to all the beautiful women
To A Lovely Woman
Shall I compare you to a rainbowed shower
Drawing to earth the very arc of dream,
Or shall I say you are an orchid flower
That favors men beside a jungle stream?
Shall I compare you to a windy morning
Because you stir the sleeping blood and brain
To rise and follow till beauty, scorning
Desire's fleet runners, vanishes again?
No, you are more than spectrum, than the find
Of orchid hunters, than ariel dawn on wings
And I, who know you are the undefined
Reality of all unreal things
Now wisely set your breathlessness apart
As the unanswered challenge to the dreamer's art.
-Angela Manalang Gloria
Shall I compare you to a rainbowed shower
Drawing to earth the very arc of dream,
Or shall I say you are an orchid flower
That favors men beside a jungle stream?
Shall I compare you to a windy morning
Because you stir the sleeping blood and brain
To rise and follow till beauty, scorning
Desire's fleet runners, vanishes again?
No, you are more than spectrum, than the find
Of orchid hunters, than ariel dawn on wings
And I, who know you are the undefined
Reality of all unreal things
Now wisely set your breathlessness apart
As the unanswered challenge to the dreamer's art.
-Angela Manalang Gloria