Helen, I’d be, if I could have my wish,
A pool among the rocks where small, shy fish
Gleam to and fro, and green and rosy weed
Sways its long fringes. So I should not heed
Your comings and your goings nor each whim
So skilfully contrived to torture him,
Your chosen fool. And still, as now, each day
Your vanity would bring you where I lay
To kneel and on my crystal face below
Gaze self-entranced, as now; and I should grow
Beautiful with your beauty, and you would be
More beautiful for the crystal lights in me.
But when, self-surfeited, you went away
I should not care, nor could the blown sea-spray,
Blurring your image all the winter through,
Vex the pure, passionless water, strictly true
To its own being. Only the weeds would swing
Rosy and green, and the ripples, ring on ring,
Tremble and wink above the gleaming fish.
So would I be, if I could have my wish.