Classic Poem

Why all these fears and feigned alarms
That never can pretend to blind me?
Let me enumerate the charms
With which you bind me.

First, I shall list one pair of eyes,
Like flame beneath some mouldering fuel;
A mouth that's witty if not wise,
Half kind, half cruel.

Thirdly, there are two tapering hands,
So delicate and diamond-spangled;
And there's your hair, in whose bright strands
I lie entangled.

Your breast, all rose and silk and pearl;
Your laugh, a bright and sharpened sickle;
Your whims, dear and distracting girl,
Footloose and fickle.

Your kiss, a wine that has no dregs;
Your love, a bird that seldom perches.
And I must add your lyric legs—
Two dancing birches.

But most of all I love your pride,
As firm as mine that I believe in.
Stubborn and selfish; hard inside . . .
That makes us even.