To A Beautiful Woman
LY, dame Nature made you in some dream Of old-world women--Chriemhild, or bright Aslauga, or Boadicea fierce and fair,
Or Berengaria as she rose, her lips Yet ruddy from the poison that anoints Her memory still, the queen of queenly wives.
I marvel, who will crown you wife, you grand And goodly creature! who will mount supreme The empty chariot of your maiden heart,
Curb the strong will that leaps and foams and chafes Still masterless, and guide you safely home Unto the golden gate, where quiet sits Grave Matronhood, with gracious, loving eyes.
What eyes you have, you wild gazelle o' the plain,
You fierce hind of the forest! now they flash,
Now glow, now in their own dark down-dropt shade Conceal themselves a moment, as some thought,
Too brief to be a feeling, flits across The April cloudland of your careless soul-- There--that light laugh--and 't is full sun--full day.
Would I could paint you, line by line, ere Time Touches the gorgeous picture! your ripe mouth,
Your white arched throat, your stature like to Saul's Among his brethren, yet so fitly framed In such harmonious symmetry, we say As of a cedar among common trees Never "How tall!" but only "O how fair!" Who made you fair? moulded you in the shape That poets dream of; sent you forth to men His caligraph inscribed on every curve Of your brave form?
Is it written on your soul? --I know not.
Woman, upon whom is laid Heaven's own sign-manual,
Beauty, mock heaven not!
Reverence thy loveliness--the outward type Of things we understand not, nor behold But as in a glass, darkly; wear it thou With awful gladness, grave humility,
That not contemns, nor boasts, nor is ashamed,
But lifts its face up prayerfully to heaven,-- "Thou who hast made me, make me worthy Thee!"
Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
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