Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.
Her DaughterMarsden Hartley
S
Her large round eyes of jet and amber
Lanceting one through from edge to edge
And from side to side with a girl’s ferocity.
Her hair was short, also jet in hue
With blue lustres in it, and her lips were round
And full, and her breasts were round and full,
And they shot through the black wool mesh
Great shafts of jungle fire out at one.
She made no other overture.
Turned so like dusted ivory with the heats and rains
And fogs, and early dews and mists—
Or, as one would say, blanched to a veritable white—
Her mother.
Her mother, shaded by a parasol, walked discreetly
So many paces behind her—so many paces,
Smiling at something, surely not this,
Smiling with a vague enthusiasm;
For she was too old to laugh heartily about lusting flesh.
She had no breasts now, and her eyes were rimmed
With gold, and there was no light and no heat in them,
Or any tendency to casual fervors.
Her very large round eyes of jet and amber
Lanceting through one from chest to spine
And from scalp to heel with a girl’s ferocity.
She had her lusty appointment with the sea.
Her suit of black wool showed all of that—
Her lips were not colored,
And her hands were pale—the mother had no breasts.
This was certainly a fair exchange for the sea.