To a Girl beloved - Bernhard Severin Ingemann

What is it, dear maid, that enraptures me so? 

What holds my fond heart in a chain of control? 

Can the fragile attire of thy spirit below 

Be match'd with the glories that beam in thy soul? 

Is the throne of thy conquest thy soft lip of roses, 

Or the flexible charm of thy bright blue eye? 

Is the temple where grandeur or sweetness reposes 

The soft-heaving breast, or the forehead high? 

Oh! lovely's thine eye, but more lovely shines through it 

The spirit unwasted, unwither'd by time: 

The frame may be fair, through whose crystal we view it, 

But fairer within is the picture sublime. 

And sweet are thy lips, but more sweet they unfold 

The soft tones of music, the language of love: 

I value the harp for its strings of gold, 

But I value its accents the gold strings above. 

And thy breast, like the arch of the temple ascending, 

Is fair, but it swells o'er a heart more divine: 

I love the white arches in majesty bending, 

But worship the god that's enthroned in the shrine. 

'Tis this, dearest maid, that enraptures me so, 

''Tis this holds my heart in a chain of control; 

I love the attire of thy spirit below, 

But rev'rence the glories that beam in thy soul

---

Bernhard Severin Ingemann (1789 - 1862) Denmark

Translated by William Sidney Walker

Source: Poems, from the Danish selected by Andreas Andersen Feldborg and translated by William Sidney Walker, Thomas Dobson, 1815