Poem by Elinor Wylie

Beauty

Say not of beauty she is good, 
Or aught but beautiful, 
Or sleek to doves’ wings of the wood 
Her wild wings of a gull.

Call her not wicked; that word’s touch 
Consumes her like a curse; 
But love her not too much, too much, 
For that is even worse.

O, she is neither good nor bad, 
But innocent and wild! 
Enshrine her and she dies, who had 
The hard heart of a child.

1. Death and the Maiden
2. Bronze Trumpets and Sea Water - On Turning Latin into English
3. Madman’s Song
4. Incantation
5. The Falcon

Constance Naden Beauty ("ETERNAL Beauty, Truth's interpreter")

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