And kiss'd it clingingly--(Ah, why
Don't women do these things in private?) -
I felt that if I lost her, I
Should not survive it:

And from my mouth the words nigh flew -
The past, the future, I forgat 'em:
"Oh! if you'd kiss me as you do
That thankless atom!"

But this thought came ere yet I spake,
And froze the sentence on my lips:
"They err, who marry wives that make
Those little slips."

It came like some familiar rhyme,
Some copy to my boyhood set;
And that's perhaps the reason I'm
Unmarried yet.

Would she have own'd how pleased she was,
And told her love with widow's pride?
I never found out that, because
I never tried.

Be kind to babes and beasts and birds:
Hearts may be hard, though lips are coral;
And angry words are angry words:
And that's the moral.