You! Inez!
Orange gleams athwart a crimson soul
Lambent flames; purple passion lurks
In your dusk eyes.
Red mouth; flower soft,
Your soul leaps up—and flashes
Star-like, white, flame-hot.
Curving arms, encircling a world of love,
You! Stirring the depths of passionate desire!
This poem is in the public domain.
“You! Inez!” by Alice Moore Dunbar-Nelson is originally from a 1921 holograph manuscript.
Alice Dunbar-Nelson
Alice Ruth Moore Dunbar-Nelson was born on July 19, 1875, in New Orleans. Her mother was Patricia Wright, a seamstress, and her father, Joseph Moore, was a merchant marine. Nelson earned a teaching degree at Straight University (now, Dillard University) in 1892 at age seventeen. She then taught in the local public school system as an elementary school teacher until 1931.