My Heart Is Tuned To Sorrow, And

In My Stiff, Brocaded Gown. With My Powdered Hair And Jeweled Fan, I Too Am A Rare Pattern.

Not A Softness Anywhere About Me, Only Whalebone And Brocade.

Life Is A Stream On Which We Strew Petal By Petal The Flower Of Our Heart; The End Lost In Dream, They Float Past Our View, We Only Watch Their Glad, Early Start. Freighted With Hope, Crimsoned With Joy, We Scatter The Leaves Of Our Opening Rose; Their Widening Scope, Their Distant Employ, We Never Shall Know. And The Stream As It Flows Sweeps Them Away, Each One Is Gone Ever Beyond Into Infinite Ways. We Alone Stay While Years Hurry On, The Flower Fared Forth, Though Its Fragrance Still Stays.

To Understand Vers Libre, One Must Abandon All Desire To Find In It The Even Rhythm Of Metrical Feet. One Must Allow The Lines To Flow As They Will When Read Aloud By An Intelligent Reader.

If What We Worship Fail Us, Still The Fire Burns On, And It Is Much To Have Believed.