THE GENTLE LADY

By John Masefield

So beautiful, so dainty-sweet,

So like a lyre's delightful touch —

A beauty perfect, ripe, complete

That art's own hand could only smutch

And nature's self not better much.

So beautiful, so purely wrought,

Like a fair missal penned with hymns,

So gentle, so surpassing thought —

A beauteous soul in lovely limbs,

A lantern that an angel trims.

So simple-sweet, without a sin,

Like gentle music gently timed,

Like rhyme-words coming aptly in,

To round a mooned poem rhymed

To tunes the laughing bells have chimed.