The perilous rim of trees
Has made my days adventurous, my spirit strong.

And now her wings
Are still--her vivid song
But ceaseless twitterings.

Her words are feathers, falling
Lightly, relentlessly, and without rest,
Revealing to my face
Her pinched and starveling breast
Like poultry, dead and unashamed
And naked in the market place.

A shattered flash of wings,
A broken song,
Echo and shine along the rim of trees.

The King Sends Three Cats to Guinevere

Queen Guinevere,
Three sleek and silent cats
Bring you gifts from me.

The first is a grey one,
(I wanted a white one,
I could not find one snowy white enough,
Queen Guinevere,)
He brings you purple grapes.

The second is a grey one,
(I wanted a sleek one,
Where could I find one sleek enough,
Queen Guinevere?)
He brings you a red apple.

The third one, too, is grey.
(I wanted a black one,
Not Hate itself could find one black enough,
Queen Guinevere,)
He brings you poison toadstools.

I send you three grey cats with gifts--
(For uniformity of metaphor,
Since Bacchus, Satan, and the Hangman
Are not contemporaneous in my mythology)
I send you three grey cats with gifts,
Queen Guinevere,
To warn you, sleekly, silently
To pay the forfeit.

Ode in the New Mode

Your face
Was a temple
From which your soul
Came to me beneath arched brows:
And my soul knelt at your feet.

Then
Inadvertently
I saw your leg
Curved and turned like a bird-song
Dying into ecstatic silence at the garter...

Wretched
Women!
When you are wholly lovely
Man cannot forget either of his two afflictions,
Soul, or body!

Night

I opened the door
And night stared at me like a fool,
Heavy dull night, clouded and safe--
I turned again toward the uncertainties
Of life within doors.

Once night was a lion,
No, years ago, night was a python
Weaving designs against space
With undulations of his being--
Night was a siren once.

O sodden, middle-aged night!

End of Project Gutenberg's A Woman of Thirty, by Marjorie Allen Seiffert

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN OF THIRTY ***

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