Her body is not so white as
anemony petals nor so smooth-nor
so remote a thing. It is a field
of the wild carrot taking
the field by force; the grass
does not raise above it.
Here is no question of whiteness,
white as can be, with a purple mole
at the center of each flower.
Each flower is a hand's span
of her whiteness. Wherever
his hand has lain there is
a tiny purple blemish. Each part
is a blossom under his touch
to which the fibres of her being
stem one by one, each to its end,
until the whole field is a
white desire, empty, a single stem,
a cluster, flower by flower,
a pious wish to whiteness gone over-
or nothing.
Queen-anne's Lace
William Carlos Williams
(1)
Poem topics: desire, wild, grass, raise, single, question, touch, force, body, purple, white, field, flower, Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
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