Poem by Elinor Wylie

* * *

What other name had half expressed the whole
Of that incomparable and touching grace
Which spells the shape of danger in your face?
It is the very pattern of your soul;
The eagle's home, above the moon's control,
Above the seas, the high precipitate place;
The stairway cut from planetary space;
The crystal steps which climb a steeper goal.

The shadow of its light is only this:
That all your beauty is the work of wars
Between the upper and the nether stars;
Its symmetry is perfect and severe
Because the barbarous force of agonies
Broke it, and mended it, and made it clear.

1. In Our Content, before the Autumn Came
2. Upon Your Heart, Which Is.the Heart of All
3. The Little Beauty That I Was Allowed
4. Absent Thee from Felicity Awhile
5. The Broken Man

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