Robert Herrick: To Anthea. (III)

Sandro Botticelli. Venus and Mars, 1483. National Gallery, London.

TO ANTHEA. (III)
by Robert Herrick

AH, my Anthea ! Must my heart still break ?
(Love makes me write, what shame forbids to speak)
Give me a kiss, and to that kiss a score ;
Then to that twenty add a hundred more :
A thousand to that hundred : so kiss on,
To make that thousand up a million.
Treble that million, and when that is done
Let's kiss afresh, as when we first begun.
But yet, though love likes well such scenes as these,
There is an act that will more fully please :
Kissing and glancing, soothing, all make way
But to the acting of this private play :
Name it I would ; but, being blushing red,
The rest I'll speak when we meet both in bed.

Source:
Herrick, Robert. Works of Robert Herrick. vol I.
Alfred Pollard, ed.
London, Lawrence & Bullen, 1891. 27.

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