War and Love/Song for Her

by Richard Aldington

 

SONG FOR HER

Why should love be dumb and go
Hidden in a shroud of lies?
Why should lovers fear to tell
What they see in women's eyes?
What it is all lovers know
And the world should know as well.

Is a woman's heart of ice?
Is a woman's sex of snow?
I've a mistress and I see
Warm desire that moves me so
I would give the whole world thrice
To express it worthily.

Every night that we can steal
Close, as lovers do, we lie,
And the wanton things we do
And the amorous pangs we feel
Told, would make the hard world cry,
"Teach us how to love like you!"

Yet if you would love aright
You must love, like us, with all
Sense and spirit, flesh and breath:
Then indeed it may befall
That you burn with our clear light—
Light that only fades with death.