Your love to me was like an unread book,
Bright-backed, with smooth white pages yet unslit;
Fondly as a lover, foolishly, I took
It from its shelf one day and opened it.
Here shall I read, I thought, beauty and grace,
The soul’s most high and awful poetry;—
Alas for lovers and the faith they place
In love, alas for you, alas for me.
I have but read a page or two at most,
The most my horror-blinded eyes may read.
I find here but a windy tapering ghost
Where I sought flesh gifted to ache and bleed.
Yet back you go, though counterfeit you be.
I love bright books even when they fail me.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on February 15, 2026, by the Academy of American Poets.
