At The Heart - A poem by Elizabeth N. Barr

At The Heart.

We are such foolish women at the
heart,
I saw one pull the petals from a
rose,
And smiling like a baby in its
dreams,
She named the petals, dropping
each apart.

Some of us are priestesses and
seers,
And some of us have followed
primrose ways,
Some bear dead children that they
can't forget,
And some bear living sorrow all
their days.

Some of us^___gaunt Hagars^___have
gone forth,
And founded empires in a desert
land,
And after us, in days of flippant
ease,
One has destroyed it with a
dainty hand.

Not one, not one, escapes the fated
dart,
A gray-haired school-ma'am count-
ing apple seeds
From queens of Sheba to the
Nubian slaves,
All, all, are foolish women at the
heart.

^__Elizabeth N. Barr.

The High Winds of Home
Elizabeth N. Barr
(Olathe: privately published. 1922)
Page 27-28