She lives on the cover

Of a chocolate‑box.

Her wide hat comes over

Her too golden locks.

Near her many a blossom

Of a bad green tree

Her hand's on her bosom

And she looks past me.

Haply she is like

Someone I ne'er knew,

And can memory strike

In a way untrue.

A vague maiden made

Of bad printing work,

Of colours ill‑laid

……

Haply she's someone,

Real, person, and true

In a world, or none,

Our thoughts can construe.

Somehow she is there

And that means something

Real, but not near

Our imagining.

Why was she made that

There and thus, if she

Is not God‑known. What

Is reality?

Nothing that we can

Interpret or dream

Quite exhausts the span

Of what she can seem.

God is very complex.

Life is very wide.

Who knows? She resembles

Much that is denied.

This is idle, but

Perhaps out of here

Its sense may abut

On some notion clear.

Life is shallow water,

Dreams are ripples gone.

To think is to falter

What's known is unknown.