What is lovely never dies,
But passes into other loveliness,
Star-dust, or sea-foam, flower or winged air.

What is lovely never dies,
But passes into other loveliness,
Star-dust, or sea-foam, flower or winged air.

The essence of all beauty, I call love,
The attribute, the evidence, and end,
The consummation to read more

The essence of all beauty, I call love,
The attribute, the evidence, and end,
The consummation to the inward sense
Of beauty apprehended from without,
I still call love.

Her gentle limbs did she undress,
And lay down in her loveliness.

Her gentle limbs did she undress,
And lay down in her loveliness.

Just because you're beautiful and perfect, it's made you conceited.

Just because you're beautiful and perfect, it's made you conceited.

Her glossy hair was cluster'd o'er a brow
Bright with intelligence, and fair and smooth;
Her eyebrow's read more

Her glossy hair was cluster'd o'er a brow
Bright with intelligence, and fair and smooth;
Her eyebrow's shape was like the aerial bow,
Her cheek all purple with the beam of youth,
Mounting, at times, to a transparent glow,
As if her veins ran lightning.

The beauty seems right
By force of beauty, and the feeble wrong
Because of weakness.

The beauty seems right
By force of beauty, and the feeble wrong
Because of weakness.

By plucking her petals, you do not gather the beauty of the flower.

By plucking her petals, you do not gather the beauty of the flower.

Truth exists for the wise, beauty for the feeling heart.

Truth exists for the wise, beauty for the feeling heart.

Ye Gods! but she is wondrous fair!
For me her constant flame appears;
The garland she hath read more

Ye Gods! but she is wondrous fair!
For me her constant flame appears;
The garland she hath culled, I wear
On brows bald since my thirty years.
Ye veils that deck my loved one rare,
Fall, for the crowning triumph's nigh.
Ye Gods! but she is wondrous fair!
And I, so plain a man am I!