Your living glass is this unpolished stone That looks at you with unappraising eyes. Only the smile is different. It is wise As things inanimate are wise, from having grown In fire and ice ten thousand years alone. You will turn shrewd, change with the volatile skies, Cheapen yourself, snatch at the moment's prize . . . Knowing all this, its smile remains its own. Here where the light is almost leaping through, The bust is real as you will never be. You will grow harder than this marble, true To nothing long, not even your effigy; While all the impulsive radiance that was you, Imprisoned in the stone, will still be free. |