Admit the ruse to fix and name her chaste With those who sleep the spring through, one and one, Cool nights, when laurel builds up, without haste, Its precise flower, like a pentagon. In her obedient breast, all that ran free You thought to bind, like echoes in a shell. At the year's end, you promised, it would be The unstrung leaves, and not her heart, that fell. So the year broke and vanished on the screen You cast about her; summer went to haws; This, by your leave, is what she should have been. Another man will tell you what she was. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ABOVE AND WITHIN by DAVID IGNATOW HOMING BRAVES by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON TO GALLANT FRANCE by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON THE BLACK MAMMY by JAMES WELDON JOHNSON A FLORIDA SUNDAY by SIDNEY LANIER THE LAKE BOATS by EDGAR LEE MASTERS |