The literature of kissing

by Charles C. Bombaugh

EXCERPTS FROM THE POETS.

For would she of her gentilnesse,

Withouten more me ones kesse,

It were to me a grete guerdon.

Chaucer.

O kiss! which dost those ruddy gems impart,

Or gems, or fruits, of new-found paradise,

Breathing all bliss and sweetening to the heart,

Teaching dumb lips a nobler exercise,

O kiss! which souls, e’en souls, together ties

By links of love, and only nature’s art,

How fain would I paint thee to all men’s eyes,

Or of thy gifts, at least, shade out some part.

Sir Philip Sidney.

He her beholding, at her feet down fell,

And kissed the ground on which her sole did tread,

And washed the same with water, which did well

From his moist eyes, and like two streams proceed.

Spenser.

These poor half-kisses kill me quite:

Was ever man thus served?

Amid an ocean of delight,

For pleasure to be starved.

Drayton.

I do confess thou’rt sweet; yet find

Thee such an unthrift of thy sweets,

Thy favors are but like the wind,

That kisseth everything that meets;

And since thou canst with more than one,

Thou’rt worthy to be kissed by none.

Sir Robert Aytoun.

I do not love thee for those soft

Red coral lips I’ve kissed so oft;

Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard

To speech, whence music still is heard;

Though from those lips a kiss being taken

Might tyrants melt, and death awaken.

Carew.

I die, dear life! unless to me be given

As many kisses as the spring hath flowers,

Or there be silver-drops in Iris’ showers,

Or stars there be in all-embracing heaven;

And if displeased you of the match remain,

You shall have leave to take them back again.

Drummond of Hawthornden.

You say I love not, ’cause I do not play

Still with your ringlets, and kiss time away;

By love’s religion, I must here confess it,

The most I love when I the least express it!

Herrick.

Love in her sunny eyes does basking play;

Love walks the pleasant mazes of her hair;

Love does on both her lips forever stay,

And sows and reaps a thousand kisses there.

Cowley.

Her kisses faster, though unknown before,

Than blossoms fall on parting spring, she strewed;

Than blossoms sweeter, and in number more.

Davenant.

So cheered he his fair spouse, and she was cheered,

But silently a gentle tear let fall

From either eye, and wiped them with her hair;

Two other precious drops, that ready stood,

Each in their crystal sluice, he, ere they fell,

Kissed, as the gracious signs of sweet remorse

And pious awe, that feared to have offended.

Milton.

We were alone, quite unsuspiciously,

But oft our eyes met, and our cheeks in hue

All o’er discolored by that reading were;

But one point only wholly us o’erthrew:

When we read the long-sighed-for smile of her,

To be thus kissed by such devoted lover,

He who from me[13] can be divided ne’er

Kissed my mouth, trembling in the act all over.[14]

Dante.

Sweet pouting lip! whose color mocks the rose,

Rich, ripe, and teeming with the dew of bliss,—

The flower of Love’s forbidden fruit, which grows

Insidiously to tempt us with a kiss.

Tasso.

I felt the while a pleasing kind of smart;

The kiss went tingling to my very heart.

When it was gone, the sense of it did stay,

The sweetness cling’d upon my lips all day,

Like drops of honey loath to fall away.

Dryden.

Upon my livid lips bestow a kiss;

Oh, envy not the dead, they feel not bliss.

Dryden.

Then with great haste

I clasped my arms about her neck and waist;

About her yielding waist, and took a fouth

Of sweetest kisses frae her glowing mouth.

While hard and fast I held her in my grips,

My very saul came louping to my lips;

Sair, sair she flet wi’ me ’tween ilka smack,

But weel I kend she meant na as she spak.

Allan Ramsay.

Oh, were I made by some transforming power

The captive bird that sings within thy bower!

Then might my voice thy listening ears employ,

And I those kisses he receives enjoy.

Pope.

On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,

Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.

Pope.

Be plain in dress, and sober in your diet;

In short, my deary, kiss me, and be quiet.

Lady Montague: Summary of Advice.

Never man before

More blest; nor like this kiss hath been another,

Nor ever beauties like, met at such closes,

But in the kisses of two damask roses.

Brown: Pastorals.

At these sweet words, how shall I tell my joy?

I called him to my side. He rose, approached,

And trembling seized the hand I proffered him,

A pledge of reconcilèd love; and, ah!

So fervent kissed it, that my very heart

Leaped in my bosom; then full many a sigh

He breathed, with sweet regards and fond caress.

Goldoni.

The kiss snatched hasty from the sidelong maid,

On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep.

Thomson: Winter.

The rose he in his bosom wore,

How oft upon my breast was seen;

And when I kissed the drooping flower,

Behold, he cried, it blooms again!

Cowper.

Soft child of love, thou balmy bliss,

Inform me, O delicious kiss!

Why thou so suddenly art gone,

Lost in the moment thou art won?

Wolcot.

I ken’t her heart was a’ my ain;

I loved her most sincerely;

I kissed her owre and owre again,

Amang the rigs o’ barley.

Burns.

Her lips, more than the cherries bright,

A richer dye has graced them;

They charm th’ admiring gazer’s sight,

And sweetly tempt to taste them.

Burns.

Sae fair her hair, sae brent her brow,

Sae bonnie blue her een, my dearie;

Sae white her teeth, sae sweet her mou’;

The mair I kiss she’s aye my dearie.

Burns.

I’ll pu’ the budding rose when Phœbus peeps in view,

For it’s like a baumy kiss o’ her sweet bonnie mou’;

The hyacinth for constancy, wi’ its unchanging blue—

And a’ to be a posie to my ain dear May.

Burns.

A man may drink and not be drunk;

A man may fight and not be slain;

A man may kiss a bonnie lass

And aye be welcome back again.

Burns.

Her head upon my throbbing breast,

She, sinking, said, “I’m thine forever!”

While many a kiss the seal imprest

The sacred vow we ne’er should sever.

Burns.

Gin a body meet a body

Coming through the rye,

Gin a body kiss a body,

Need a body cry?

Gin a body meet a body

Coming through the glen,

Gin a body kiss a body,

Need the world ken?

Burns.

How delicious is the winning

Of a kiss at Love’s beginning,

When two mutual hearts are sighing

For the knot there’s no untying!

Campbell.

That’s hallowed ground—where, mourned and missed,

The lips repose our love has kissed.

...

A kiss can consecrate the ground

Where mated hearts are mutual bound.

Campbell.

The kiss that would make a maid’s cheek flush

Wroth, as if kissing were a sin,

Amid the Argus eyes and din

And tell-tale glare of noon,

Brings but a murmur and a blush,

Beneath the modest moon.

Campbell.

A creature not too bright or good

For human nature’s daily food;

For transient sorrows, simple wiles,

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

Wordsworth.

Ah, happy she! to ’scape from him whose kiss

Had been pollution unto aught so chaste;

Who soon had left her charms for vulgar bliss,

And spoiled her goodly lands to gild his waste,

Nor calm domestic peace had ever deigned to taste.

Byron.

How shall I bear the moment, when restored

To that young heart where I alone am lord,

When from those lips, unbreathed upon for years,

I shall again kiss off the soul-felt tears,

And find those tears warm as when last they started,

Those sacred kisses pure as when we parted!

Moore: Lalla Rookh.

One dear glance,

Like those of old, were heaven! whatever chance

Hath brought thee here, oh, ’twas a blessed one!

There—my loved lips—they move—that kiss hath run

Like the first shoot of life through every vein,

And now I clasp her, mine, all mine again.

Moore: Lalla Rookh.

Though high that tower, that rock-way rude,

There’s one who, but to kiss thy cheek,

Would climb the untrodden solitude

Of Ararat’s tremendous peak,

And think its steeps, though dark and dread,

Heaven’s pathways, if to thee they led!

Moore: Lalla Rookh.

Oh, think what the kiss and the smile must be worth,

When the sigh and the tear are so perfect in bliss,

And own, if there be an Elysium on earth,

It is this, it is this.

Moore: Lalla Rookh.

The bride kissed the goblet; the knight took it up,

He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup.

She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh,

With a smile on her lips, and a tear in her eye.

Scott: Marmion.

Oh, lift me from the grass!

I die, I faint, I fail!

Let thy love in kisses rain

On my lips and eyelids pale.

Shelley.

Then press, with warm caresses,

Close lips, and bridal kisses,

Your steel;—cursed be his head,

Who fails the bride he wed.

Koerner: Sword Song.

Around the glowing hearth at night

The harmless laugh and winter tale

Go round, while parting friends delight

To toast each other o’er their ale;

The cotter oft with quiet zeal

Will musing o’er his Bible lean;

While in the dark the lovers steal

To kiss and toy behind the screen.

Clare: December.

Then Rory, the rogue, stole his arm round her neck,

So soft and so white, without freckle or speck,

And he looked in her eyes that were beaming with light,

And he kissed her sweet lips—don’t you think he was right?

“Now, Rory, leave off, sir, you’ll hug me no more;

That’s eight times to-day that you’ve kissed me before.”

“Then here goes another,” says he, “to make sure,

For there’s luck in odd numbers,” says Rory O’Moore.

Lover.

Grief with vain passionate tears hath wet

The hair, shedding gleams from thy pale brow yet;

Love with sad kisses unfelt hath prest

Thy meek-dropt eyelids and quiet breast;

And the glad Spring, calling out bird and bee,

Shall color all blossoms, fair child, but thee.

Mrs. Hemans.

She wiped the death-damps from his brow,

With her pale hands and soft,

Whose touch upon the lute-chords low

Had stilled his heart so oft.

She spread her mantle o’er his breast,

She bathed his lips with dew,

And on his cheeks such kisses pressed

As hope and joy ne’er knew.

Mrs. Hemans.

Jenny kissed me when we met,

Jumping from the chair she sat in;

Time, you thief! who love to get

Sweets into your list, put that in.

Say I’m weary, say I’m sad,

Say that health and wealth have missed me,

Say I’m growing old, but add—

Jenny kissed me!

Leigh Hunt.

I classed and counted once

Earth’s lamentable sounds,—the well-a-day,

The jarring yea and nay,

The fall of kisses upon senseless clay.

Mrs. Browning.

There were words

That broke in utterance—melted in the fire;

Embrace, that was convulsion; then a kiss,

As long and silent as the ecstatic night,

And deep, deep shuddering breaths, which meant beyond

Whatever could be told by word or kiss.

Mrs. Browning.

First time he kissed me, but he only kissed

The fingers of this hand wherewith I write;

And, ever since, it grew more clear and white,

Slow to world greeting; quick with its “Oh, list!”

When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst,

I could not wear it plainer to my sight

Than that first kiss. The second passed in height

The first, and sought the forehead; and half missed.

Falling upon my hair. Oh, beyond meed!

That was the chrism of love, which love’s own crown,

With sanctifying sweetness, did precede.

The third upon my lips was folded down

In perfect purple state! Since when, indeed,

I have been proud, and said, “My love, my own!”

Mrs. Browning.

He will kiss me on the mouth

Then; and lead me as a lover

Through the crowds that praise his deeds.

Mrs. Browning.

Love feareth death! I was no child—I was betrothed that day;

I wore a troth-kiss on my lips I could not give away.

Mrs. Browning.

Kiss, baby, kiss! mothers’ lips shine by kisses;

Choke the warm breath that else would fall in blessings;

Black manhood comes, when turbulent guilty blisses

Tend thee the kiss that poisons ’mid caressings.

Charles Lamb.

Both our mouths went wandering in one way,

And, aching sorely, met among the leaves;

Our hands, being left behind, strained far away.

Wm. Morris: Defence of Guinevere.

I saw you kissing once: like a curved sword,

That bites with all its edge, did your lips lie.

Wm. Morris: Defence of Guinevere.

And with a velvet lip print on his brow

Such language as the tongue hath never spoken.

Mrs. Sigourney.

There was a beam in that young mother’s eye, ’

Lit by the feelings that she could not speak,

As from her lips a plaintive lullaby

Stirred the bright tresses on her infant’s cheek;

While now and then, with melting heart, she prest

Soft kisses o’er its red and smiling lips,—

Lips sweet as rosebuds in fresh beauty dressed

Ere the young murmuring bee their honey sips.

Mrs. Welby.

Oh, turn from me those radiant eyes,

With love’s dark lightning beaming,

Or veil the power that in them lies

To set the young heart dreaming.

...

What pity that thy lips of rose,

So fitted for heart-healing,

Should not with tenderest kisses close

The wounds thine eyes are dealing!

Motherwell.

She tenderly kissed me,

She fondly caressed,

And then I fell gently

To sleep on her breast—

Deeply to sleep

From the heaven of her breast.

E. A. Poe.

Oh, stay, Madonna! stay;

’Tis not the dawn of day

That marks the skies with yonder opal streak;

The stars in silence shine;

Then press thy lips to mine,

And rest upon my neck thy fervid cheek.

Macaulay.

A moment, and he saw her come,—

That maiden, from her latticed home,

With eyes all love, and lips apart,

And faltering step, and beating heart,

She came, and joined her cheek to his

In one prolonged and rapturous kiss;

And while it thrilled through heart and limb,

The world was naught to her or him.

Praed.

Oh! Vidal’s very soul did weep

Whene’er that music, like a charm,

Brought back from their unlistening sleep

The kissing lip and clasping arm.

Praed.

How shall I woo her? I will bow

Before the holy shrine,

And pray the prayer, and vow the vow,

And press her lips to mine;

And I will tell her, when she parts

From passion’s thrilling kiss,

That memory to many hearts

Is dearer far than bliss.

Praed.

She loved the ripples’ play,

As to her feet the truant rovers

Wandered and went with a laugh away,

Kissing but once, like wayward lovers.

Praed.

Deep is the bliss of the belted knight,

When he kisses at dawn the silken glove,

And goes, in his glittering armor dight,

To shiver a lance for his Lady-Love!

Praed.

Dream, while the chill sea-foam

In mockery dashes o’er thee,

Of the cheerful hearth, and the quiet home,

And the kiss of her that bore thee.

Praed.

I wept and blessed thee, called thee o’er and o’er

By that dear name which I must use no more;

And kissed with passionate lips the empty air,

As if thy image stood before me there.

Anon.: Josephine to Napoleon.

My heart can kiss no heart but thine,

And if these lips but rarely pine

In the pale abstinence of sorrow,

It is that nightly I divine,

As I this world-sick soul recline,

I shall be with thee ere the morrow.

Bailey: Festus.

The smile, the sigh, the tear, and the embrace—

All the delights of love at last in one,

With kisses close as stars in the Milky Way.

Bailey: Festus.

Frown—toss about—let her lips be for a time:

But steal a kiss at last like fire from heaven.

Bailey: Festus.

Oh, weep not—wither not the soul

Made saturate with bliss;

I would not have one briny tear

Embitter Beauty’s kiss.

Bailey: Festus.

Mother’s kiss

Was ne’er more welcome to the waking child,

After a dream of horrors, than the breeze

Upon my feverish brow.

Anon.: Saul.

Dear as remembered kisses after death,

And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned

On lips that are for others; deep as love,

Deep as first love, and wild with all regret;

O Death in Life! the days that are no more.

Tennyson: Princess.

The trance gave way

To those caresses, when a hundred times

In that last kiss, which never was the last,

Farewell, like endless welcome, lived and died.

Tennyson: Love and Duty.

Many an evening by the waters did we watch the stately ships,

And our spirits rushed together at the touching of the lips.

Tennyson: Locksley Hall.

When I was wont to meet her

In the silent woody places

By the home that gave me birth,

We stood tranced in long embraces

Mixed with kisses sweeter, sweeter

Than anything on earth.

Tennyson: Maud.

They found the stately horse,

Who now, no more a vassal to the thief,

But free to stretch his limbs in lawful flight,

Neighed with all gladness as they came, and stooped

With a low whinny toward the pair; and she

Kissed the white star upon his noble front,

Glad also: then Geraint upon the horse

Mounted, and reached a hand, and on his foot

She set her own and climbed; he turned his face

And kissed her climbing, and she cast her arms

About him, and at once they rode away.

Tennyson: Enid.

Ah, one rose,

One rose, but one, by those fair fingers culled,

Were worth a hundred kisses pressed on lips

Less exquisite than thine.

Tennyson: Gardener’s Daughter.

Then stood the maiden hushed in sweet surprise,

And with her clasped hands held her heart-throbs down

Beneath the wondrous brightness of his eyes,

Whose smile seemed to enwreathe her like a crown.

He raised no wand, he gave no strange commands,

But touched her eyes with tender touch and light,

With charmed lips kissed apart her folded hands,

And laid therein the lily, snowy white.

Wilson: Magic Pitcher.

Ah, sad are they who know not love,

But, far from passion’s tears and smiles,

Drift down a moonless sea, beyond

The silvery coasts of fairy isles.

And sadder they whose longing lips

Kiss empty air, and never touch

The dear warm mouth of those they love—

Waiting, wasting, suffering much.

Aldrich: Persian Love-Song.

Yes, child, I know I am out of tune;

The light is bad; the sky is gray;

I’ll work no more this afternoon,

So lay your royal robes away.

Besides, you’re dreamy—hand on chin—

I know not what—not in the vein:

While I would paint Anne Boleyn,

You sit there looking like Elaine.

Not like the youthful, radiant queen,

Unconscious of the coming woe,

But rather as she might have been,

Preparing for the headsman’s blow.

I see! I’ve put you in a miff—

Sitting bolt upright, wrist on wrist.

How should you look? Why, dear, as if—

Somehow—as if you’d just been kissed!

Aldrich: In an Atelier.

We had talked long; and then a silence came;

And in the topmost firs

To his nest the white dove floated like a flame;

And my lips closed on hers

Who was the only She,

And in one girl all womanhood to me.

Palgrave.

Fly, white-winged sea-bird, following fast,

That dips around our foamy wake,

Go nestle in her virgin breast,

And kiss her pure lips for my sake.

Sailor’s Valentine.

He who wandered with the peasant Jew,

And broke with publicans the bread of shame,

And drank with blessings in His Father’s name

The water which Samaria’s outcast drew,

Hath now His temples upon every shore,

Altar and shrine and priest,—and incense dim

Evermore rising, with low prayer and hymn,

From lips which press the temple’s marble floor,

Or kiss the gilded sign of the dread Cross He bore!

Whittier.

Lament who will the ribald line

Which tells his lapse[15] from duty,

How kissed the maddening lips of wine

Or wanton ones of beauty;

But think, while falls that shade between

The erring one and Heaven,

That he who loved like Magdalen

Like her may be forgiven.

Whittier.

Oh to have dwelt in Bethlehem

When the star of the Lord shone bright!

To have sheltered the holy wanderers

On that blessed Christmas night!

To have kissed the tender wayworn feet

Of the Mother undefiled,

And, with reverent wonder and deep delight,

To have tended the Holy Child!

Adelaide Procter.

“What more have I to give you?

Why give you anything?

You had my rose before, sir,

And now you have my ring.”

“You have forgotten one thing.”

“I do not understand.”

“The dew goes with the rose-bud,

And with the ring the hand!”

She gave her hand; he took it,

And kissed it o’er and o’er:

“I give myself to you, love;

I cannot give you more!”

Stoddard: The Lady’s Gift.

And Halfred the Scald said, “This

In the name of the Lord I kiss,

Who on it was crucified!”

And a shout went round the board,

“In the name of Christ the Lord,

Who died!”

Longfellow.

They climb up into my turret

O’er the arms and back of my chair:

If I try to escape, they surround me;

They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses;

Their arms about me entwine,

Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen

In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine.

Longfellow: The Children’s Hour.

Men and devils both contrive

Traps for catching girls alive;

Eve was duped, and Helen kissed,—

How, oh, how can you resist?

Holmes.

Kiss but the crystal’s mystic rim,

Each shadow rends its flowery chain,

Springs in a bubble from its brim,

And walks the chambers of the brain.

Holmes.

Now, why thy long delaying?

Alack! thy beads and praying!

If thou, a saint, dost hope

To kneel and kiss the Pope,

Then I, a sinner, know

Where sweeter kisses grow—

Nay, now, just one before we go!

Tilton: Flight from the Convent.

[Before closing this portion of our selections, it is worth while to note the popular misconception of the favorite ditty “Coming through the Rye,” as shown in the pictorial illustrations which present a laddie and lassie meeting and kissing in a field of grain. The lines,—

“If a laddie meet a lassie

Comin’ thro’ the rye,”

and especially the other couplet,—

“A’ the lads they smile on me

When comin’ thro’ the rye,”

seem to imply that traversing the rye was a habitual or common thing; but what in the name of the Royal Agricultural Society could be the object in trampling down a crop of grain in that style? The song, perhaps, suggests a harvest-scene, where both sexes, as is the custom in Great Britain, are at work reaping, and where they would come and go through the field indeed, but not through the rye itself, so as to meet and kiss in it. The truth is, the rye in this case is no more grain than Rye Beach is, it being the name of a small shallow stream near Ayr, in Scotland, which, having neither bridge nor ferry, was forded by the people going to and from the market, custom allowing a lad to steal a kiss from any lass of his acquaintance whom he met in mid-stream. Reference to the first verse, in which the lass is shown as wetting her clothes in the stream, confirms this explanation:

“Jenny is a’ wat, puir bodie;

Jenny’s seldom dry;

She drag’lt a’ her petticoatie,

Comin’ thro’ the rye.”]