Destroyers and Other Verses/My Tender Ways and Laughter
My tender ways and laughterHave gained me lovers twain.I flouted the one, but the otherI bitterly love again.
One loved me for my great virtue;I was sweet, and pure, and good.He worshipped in me incarnate,Mysterious womanhood.
To the other my soul lies open—I never could play my part—He thinks that virtue 's scarcelyThe thing I've most at heart.
Paris, May, 1855.