Classic and Contemporary Poetry
THE WHITE FEET OF ATTHIS, by HENRY ANDERSON LAFLER First Line: Then atthis to her lover-poet said Last Line: Her cold, sweet finger-tips. Subject(s): Feet; Man-woman Relationships; Poetry & Poets; Male-female Relations | ||||||||
THEN Atthis to her lover-poet said: "Why dost thou never murmur of my feet A little song and sweet? For surely they are worth a fragile rhyme To cast in the teeth of Time." From that imperious countenance, behold, He looked along the dais stained with gold Where bright her silver garments gleamed and, lo! A little drift of snow Was newly fallen there, Nor fled in the dim air. Gazing, a mist about his eyelids fell; As strokes of a loud bell His heart beat: loveliness Surged in his brain and did his soul possess, And earth's white shapes, a cavalcade of dreams, Hurried their phantom-streams; Yet came no vision out of lands or seas So perfect-fair as these So white, so slight, so pale, so frail, so sweet Were her unsandaled feet. Ah, grievèd was his heart That ever in mead or mart Aught carved so fragilely and slender-round Should tread the dark, cold ground. "Such white hath not the curds Drawn of the dreamy herds, Nor white breasts of white birds, Nor marble women folded in their stone, Still, sunless, and unknown. "White of a moonlit garden of pale roses, And blossomy orchard-closes, Or shroud that wreathes a girl's virginity Her cold inviolacy Or viewless foam of far, enchanted seas Nay, not any of these Is whiter" Suddenly, With petulant bright mouth a-question, she Shattered to air that weaving reverie "Tak'st thou so long to see that they are fair, So mute thou standest there? A song I'd have to quell the singing birds, Of soft and colored words, All woven together in a gleaming rhyme Seven silver bells a-chime To ring and murmur in all maidens' ears Through the unceasing years: Her feet were smallest, fairest. They must be Forever hating me." Then he from all his dreams awakenèd, His grave eyes lifted, said: "O Beautiful, mine all-allegiance Bowed to the emerald shadows of thy glance, And thine unconquered mouth (A scarlet poppy out of the warm South), And till thou bad'st them see Mine eyes knew not so far a falsity Unto thy face, O Sweet, As one small, fleeting glance unto thy feet!" Thereat she laughed in her high queenly mood, And said: "Thy words are of thy poethood, And wilt thou bring some slight immortal rhyme In morrow's morning-time?" He leaned, and Atthis yielded to his lips Her cold, sweet finger-tips. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MISERY AND SPLENDOR by ROBERT HASS THE APPLE TREES AT OLEMA by ROBERT HASS DOUBLE SONNET by ANTHONY HECHT CONDITIONS XXI by ESSEX HEMPHILL CALIFORNIA SORROW: MOUNTAIN VIEW by MARY KINZIE SUPERBIA: A TRIUMPH WITH NO TRAIN by MARY KINZIE COUNSEL TO UNREASON by LEONIE ADAMS TWENTY QUESTIONS by DAVID LEHMAN WIRELESS by HENRY ANDERSON LAFLER ON THE MEDUSA OF LEONARDO DA VINCI IN THE FLORENTINE GALLERY by PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY |
|