La Nue

A poem by Alan Seeger (1888-1916)

Oft when sweet music undulated round,

Like the full moon out of a perfumed sea

Thine image from the waves of blissful sound

Rose and thy sudden light illumined me.

And in the country, leaf and flower and air

Would alter and the eternal shape emerge;

Because they spoke of thee the fields seemed fair,

And Joy to wait at the horizon’s verge.

The little cloud-gaps in the east that filled

Gray afternoons with bits of tenderest blue

Were windows in a palace pearly-silled

That thy voluptuous traits came glimmering through.

And in the city, dominant desire

For which men toil within its prison-bars,

I watched thy white feet moving in the mire

And thy white forehead hid among the stars.

Mystical, feminine, provoking, nude,

Radiant there with rosy arms outspread,

Sum of fulfillment, sovereign attitude,

Sensual with laughing lips and thrown-back head,

Draped in the rainbow on the summer hills,

Hidden in sea-mist down the hot coast-line,

Couched on the clouds that fiery sunset fills,

Blessed, remote, impersonal, divine;

The gold all color and grace are folded o’er,

The warmth all beauty and tenderness embower, —

Thou quiverest at Nature’s perfumed core,

The pistil of a myriad-petalled flower.

Round thee revolves, illimitably wide,

The world’s desire, as stars around their pole.

Round thee all earthly loveliness beside

Is but the radiate, infinite aureole.

Thou art the poem on the cosmic page —

In rubric written on its golden ground —

That Nature paints her flowers and foliage

And rich-illumined commentary round.

Thou art the rose that the world’s smiles and tears

Hover about like butterflies and bees.

Thou art the theme the music of the spheres

Echoes in endless, variant harmonies.

Thou art the idol in the altar-niche

Faced by Love’s congregated worshippers,

Thou art the holy sacrament round which

The vast cathedral is the universe.

Thou art the secret in the crystal where,

For the last light upon the mystery Man,

In his lone tower and ultimate despair,

Searched the gray-bearded Zoroastrian.

And soft and warm as in the magic sphere,

Deep-orbed as in its erubescent fire,

So in my heart thine image would appear,

Curled round with the red flames of my desire.

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Poems in English 

• In Memoriam A. H. H.: The Prelude poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H. Obiit MDCCCXXXIII: 3. O Sorrow, cruel poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: Is it, then, regret for buried time poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 131. O living will that shalt endure poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 99. Risest thou thus, dim dawn, again poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 95. By night we linger’d on the lawn poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 83. Dip down upon the northern shore poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 82. I wage not any feud with death poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 7. Dark house, by which once more I s poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 78. Again at Christmas did we weave poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 5. Sometimes I Hold it half a Sin poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 55. The wish, that of the living whol poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 54. Oh, yet we Trust that somehow Goo poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 45. The baby new to earth and sky poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 39. Old warder of these buried bones poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 2. Old Yew, which graspest at the sto poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 22. The path by which we twain did go poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 16. I Envy not in any Moods poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 15. To-night the winds begin to rise poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson
• In Memoriam A. H. H.: 126. Love is and was my Lord and King poem – Lord Alfred Tennyson poems by Alfred 1st Baron Tennyson

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