Romance was always young. <br />You come today <br />Just eight years old <br />With marvellous dark hair. <br />Younger than Dante found you <br />When you turned <br />His heart into the way <br />That found the heavenly stair. <br /> <br />Perhaps we must be strangers. <br />I confess <br />My soul this hour is Dante's, <br />And your care <br />Should be for dolls <br />Whose painted hands caress <br />Your marvellous dark hair. <br /> <br />Romance, with moonflower face <br />And morning eyes, <br />And lips whose thread of scarlet prophesies <br />The canticles of a coming king unknown, <br />Remember, when you join him <br />On his throne, <br />Even me, your far off troubadour, <br />And wear <br />For me some trifling rose <br />Beneath your veil, <br />Dying a royal death, <br />Happy and pale, <br />Choked by the passion, <br />The wonder and the snare, <br />The glory and despair <br />That still will haunt and own <br />Your marvellous dark hair.<br /><br />Vachel Lindsay<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-lady-jane/
