IN AN ARTIST’S STUDIO

IN AN ARTIST’S STUDIO

One face looks out from all his canvases,

       One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans:

       We found her hidden just behind those screens,

That mirror gave back all her loveliness.

A queen in opal or in ruby dress,

       A nameless girl in freshest summer-greens,

       A saint, an angel — every canvas means

The same one meaning, neither more nor less.

He feeds upon her face by day and night,

       And she with true kind eyes looks back on him,

Fair as the moon and joyful as the light:

       Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;

Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;

       Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti PORTRAIT OF ELIZABETH SIDDAL, SEATED AT A WINDOW Graphite, pen and ink on paper. 1854 Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

Данте Габриэль Россетти ПОРТРЕТ ЭЛИЗАБЕТ СИДДАЛ, СИДЯЩЕЙ У ОКНА Бумага, карандаш, перо, чернила. 1854 Музей Фицуильяма, Кембридж