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Mignonne

1861 –

1909

^{Fourteenth Century Form}

Mignonne, whose face bends low for my caressing,
New and unknown to-night thy beauty seemeth;
Dimly I read thine eyes as one who dreameth.

The moonlight yester-eye fell soft in blessing,
That coldly now across thy bright hair gleameth;
Mignonne, whose face bends low for my caressing,
New and unknown to-night thy beauty seemeth.

As penitent, low-voiced, his sins confessing,
Pleads where the light of the high altar streameth,
I speak to thee, whose love my love redeemeth.
Mignonne, whose face bends low for my caressing,
New and unknown to-night thy beauty seemeth;
Dimly I read thine eyes as one who dreameth.

Sophie Jewett, a poet, translator, and professor, was born on June 3, 1861, in Moravia, New York, to Dr. Charles Carroll Jewett, a country physician, and Ellen Ransom Burroughs. Jewett’s father died during her childhood, prompting the family, including her two sisters and brother, to move to Buffalo, New York. Around age twenty, she traveled to England and Italy, usually in the company of one of her sisters, who was an artist. Her sojourns in the latter country inspired what became Italian Sketches (Suburban Press, 1917).

Themes

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More by this poet

I Speak Your Name

I speak your name in alien ways, while yet
November smiles from under lashes wet.
In the November light I see you stand
Who love the fading woods and withered land,
Where Peace may walk, and Death, but not Regret.

Sophie Jewett

1910

Across the Fields

Across the fields, the happy fields that lay
Unfaded yet, one visionary day
We walked together, and the world was sweet.
Each heard the whisper neither might repeat,
Love's whisper underneath our light word-play.

Sophie Jewett

1910

For a Birthday

^{Cornelia Frances Bates, AET. 79}

Long ago sweet song songs were sung
Of fair ladies ever young;
Wearier wanderings over sea,
Exile in sad lands and strange,
Yet their beauty might not change.
Not a single word is told
Of a Helen who grows old;
Not her thousand sorrows dare
Dull the light of Deirdre’s hair;
Iseult, lovelier than report,
Maiden. In her father’s court,
Grown world-radiant shall be seen
Through all time, Iseult the Queen.

Sophie Jewett

1910

Poems

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Mignonne

More by this poet

I Speak Your Name

Across the Fields

For a Birthday

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