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Home  »  The World’s Best Poetry  »  “She is not fair to outward view”

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

I. Admiration

“She is not fair to outward view”

Hartley Coleridge (1796–1849)

SHE is not fair to outward view,

As many maidens be;

Her loveliness I never knew

Until she smiled on me:

O, then I saw her eye was bright,—

A well of love, a spring of light.

But now her looks are coy and cold;

To mine they ne’er reply;

And yet I cease not to behold

The love-light in her eye:

Her very frowns are fairer far

Than smiles of other maidens are!