Poems By Arjava

LA BEAUTE

(From Baudelaire)

I AM loveliness infrangibly, the dream of adamantine stone,

Omortals, and my bosom where each one is bruised in turn

Inspires the Poet's love to burn

Like matter's dumb mute ecstasy, eternal and alone.,

Enthroned in my unfathomed thought under the sky's blue rafter,

—Asphinx with unravaged heart of snow, winged with the swan's white gift —

I hate distorting shift

Of lineaments and never wry to weeping or to laughter.

The austere poets who see the aspiring coil

Of my composure, which inmost essence takes

From all sublimity of stone,

Give sedentary hours of ceaseless toil;

For I have that which magically musters

These obedient lovers, pure mirroring which makes

All things more beautiful,—

My eyes' deep-gazing, imperishable lustres.

March 23, 1934.