Classic Poem

Yea, who could tell thou wast a woman then?
Not thine own sister-flowers of sister-sweetness
But not the same divine white flower-completeness.
For moulded thou wast to be loved of men,
Yea, to be followed with all passionate fleetness.
Was it God who watched, and marked thy holy meetness
To spring forth budlike, tenderly expanding,
Into a woman's shape, superb, commanding,
Bearing the old same fragrance in her limbs,
The flowerlike scent whereat the dazed sense swims,—
Yea, suddenly, is the shapely flower-stem standing
Human, alive for aye, with breath that dims
All watching eyes—so sweet it is—with tears,
And voice like flowing ripples in all ears?