Nancy Cunard

Your eyes diffused with holly lights
of ancient Christmas
Helmetted with masks
whose silken nostrils
point the cardinal airs,

The vermillion wall
receding as a sin
beyond your moonstone whiteness,

Your chiffon voice
tears with soft mystery
a lily loaded with a sucrose dew
of vigil carnival,

Your lone fragility
of mythological queens
conjures long-vanished dragons —
— their vast jaws
yawning in disillusion,

Your drifting hands
faint as exotic snow
spread silver silence

as a fondant nun
framed in the facing profiles
of Princess Murat
and George Moore

Mina Loy