Verse > Anthologies > T. R. Smith, ed. > Poetica Erotica: A Collection of Rare and Curious Amatory Verse
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T. R. Smith, comp.  Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse.  1921–22.
 
Beauty
By Alfred Bryan (1871–1958)
 
(From Pagan Love Lyrics, 1921)

BEAUTY is not modest. Why should Beauty be?
  But ugliness is moral after all.
Beauty and concealment have no affinity:
  For Ugliness—convention wears a pall.
 
Beauty bares her loveliness for other eyes to see;        5
  And Truth, when naked only, is divine.
So you, dear heart, are modest in all your nudity
  Save when observed by other eyes than mine.
 
 
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