Roses Only by Marianne Moore

Roses Only

 

You do not seem to realize that beauty is a liability rather than 

    an asset – that in view of the fact that spirit creates form we are justified

      in supposing 

      that you must have brains. For you, a symbol of the unit, stiff

        and sharp,

    conscious of surpassing by dint of native superiority and liking

      for everything self-dependent,

 

on anything an ambitious civilization might produce: for you, unaided, to attempt 

      through sheer 

    reserve to confute presumptions resulting from observation is

      idle. You cannot make us 

      think you a delightful happen-so. But rose, if you are brilliant, it

    is not because your petals are the without-which-nothing of pre- 

      eminence. You would look, minus

thorns – like a what-is-this, 

 

a mere peculiarity. They are not proof against a storm, the elements, or mildew

    but what about the predatory hand? What is brilliance without

      coordination? Guarding the 

      infinitesimal pieces of your mind, compelling audience to

    the remark that it is better to be forgotten than to be remembered too

      violently,

your thorns are the best part of you.