"I Could Not Be a Nun"

I Could Not Be a Nun

I could not be a nun,

         For I should kneel and say

A prayer for every head

         A dozen times a day—

And all the while my thoughts

         Would wander thy dear way.

I could not be a nun,

         And push my warm brown hair

Under a heavy veil,

         And smooth and hide it there—

For I should smile, and think,

         “He praised it as most fair.”

How could I be a nun?

         How could I ever still

The sudden throb, or stay

         The thought of thee at will,

Or check the quick response

         To love’s remembered thrill?

I could not be a nun,

         I never could confess

My sins and not say—“Lord,

         I love him more not less;

Give me a thousand years

         Of pain for one caress!”

I could not be a nun—

         Dearest, thou knowest this!

For deep my cheek would burn

         At thought of one long kiss;

Or I should bow and weep

         One unforgotten bliss.

I could not be a nun!

         For how, I ask, at night,

Could I lie still and sleep

         Within my chamber white,

Nor reach my arms and yearn

         For one dear lost delight?

Nay. In the first sweet dream

         I should run straight to thee,

And draw thee—my arms so—

         Close, closer, love, to me . . . . . 

And till the morning bell

         We would kiss silently.

A draft of "I Could Not Be a Nun" on onionskin paper, courtesy of the Ella Higginson Papers, Center for Pacific Northwest Studies, Heritage Resources, Western Washington University, Bellingham WA.

"I Could Not Be a Nun" appears in Ella Higginson's When the Birds Go North Again (1898).