A Portrait

Arthur Henry Adams 1872 (Lawrence) – 1936 (Sydney, New South Wales)



HER glance is equable, serene;
 She looks at life with level brow;
 She strides through circumstance—a queen!
 To compromise she cannot bow—
 Even to love she will not lean!  
  Not hers the head that, like a flower,
 Trembles upon a swaying stem;
 Her neck is firm-curved as a tower,
 And on her brow for diadem
 Shine steadfastness and peace and power.  
  She wills no limits to her scope;
 Her head imperiously borne
 Above her gradual bosom's slope;
 Her chin a dainty-moulded scorn,
 Her eyes a deep, untarnished hope.  
  By gusts of passion undistressed,
 She spurs not on a panting pulse;
 Throned in her womanhood, at rest,
 No ripples of her moods convulse
 The tidal swayings of her breast.  
  She is no fevered Sex to flush—
 A woman-weakness that should yield,
 A fruit for love to clench and crush,
 A fragile warmth that arms should shield,
 A whisper that a kiss should hush!  
 
  Yet with the tears her soul has shed
 Her innocence is seared within;
 Her heart is not a white thing dead:
 She lifted dauntless eyes to Sin,
 And from her splendid frown he fled!  
  But when love breathless to her trips
 And joy within her laughs elate,
 Her soul to no surrender slips—
 She meets the kiss that crowns her mate
 With vivid eyes and virile lips!

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:06 min read
110

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABABACDCDCEFEFEGHGHGIGIGI GJGJGKGKGK
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,273
Words 221
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 25, 10

Arthur Henry Adams

Arthur Henry Adams was a journalist and author. He started his career in New Zealand, though he spent most of it in Australia, and for a short time lived in China and London.  more…

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