For an Unnamed Lady

I love you in your mystery

For all you are, and all you might be

Lasting love, it is said,

Can only come of Knowledge

and I cannot deny that it is so

But what lover knows his Beloved perfectly?

Woman is mystery

the incarnation of Holy Mystery

which must be loved in its obscurity

Wrapped in darkness, only revealing glimpses of itself

to longing and adoring eyes

Must a man taste every vintage

to know that wine is good?

Or cannot he accept that he will,

on occasion,

taste vinegar and gall,

and still love wine for all its variety,

and even love the mystery itself;

never knowing what surprises each new glass will bring?

Or how long must a man walk in Faerie

to know that he prefers it

to every place he's ever been,

or shall be?

Must he seek out all its dark corners,

uncover all its secrets

fight all its monsters

before he can say he loves it?

For in Faerie is darkness

as well as light

Elven song and the stench of trolls

Modest maids and devouring dragons

But can he not, having seen that this is so,

declare that here he will make his home--

taking the evil with the good,

the hideous with the fair?

And had he not rather die in the realm of light and shadows,

than live a thousand years in the grey land of men?

Thus I love you.

I know that you have faults;

some I see, some are undiscovered

But to me, they are not faults: they are imperfect perfections

I love your good, I love your bad
because I am bad, and good;

Your virtue and your vice,

Your beauty and your blemishes,

your sanctity and your sin

I do not know you yet--not all of you

it is true

But I know that all I wish to know is you

-- M.S. du Pré