From "Vashti"

Lascelles Abercrombie 1881 (Ashton upon Mersey) – 1938 (London)



WHAT thing shall be held up to woman's beauty?   
Where are the bounds of it? Yea, what is all   
The world, but an awning scaffolded amid   
The waste perilous Eternity, to lodge   
This Heaven-wander'd princess, woman's beauty?           
The East and West kneel down to thee, the North   
And South; and all for thee their shoulders bear   
The load of fourfold space. As yellow morn   
Runs on the slippery waves of the spread sea,   
Thy feet are on the griefs and joys of men     
That sheen to be thy causey. Out of tears   
Indeed, and blitheness, murder and lust and love,   
Whatever has been passionate in clay,   
Thy flesh was tempered. Behold in thy body   
The yearnings of all men measured and told,     
Insatiate endless agonies of desire   
Given thy flesh, the meaning of thy shape!   
What beauty is there, but thou makest it?   
How is earth good to look on, woods and fields,   
The season's garden, and the courageous hills,     
All this green raft of earth moored in the seas?   
The manner of the sun to ride the air,   
The stars God has imagined for the night?   
What's this behind them, that we cannot near,   
Secret still on the point of being blabbed,     
The ghost in the world that flies from being named?   
Where do they get their beauty from, all these?   
They do but glaze a lantern lit for man,   
And woman's beauty is the flame therein.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:13 min read
70

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABCDAEFGAHIJKALMNOPQRFSTAURVW
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,361
Words 240
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 29

Lascelles Abercrombie

Lascelles Abercrombie was a British poet and literary critic, one of the "Dymock poets". more…

All Lascelles Abercrombie poems | Lascelles Abercrombie Books

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    Which of these famous poems is written in villanelle form?
    A Funeral Blues
    B The Owl And The Pussycat
    C Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening
    D Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night