Fugitive Poetry. 1600–1878/A Beautiful Maiden
A Beautiful Maiden.
Whence that completed form of all completeness?
Whence came that high perfection of all sweetness?
Speak, stubborn earth, and tell me where, oh where!
Hast thou a symbol of her golden hair?
Not oat-sheaves dropping in the western sun;
Not thy soft hand, fair sister! Let me shun
Such follying before thee—yet she had,
Indeed, locks bright enough to make me mad;
And they were simply gordianed up and braided,
Leaving, in naked comeliness, unshaded,
Her pearl round ears, white neck, and orbed brow;
The which were blended in, I know not how,
With such a paradise of lips and eyes,
Blush-tinted cheeks, half-smiles, and faintest sighs,
That when I think thereon, my spirit clings
And plays about its fancy, till the stings
Of human neighbourhood envenom all.
Unto what awful power shall I call?
To what high fane?—Ah! see her hovering feet.
More bluely veined, more soft, more whitely sweet
Than those of sea-born Venus, when she rose
From out her cradle shell. The wind out-blows
Her scarf into a fluttering pavilion;
'Tis blue and over-spangled with a million
Of little eyes, as though thou wert to shed,
Over the darkest, loveliest bluebell bed,
Handfuls of daisies.
Whence came that high perfection of all sweetness?
Speak, stubborn earth, and tell me where, oh where!
Hast thou a symbol of her golden hair?
Not oat-sheaves dropping in the western sun;
Not thy soft hand, fair sister! Let me shun
Such follying before thee—yet she had,
Indeed, locks bright enough to make me mad;
And they were simply gordianed up and braided,
Leaving, in naked comeliness, unshaded,
Her pearl round ears, white neck, and orbed brow;
The which were blended in, I know not how,
With such a paradise of lips and eyes,
Blush-tinted cheeks, half-smiles, and faintest sighs,
That when I think thereon, my spirit clings
And plays about its fancy, till the stings
Of human neighbourhood envenom all.
Unto what awful power shall I call?
To what high fane?—Ah! see her hovering feet.
More bluely veined, more soft, more whitely sweet
Than those of sea-born Venus, when she rose
From out her cradle shell. The wind out-blows
Her scarf into a fluttering pavilion;
'Tis blue and over-spangled with a million
Of little eyes, as though thou wert to shed,
Over the darkest, loveliest bluebell bed,
Handfuls of daisies.