CUMMINGS, e.e.


May i feel said he

may i feel said he

(i'll squeal said she

just once said he)

it's fun said she

(may i touch said he

how much said she

a lot said he)

why not said she

(let's go said he

not too far said she

what's too far said he

where you are said she)

may i stay said he

(which way said she

like this said he

if you kiss said she

may i move said he

is it love said she)

if you're willing said he

(but you're killing said she

but it's life said he

but your wife said she

now said he)

ow said she

(tiptop said he

don't stop said she

oh no said he)

go slow said she

(cccome?said he

ummm said she)

you're divine!said he

(you are Mine said she)


Since feeling is first

since feeling is first

who pays any attention

to the syntax of things

will never wholly kiss you;

wholly to be a fool

while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,

and kisses are better fate

than wisdom

lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry

- the best gesture of my brain is less than

your eyelids' flutter which says

we are for each other: then

laugh, leaning back in my arms

for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis


I carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in

my heart) i am never without it (anywhere

i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done

by only me is your doing, my darling)

i fear

no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want

no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)

and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)


somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond

any experience, your eyes have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and

my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals

the power of your intense fragility: whose texture

compels me with the colour of its countries,

rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes

and opens; only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls

The Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls

are unbeautiful and have comfortable minds

(also, with the church's protestant blessings

daughters, unscented shapeless spirited)

they believe in Christ and Longfellow, both dead,

are invariably interested in so many things—

at the present writing one still finds

delighted fingers knitting for the is it Poles?

perhaps. While permanent faces coyly bandy

scandal of Mrs. N and Professor D

.... the Cambridge ladies do not care, above

Cambridge if sometimes in its box of

sky lavender and cornerless, the

moon rattles like a fragment of angry candy

next to of course god america I love you

next to of course god america i

love you land of the pilgrims’ and so forth oh

say can you see by the dawn’s early my

country tis of centuries come and go

and are no more what of it we should worry

in every language even deafanddumb

thy sons acclaim your glorious name by gorry

by jingo by gee by gosh by gum

why talk of beauty what could be more beaut-

iful than these heroic happy dead

who rushed like lions to the roaring slaughter

they did not stop to think they died instead

then shall the voice of liberty be mute?

All in green went my love riding]

All in green went my love riding

on a great horse of gold

into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling

the merry deer ran before.

Fleeter be they than dappled dreams

the swift sweet deer

the red rare deer.

Four red roebuck at a white water

the cruel bugle sang before.

Horn at hip went my love riding

riding the echo down

into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling

the level meadows ran before.

Softer be they than slippered sleep

the lean lithe deer

the fleet flown deer.

Four fleet does at a gold valley

the famished arrow sang before.

Bow at belt went my love riding

riding the mountain down

into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling

the sheer peaks ran before.

Paler be they than daunting death

the sleek slim deer

the tall tense deer.

Four tall stags at a green mountain

the lucky hunter sang before.

All in green went my love riding

on a great horse of gold

into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling

my heart fell dead before.

spring omnipotent goddess

spring omnipotent goddess Thou
dost stuff parks
with overgrown pimply
chevaliers and gumchewing giggly

damosels Thou dost
persuade to serenade
his lady the musical tom-cat
Thou dost inveigle

into crossing sidewalks the
unwary june-bug and the frivolous
angleworm
Thou dost hang canary birds in parlour windows

Spring slattern of seasons
you have soggy legs
and a muddy petticoat
drowsy

is your hair your
eyes are sticky with
dream and you have a sloppy body from

being brought to bed of crocuses
when you sing in your whisky voice
the grass rises on the head of the earth
and all the trees are put on edge

spring
of the excellent jostle of
thy hips
and the superior

slobber of your breasts i

am so very fond that my

soul inside of me hollers

for thou comest

and your hands are the snow and thy

fingers are the rain

and your

feet O your feet

freakish

feet feet incorrigible

ragging the world