BLUEBEARD

By Edna St. Vincent Millay

This door you might not open, and you did;

So enter now, and see for what slight thing

You are betrayed.... Here is no treasure hid,

No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring

The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain

For greed like yours, no writhings of distress,

But only what you see.... Look yet again—

An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless.

Yet this alone out of my life I kept

Unto myself, lest any know me quite;

And you did so profane me when you crept

Unto the threshold of this room to-night

That I must never more behold your face.

This now is yours. I seek another place.