THE THIRTY-FOURTH DAY 
 
“ Ben.   Stop there, stop there. 
Mer.   Thou desirest me to stop in my tale against the hair.” 
Romeo and Juliet. 
 
Sweet are the swift hard struggles ere the kiss, 
When the frail body blushes into tears, 
And short breaths cancel the long sighs, and fears 
Constrain delight, until their import is 
Made foolish when the struggle’s synthesis 
Leads to hot armistice, as dewy spheres 
Glow, and increase the fury that reveres 
No God, no heaven but its own hell’s bliss. 
 
So after desperate shifts of modesty 
We could no more ; loosened and lax we lay 
Breathing and holding :  then in amorous play 
She laughed and left her body’s love to me, 
And kissed one kiss holding the heart of May, 
And kissed again, and kissed our lives away. 
 
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