At First She Came To Me Pure

   At first she came to me pure,
dressed only in her innocence;
and I loved her as we love a child.

   Then she began putting on 
clothes she picked up somewhere;
and I hated her, without knowing it.

   She gradually became a queen,
the jewelry was blinding ...
What bitterness and rage!

   ... She started going back towards nakedness.
And I smiled.

   Soon she was back to the single shift
of her old innocence.
I believed in her a second time.

   Then she took off the cloth
and was entirely naked ...
Naked poetry, always mine,
that I have loved my whole life!

by Juan Ramon Jimenez
translated by Robert Bly