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Home  »  The Oxford Book of English Verse  »  694. To Helen

Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.

Edgar Allan Poe. 1809–1849

694. To Helen

HELEN, thy beauty is to me 
  Like those Nicèan barks of yore 
That gently, o’er a perfumed sea, 
  The weary way-worn wanderer bore 
  To his own native shore.         5
 
On desperate seas long wont to roam, 
  Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, 
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home 
  To the glory that was Greece, 
And the grandeur that was Rome.  10
 
Lo, in yon brilliant window-niche 
  How statue-like I see thee stand, 
  The agate lamp within thy hand, 
Ah! Psyche, from the regions which 
  Are holy land!  15