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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
TO BERTHA, by CLARENCE ALVA POWELL
First Line: I am a connoisseur of rare and priceless portraits
Last Line: In that it is unfaltering and lasting.
Subject(s): Portraits
First Line: I am a connoisseur of rare and priceless portraits
Last Line: In that it is unfaltering and lasting.
Subject(s): Portraits
I am a connoisseur of rare and priceless portraits.
Being reproduced on poignantly precise mental plates
and framed in the golden wealth of reverie,
they are more genuine than color and canvas
have ever captured.
All my portraits are of one person only --
etchings, profiles, and silhouettes.
Sometimes, in rapid succession, they flash before my eyes
as crazily as those kaleidoscopic previews
of future attractions at the neighborhood theatre.
Some of the portraits, however,
being more consistent than others,
haunt me:
there is, for instance,
the quick smile that hurts me to remember; the
the unreadable expression in the brown depths of your eyes;
gorgeous tresses; shoulders squarely independent,
yet frail withal; the hands that have interlocked my own
and walled in the dreams of my heart.
A portrait in composite beauty made so by love
in that it is unfaltering and lasting.
Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!
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AQUATINT FRAMED IN GOLD by AMY LOWELL
PORTRAIT OF X (III) by THOMAS LUX
PORTRAIT OF THE GREAT WHITE HUNTER FOXHUNTING IN THE ABSENCE OF BIG... by CLARENCE MAJOR
PORTRAIT OF A MAN by ALICIA SUSKIN OSTRIKER
PORTRAITE DE L'ARTISTE by ALICIA SUSKIN OSTRIKER
FAMILY PORTRAIT by KENNETH PATCHEN
FEMALE PORTRAIT, 19TH CENTURY by TOMAS TRANSTROMER
HORIZONS by CLARENCE ALVA POWELL
PIONEERS OF INDUSTRY by CLARENCE ALVA POWELL
THE PLAYERS ASK FOR A BLESSING ON THE PSALTERIES AND ON THEMSELVES by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS