#MIDDLEBURY
Sea Lily
H.D.
Reed,
slashed and torn
but doubly rich –
such great heads as yours
drift upon temple-steps,
but you are shattered
in the wind.
Myrtle-bark
is flecked from you,
scales are dashed
from your stem,
sand cuts your petal,
furrows it with hard edge,
like flint
on a bright stone.
Yet though the whole wind
slash at your bark,
you are lifted up,
aye – though it hiss
to cover you with froth.
About this poem
“Sea Lily” was published in “Sea Garden” (Constable and Company, Ltd., 1916).
About H.D.
Hilda Doolittle was born on Sept. 10, 1886, in Bethlehem, Penn. Her collections of poetry include “Red Roses for Bronze” (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1931) and “Helen in Egypt” (New Directions, 1961). She died in 1961.
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day@poets.org.
This poem is in the public domain. Originally published in Poem-a-Day, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.
