HER HAND WITHIN MY HANDS
by: Gustavo Adolfo Becquer (1836-1870)
 er hand within my hands,
- Her eyes upon my eyes,
- Her amorous head
- Reclined upon my breast.--
- God knows how many times,
- With languid step,
- We wandered on together
- Beneath the high-topped elms,
- Which round her portal throw
- Shadow and mystery!
- And yesterday, scarcely a year
- Flown like a breath,
- With what a finished grace,
- With what a smiling calm,
- She said, as an officious friend
- Presented each to each--
- "I think somewhere we've met,
- Your face is known to me"--
- Ah! fools and high-born gossips
- Who chase athwart the salons
- Your prey of scandalous love-tales,
- What a prize is lost you here!
- How exquisite a morsel
- Meant to be devoured
- Mid whispers--in corners,
- Behind your fans
- Of feathers and of gold!--
- O! chaste and silent moon,
- O! tall and leafy elms,
- O! walls which gird her house,
- O! shadows of her gate--
- Keep silence, let none guess!
- Keep silence!--for my part
- I have forgotten all,
- And she--she--there is no mask
- Like to her face!
- --Translated by Mary A. Ward
| "Her Hand Within My Hands" is reprinted from "A Spanish Romanticist: Gustavo Becquer." Macmillan's Magazine, February, 1883. |
MORE POEMS BY GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER |
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