Emerson).
4
April's Amazing Meaning
April’s amazing meaning doubtless lies
In tall, hoarse boys and slips
Of slender girls with suddenly wider eyes
And parted lips;
For girls must wander pensive in the spring
When the green rain is over,
Doing some slow inconsequential thing,
Notice, the entire poem is one long
sentence not allowing the reader a
full breath until the moment of “the
kiss”.
Plucking clover;
And any boy alone upon a bench
When his work’s done will sit
And stare at the black ground and break a branch
And whittle it
Slowly; and boys and girls, irresolute,
Will curse the dreamy weather
Until they meet past the pale hedge and put
Their lips together.
George Dillon, 1965
5
April Love
We have walked in Love's land a little way,
We have learnt his lesson a little while,
And shall we not part at the end of day,
With a sigh, a smile?
A little while in the shine of the sun,
We were twined together, joined lips, forgot
How the shadows fall when the day is done,
And when Love is not.
We have made no vows—there will none be broke,
Our love was free as the wind on the hill,
There was no word said we need wish unspoke,
We have wrought no ill.
So shall we not part at the end of day,
Who have loved and lingered a little while,
Join lips for the last time, go our way,
With a sigh, a smile?
Ernest Dowson, 1922
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The Bobolink
Once, on a golden afternoon,
With radiant faces and hearts in tune,
Two fond lovers, in dreaming mood,
Threaded a rural solitude.
Wholly happy, they only knew
That the earth was bright and the sky was blue;
That light and beauty and joy and song
Charmed the way as they passed along.
The air was fragrant with woodland scents;
The squirrel frisked on the roadside fence;
And hovering near them, “ Chee, chee, chink? ”
Queried the curious bobolink,
Pausing and peering with sidelong head,
As saucily questioning all they said;
While the ox-eye danced on its slender stem,
And all glad Nature rejoiced with them.
Over the odorous fields were strown
Wilting windrows of grass new-mown;
And rosy billows of clover-bloom
Surged in the sunshine and breathed perfume.
Swinging low on a slender limb,
The sparrow warbled his wedding-hymn;
And balancing on a blackberry brier,
The bobolink sang with his heart on fire,
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“Chink? if you wish to kiss her, do!
Do it! do it! you coward, you!
Kiss her! kiss, kiss her! who will see?
Only we three! we three! we three!”
Under garlands of drooping vines,
Through dim vistas of sweet-breathed pines,
Past wide meadow-fields, lately mowed,
Wandered the indolent country road.
The lovers followed it, listening still,
And, loitering slowly, as lovers will.
Entered a gray-roofed bridge, that lay
Dusk and cool, in their pleasant way.
Under its arch a smooth brown stream
Silently glided with glint and gleam,
Shaded by graceful elms which spread
Their verdurous canopy overhead,—
The stream so narrow, the boughs so wide,
They met and mingled across the tide.
Alders loved it, and seemed to keep
Patient watch as it lay asleep,
Mirroring clearly the trees and sky,
And the flitting form of the dragon-fly,
Save where the swift-winged swallows played
In and out in the sun and shade,
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And darting and circling in merry chase,
Dipped, and dimpled its clear, dark face.
Flitting lightly from brink to brink,
Followed the garrulous bobolink,
Rallying loudly with mirthful din,
The pair who lingered unseen within;
And when from the friendly bridge at last
Into the road beyond they passed,
Again beside them the tempter went,
The Bobolink (Dolichonyx
oryzivorus): “American bird of
the family Icteridae (order
Passeriformes) that breeds in
northern North America and
winters chiefly in central
South America.” (“Bobolink”)
Keeping the thread of his argument:
“Kiss her! kiss her! chink-a-chee-chee?
I’ll not mention it! don’t mind me!
I’ll be sentinel; I can see
All around from this tall birch-tree!”
But ah! they noted—nor deemed it strange
In his rollicking chorus a trifling change:
“ Do it! do it! ” with might and main
Warbled the tell-tale; “ do it again! ”
Elizabeth Allen Akers, 1891
9
Book I. Ode IX.
See, in what a depth of snow
“Soracte’s head” refers to
a mountain near Rome
Keen Soracte’s head is bound;
Here the woods are bending low,
There in ice the current ’s bound.
Break the chilling air with flame,
Animate the genial fire;
Give me wine of proudest name,
Cups that Genius may inspire.
To the Gods permit the rest,
They can still the Winter’s blast;
Shift the North into the West,
And forbid the rage to last.
What’s to-morrow never ask,
Make the passing day your own;
Spare not Love’s delightful task,
Till the day of youth is flown.
Meet the whispers of the fair ,
If the moment ’s ripe for bliss;
Then her wanton frolic share ,
Then deserve—or steal—the kiss!
Horace, 1st Century b.c..
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Catullus, Considerable Kisser .
How many kisses, Lesbia, miss, you ask would be enough for me?
I cannot sum the total number; nay, that were too tough for me.
The sands that o’er Cyrene’s shore lie sweetly odoriferous,
The stars that sprent the firmament when overly stelliferous—
Come, Lezzy, please add all of these, until the whole amount of ’em
Will sorely vex the rubbernecks attempting to keep count of ’em.
Catullus, 1st Century b.c.
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Lesbia is the name Catullus
used to address his
beloved Clodia in verse.
(“Catullus”)
Deadly Kisses
Ah, take these lips away; no more,
No more such kisses give to me.
My spirit faints for joy; I see
Through mists of death the dreamy shore,
And meadows by the water-side,
Where all about the Hollow Land
Fare the sweet singers that have died,
With their lost-ladies, hand in hand;
Ah, Love, how fireless are their eyes,
How pale their lips that kiss and smile.
So mine must be in little while
If thou wilt kiss me in such wise.
Pierre de Ronsard, 1928
12
For You
FOR you, I could forget the gay
I could forget the just deserts
What could I not forget? Ah me!
Delirium of merriment,
Of mine own sins, and so erase
One thing I know would still abide
And let my laughter die away
The tear that burns, the smile that hurts,
Forever in my memory,
In endless silence of content.
And all that mars and masks my face.
Though all of love were lost beside—
I could forget, for your dear sake,
For your fair sake I could forget
I yet would feel how first the wine
The utter emptiness and ache
The bonds of life that chafe and fret,
Of your sweet lips made fools of mine
Of every loss I ever knew.—
Nor care if death were false or true.—
Until they sung, all drunken through—
What could I not forget for you?
What could I not forget for you?
“What could I not forget for you?”
James Riley Whitcomb, 1883
13
A Hymne to Venus, and Cupid,
Sea-born Goddesse, let me be,
By thy sonne thus grac't, and thee;
That when ere I wooe, I find
Virgins coy, but not unkind.
Let me when I kisse a maid,
Taste her lips, so over-laid
With Loves-sirrop; that I may,
In your Temple, when I pray,
Kisse the Altar, and confess
Ther's in love, no bitterness.
Robert Herrick, 17th Century
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I Begged a Kiss of a Little Maid
I begged a kiss of a little maid;
Shyly, sweetly, she consented;
Then of a sudden, all afraid,
After she gave it, she repented;
And now as penance for that one kiss
Notice the
objectification of “the
kiss” in this selection.
She asks a poem—I’ll give her this.
But how can my song be my very best
When she, with a voice as soft as Circe’s,
Has charmed the heart from my lonely breast—
The heart, the fountain of all true verses?
Why, oh, why should a maid do this?
No—I must give her back her kiss.
Robert Johnson Underwood, 1931
15
Kisses
My Love bound me with a kiss
Wherefore did she thus inflame
That I should no longer stay.
My desires, heat my blood,
When I felt so sweet a bliss,
Instantly to quench the same,
I had less power to pass away.
And starve whom she had given food?
Alas! that women do not know
I the common sense can show;
Kisses make men loth to go.
Kisses make men loth to go.
Yes, she knows it but too well,
Had she bid me go at first,
For I heard when Venus' dove
It would ne'er have grieved my heart;
In her ear did softly tell
Hope delayed had been the worst.
That kisses were the seals of love.
But ah! to kiss and then to part!
O! muse not then though it be so,
How deep it struck, speak, gods, you know.
Kisses make men loth to go.
Kisses make men loth to go.
Thomas Campion, 16th Century
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Poets
Allen, Elizabeth Akers (1832–1911): Elizabeth Akers Allen was a novelist, journalist and an occasional versifier. Born in Strong,
Maine, Akers worked for the Portland Daily Advertiser for many years as literary editor. (“ Elizabeth Akers Allen”).
Campion, Thomas (1567–1620) : Born in London Thomas Campion, was orphaned at the age of twelve. He attended Cambridge
University from 1581-1584 but left without earning a degree. Campion’s works were based on Latin poetic rhythm, which unlike
English poetry, uses the alternation of long and short syllables and not stressed and unstressed ones. Timing therefore and not
stress was “the key to Campion’s poetics”. His famous lyric poem Rose-Cheek'd Laura, Come first appeared in Observations in
the Art of English Poesy (1602). The publishing of Thomas’s “observations” motivated his contemporary Samuel Daniel to release
A Defence of Rhyme in 1603. (“Thomas Campion”).
Catullus, (87–c.54 B.C.): Catullus was born in Verona, Italy. At the age of twenty-five he traveled to Rome and fell hopelessly in
love with Clodia, who he addressed in verse as “Lesbia”. Catullus, like Horace, is known as “one of the greatest lyric poets of all
time”. Two of his most popular poems are Carmen 101 and Carmen 2 (On the death of Lesbia’s sparrow). (“Catullus”).
Clare, John (1793-1864): John Clare was born to a very poor family near Peterborough in England; he started working at the
tender age of seven. As a young man, Clare showed great literary promise. His first volume of poetry was published in 1820 and
was well received earning him a fair (although brief) amount of fame. In the years to come a combination alcohol and poverty
along with a declining public interest in poetry, led to Clare’s decline both as a poet and as a citizen. Clare spent the last 23 years
of his life confined to a mental institution. It was not until after his death that comprehensive collections of his works were
published. (“John Clare”).
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Dowson, Ernest (1867-1900): Ernest Dowson was born in Kent, England but spent much of his short life in London and Paris.
Dowson attended Oxford for a short time but left the University after only 2 years after which time he “fell in” with members of the
Rhymers’ Club in London and Paris. Notable talents such as William Butler Yeats and Oscar Wilde moved in this circle. Dowson
led a short troubled life. 6 years before his death both of his parents commited suicide. “Amid the gloom and squalor of his
blighted life, Dowson was given a few shining moments of genius.” (“Earnest Dowson”).
Dillon, George (1906-1968): George Dillon was born In Jacksonville Florida. During his life, he was a Poet and an editor. One of
the most acclaimed collections of his work, The Flowering Stone, earned him a Pulitzer Prize. (“George Dillon”).
Herrick, Robert (1591–1674): Born in London Robert Herrick “was superficially a good deal like his near-contemporary George
Herbert: a poet and clergyman educated at Cambridge.” Herrick lived during the turbulent times of the scientific revolution in
Europe. Finding himself in and out of favor, depending on what direction politics were moving, Herrick still managed to published
many popular works such as, Hesperides, “a tribute to his time in Devonshire” and such individual favorites as To the Virgins, to
Make Much of Time, and Upon Julia's Clothes, which both express his appreciation of the physical body and nature. (“Robert
Herrick”).
Horace, (65–8 B.C.): Horace, “one the greatest of lyric poets” was born in southern Italy in Venusia. Horace released many
volumes of his work between 38 and 13 B.C. Horace’s contemporary Vergil, another famous poet of the age, is said to have
introduced him to Maecenas around 38 B.C., who then became his friend and benefactor. It is said that Horace’s work “gives a
vivid picture of contemporary Roman society and represents especially the spirit of the Augustan age of Rome.” His work would
later have a great influence on European Poetry. (“Horace”).
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Johnson, Robert Underwood (1853-1937) Born in Washington, D.C. Robert Underwood Johnson was not only a poet but a
diplomat as well. Founder of the American Poets' Ambulance in Italy, Johnson was decorated by the Italian government for his
work as a diplomat. (“Robert Johnson Underwood”)
Riley, James Whitcomb (1849-1916): Born in Greenfield, Indiana, James Whitcomb Riley was well known for his dialectic writing
style, which gained him “enormous popularity” during his career. Riley’s popularity has waned since his death; nevertheless, he
remains a very notable and often debated poet with a large mass of work to his credit. His works number nearly one thousand
poems of various forms, most of which were common and familiar for the period. However, Riley was the first American poet to
successfully tackle the form of the Villanelle with his poem The Best is Good Enough. Riley is also credited with the creation (at
least in concept) of the ever popular Raggedy Ann doll. (“James Whitcomb Riley”).
Ronsard, Pierre de (1524–85): Early in life the French Poet Pierre de Ronsard was a page and then a squire but his unfortunate
deafness lead him to a less courtly and more academic lifestyle at the College de Coqueret where he became leader of the
“Pleiade” and was named “Poet Royal”. Ronsard wrote many poem, often on the themes of love, death and patriotism. His bestknown love poems were published in the Sonnets pour Hélène (1578). (“Pierre de Ronsard”).
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Final Kiss (From the Editor)
This anthology was initially begun with the theme of death, a subject (unfortunately) I, like so many others, am all too
familiar with. I found, however, that my grief, which I have expressed recently in verse myself, has been sufficiently explored, or at
least repressed, so that the reading of the expressions of other’s grief and sorrow was simply too depressing. So while waiting for
the love of my life to return home and bestow upon my lips the privilege of touching hers, I decided the anthology would be about
“the kiss”. I feel that this subject is universal and can be appreciated by all, man and woman, young and old, white, yellow, black,
blue or green.
I tried to choose poems, which showed various sides of the dynamic meaning of “the kiss”. Sensuality, love, life, death and
hope, just to name a few. Of the works included, my favorites are The Bobolink by Elizabeth Allen Akers, (1891) and April's
Amazing Meaning by George Dillon (1965). Both of these poems incite for me a sense of life, passion and hope and bring me to
place I have been but did not realize I missed so deeply.
I hope that the reader will enjoy the works that preface this note as much as I have, and I hope the reader, like myself, will
be stirred to remember, and perhaps pursue anew, the many joys of “the kiss”.
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