| Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 1912–22. | | | | Dead Queens | | By John Rodker |
| | “There come not now … such gold-giving lords.”
WOMEN of large hips, small breasts, | |
| And high white shoulders, | |
| Red hair plaited | |
| And pale steadfast eyes, | |
| You are the high romance— | 5 |
| Lilith, Iseult and Guinevere; | |
| You were fierce lovers, | |
| Not caring to be loved. | |
| |
| Always your lovers fared the perilous quest. | |
| Patiently maybe you waited, | 10 |
| Maybe loved another— | |
| What mattered it? | |
| |
| All passion was in you, all sweetness. | |
| Your lovers in the far-off courts of kings, | |
| Feasted … tarrying with many women. | 15 |
| |
| Patiently you waited, | |
| Maybe loved another— | |
| What mattered it? | |
| |
| Dead queens, dead queens, | |
| Your lovers left you | 20 |
| When cheeks grew pale, lips faded— | |
| Yet you’d not tie them to you | |
| With their pity. | |
| Dead queens! | |
| In that twilight | 25 |
| Where you lived when love had left you, | |
| Often the rumor came | |
| Of Tristrem and of Lancelot | |
| Riding afar … | |
| Yet that was nought to you…. | 30 |
| Time flies, love dies and must die, | |
| Why weep then? | |
| In your king’s beds | |
| You’ll not remember | |
| The sweet or bitter of love. | 35 |
| |
| Lilith laughs at the old Adam, | |
| Caught serpent-wise by the swart eastern woman | |
| God gave him to his sorrow! | |
| Her sorrows are his sorrow, | |
| Her thoughts his thoughts; | 40 |
| For she has bound him to her | |
| With the strong toils of his pity— | |
| His heart would burst to break them. | | | | |
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