(2005)

Now I’ve spied beauty so unparalleled
Not just of face and form, but broader still.
Duplicity results when she’s beheld
By her – for in her eye her beauty’s nil.
The basest word in English is no curse;
The taint that t’aint befit for tongue is ‘than’.
“More fair than,” “kinder than” – not fit for verse!
Comparisons to damn the also-ran.
Would she, for scarcely but a moment, lift
Away those glasses of perverse perspective,
She then could through a thousand falses sift
And promptly brand her mind’s eye thus defective.
Imperfect you – one day shall’st meet surprise
To see perfection through all else’s eyes.