To Mary Pickford
Vachel Lindsay 1879 (Springfield) – 1931 (Springfield)
MOVING-PICTURE ACTRESS
(On hearing she was leaving the moving-pictures for the stage.)
Mary Pickford, doll divine,
Year by year, and every day
At the movmg-picture play,
You have been my valentine.
Once a free-limbed page in hose,
Baby-Rosalind in flower,
Cloakless, shrinking, in that hour
How our reverent passion rose,
How our fine desire you won.
Kitchen-wench another day,
Shapeless, wooden every way.
Next, a fairy from the sun.
Once you walked a grown-up strand
Fish-wife siren, full of lure,
Snaring with devices sure
Lads who murdered on the sand.
But on most days just a child
Dimpled as no grown-folk are,
Cold of kiss as some north star,
Violet from the valleys wild.
Snared as innocence must be,
Fleeing, prisoned, chained, half-dead—
At the end of tortures dread
Roaring Cowboys set you free.
Fly, O song, to her to-day,
Like a cowboy cross the land.
Snatch her from Belasco's hand
And that prison called Broadway.
All the village swains await
One dear lily-girl demure,
Saucy, dancing, cold and pure,
Elf who must return in state.
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 30, 2023
- 54 sec read
- 135 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | X ABBA CDDCEBBE FGGFHIIHJKKJ BFFB LGGL |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,027 |
Words | 179 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 4, 8, 12, 4, 4 |
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"To Mary Pickford" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 4 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/37420/to-mary-pickford>.
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