Dorothy Parker

12 poems

Oh, mercifullest one of all, / Oh, generous as dear,

Now it's over, and now it's done; / Why does everything look the same?

And if my heart be scarred and burned, / The safer, I, for all I learned;

Daily dawns another day; / I must up, to make my way.

Tonight my love is sleeping cold / Where none may see and none shall pass.

Here in my heart I am Helen; / I'm Aspasia and Hero, at least.

Oh, I should like to ride the seas, / A roaring buccaneer;

He'd have given me rolling lands, / Houses of marble, and billowing farms,

You know the bloom, unearthly white, / That none has seen by morning light-

They laid their hands upon my head, / They stroked my cheek and brow;

No more my little song comes back; / And now of nights I lay

With you, my heart is quiet here, / And all my thoughts are cool as rain.