" Take hands.
There is no love now.
But there are hands.
There is no joining now,
But a joining has been
Of the fastening of fingers
And their opening.
More than the clasp even, the kiss
Speaks loneliness,
How we dwell apart,
And how love triumphs in this. "

― , The Poems of Laura Riding: A Newly Revised Edition of the 1938/1980 Collection