Patience Poem by Herbert Nehrlich

I laid my hand upon your breast
and drowned my lips with gentle greed.
Your eyes were mine, your core was prest
against me, hard, with urgent need.
And yet we stayed in this position
like frozen statues, all suspended.
The Gods had said that the condition
for lasting love that never ended
would be abstention at this time.
Just close encounter of a kind
that does allow the lust to climb
but would stop short of intertwined
hot bodies that just know they must
search deep inside the other's soul,
that give in freely to their lust,
believing that their lives be whole.

But, when I heard that I could trade
for abstinence the end of time.
So that no clock was ever made,
would be of use or need a chime.
That time would cease now to exist,
I said 'with pleasure', as we kissed.