15 The Ladybird

She said: Some little speck
Torments me. So I stared:
On her snowy neck there
A tiny pink insect.

I should have—(but, wise or thick,
At sixteen, one is glib)—
Seen the kiss upon her lip
More than the bug on neck.

It looked like seashell conch;
Its pink back black-freckled.
Above us, songbirds settled
To watch us from their branch.

Her cool mouth was on my way
As I bent in, allured,
And I took the ladybird,
But the kiss flew away.

“Son, learn now my name,”
Said the bug of the blue sky,
“Animals belong to the Divine:
But foolishness to man.”

Paris, May 1830.