American Poetry 1922/Bubbles

by Alfred Francis Kreymborg

BUBBLES

You had best be very cautious
    how
you say, I love you.
If you accent the I,
she has an opening for,
who are you
to strut on ahead
and hint there aren't others,
aren't, weren't and won't be?
Blurt out the love,
she has suspicion for,
    so?—
why not hitherto?—
what brings you bragging now?—
and what'll it be hereafter?
Defer to the you,
she has certitude for,
    me?
thanks, lad!—
but why argue about it?—
or fancy I'm lonesome?—
do I look as though you had to?
And having determined how
you'll say it,
you had next best ascertain
    whom
it is that you say it to.

That you're sure she's the one,
that there'll never be another,
never was one before.
And having determined whom
and having learned how,
when you bring these together,
inform the far of the intimate—
like a bubble on a pond,
emerging from below,
round wonderment completed
by the first sight of the sky—
what good will it do,
if she shouldn't, I love you?—
a bubble's but a bubble once,
a bubble grows to die.

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