Marsden Hartley

From “Kaleidoscope”

SHE was so young, so like a tigress,

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.

Following her, upon the bridge made of young trees

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.

But she was young, so like a tigress—

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.