Her scarf a la Bardot, <br />In suede flats for the walk, <br />She came with me one evening <br />For air and friendly talk. <br />We crossed the quiet river, <br />Took the embankment walk. <br /> <br />Traffic holding its breath, <br />Sky a tense diaphragm: <br />Dusk hung like a backcloth <br />That shook where a swan swam, <br />Tremulous as a hawk <br />Hanging deadly, calm. <br /> <br />A vacuum of need <br />Collapsed each hunting heart <br />But tremulously we held <br />As hawk and prey apart, <br />Preserved classic decorum, <br />Deployed our talk with art. <br /> <br />Our Juvenilia <br />Had taught us both to wait, <br />Not to publish feeling <br />And regret it all too late - <br />Mushroom loves already <br />Had puffed and burst in hate. <br /> <br />So, chary and excited, <br />As a thrush linked on a hawk, <br />We thrilled to the March twilight <br />With nervous childish talk: <br />Still waters running deep <br />Along the embankment walk.<br /><br />Seamus Heaney<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/twice-shy/
