MADONNA MIA
by: Oscar Wilde
- LILY-GIRL, not made for this
world's pain,
- With brown, soft hair close braided by her ears,
- And longing eyes half veiled by slumberous tears
- Like bluest water seen through mists of rain:
- Pale cheeks whereon no love hath left its stain,
- Red underlip drawn in for fear of love,
- And white throat, whiter than the silvered dove,
- Through whose wan marble creeps one purple vein.
- Yet, though my lips shall praise her without cease,
- Even to kiss her feet I am not bold,
- Being o'ershadowed by the wings of awe,
- Like Dante, when he stood with Beatrice
- Beneath the flaming Lion's breast, and saw
- The seventh Crystal, and the Stair of Gold.
'Madonna Mia' was originally published
in Kottabos (1877) under the title Wasted Days.
It was entirely rewritten for Poems (1881). |
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