Four Sonnets: 02 ( I Think I Should Have Loved You Presently )

Edna St. Vincent Millay

I think I should have loved you presently,
And given in earnest words I flung in jest;
And lifted honest eyes for you to see,
And caught your hand against my cheek and breast;
And all my pretty follies flung aside
That won you to me, and beneath your gaze,
Naked of reticence and shorn of pride,
Spread like a chart my little wicked ways.
I, that had been to you, had you remained,
But one more waking from a recurrent dream,
Cherish no less the certain stakes I gained,
And walk your memory’s halls, austere, supreme,
A ghost in marble of a girl you knew
Who would have loved you in a day or two.

Next 10 Poems

• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Four Sonnets: 03 ( Oh, Think Not I Am Faithful To A Vow! )
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Four Sonnets: 04 ( I Shall Forget You Presently, My Dear )
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : God's World
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Grown-up
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : If I Should Learn, In Some Quite Casual Way
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Indifference
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Inland
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Interim
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Into The Golden Vessel Of Great Song
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Journey

Previous 10 Poems

• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Four Sonnets: 01 ( Love, Though For This You Riddle Me With Darts )
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : First Fig
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Exiled
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Epitaph
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Elegy Before Death
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Elegy
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Elaine
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Eel-grass
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Ebb
• Edna St. Vincent Millay : Doubt No More That Oberon