Wednesday, September 16, 2026

denise levertov | in mind | poem

There's in my mind a woman

of innocence, unadorned but

 

fair-featured, and smelling of
apples or grass. She wears

 

a utopian smock or shift, her hair
is light brown and smooth, and she

 

is kind and very clean without
ostentation –


                       but she has
no imagination.


                     And there's a
turbulent moon-ridden girl

 

or old woman, or both,
dressed in opals and rags, feathers

 

and torn taffeta,
who knows strange songs –

 

but she is not kind.