(Keats’s young lover as portrayed by Abbie Cornish in the film Bright Star) 

Fanny had a face full of character

and gave true love.

She held inside her borders

plum ripe fullness—

dark warm red with an

infrequent smile that lit

when it came, poised, not bent,

for life’s harmony, a destiny

she could not see with

amber eyes aglow but would

in latter days accommodate.

At ease and gifted with details,

she saw, without, a world whole.

Loyal to her family, she stayed,

walked the fields afterward,

to the very end, a heart full

of knowing she, alone,

had the only thing

she wanted.  

From Allan Cox’s collection, “Cool in the Shade.”Copyright© 2009, all rights reserved.