All Things Feminine
There is that which running along after like a lost puppy is
no shame.
I have an untoward gravitation, I think, towards all things
feminine. No, not in the way that I am some girl-crazy kid, but merely
in that women seem to make up a larger part of my life than they do for
most men. You see, I would very much prefer being the only man anywhere
in my life. It is much more pleasant, and pleasant nearly to a fault,
to have anything — even the smallest task — done by a
woman.
All beauty seems to spring from The Feminine — from the
delicate inklings of nature: please do not misunderstand this as
neo-Pagan goddess-worship — whether the clean design of a
beautiful piece of architecture or a splendid poppy blowing in the
wind, what makes something worth just sitting and staring at is always
its feminine properties. The delicacy of the flower, the
perfectly-arranged sweeping columns of some Parthenon in any country:
all point to the beauty that is SHE.
The Feminine has always, as far as I can remember, held a strange
fascination for me. There is that which running along after like a
lost puppy is no shame. Indeed, I would be ashamed to not throw
myself to the great Wind of Beauty. “From far, from eve and
morning and yon twelve-winded sky, the stuff of life to knit me blew
hither: here am I.”1 To stand firm when such a
mistress bids me crumble I find the greatest blasphemy; to fall at her
word, the stuff of life. Careless of being crushed by such a force, I
would ride high on the gales of Her mischance until swept into the face
of Wonder, I live, crippled by sweetness, forever.
Above all, I am a follower of the Feminine. I am a worshipper of
Beauty.
1.
From far, from eve and morning
And yon twelve-winded sky,
The stuff of life to knit me
Blew hither: here am I.
Now — for a breath I tarry
Nor yet disperse apart —
Take my hand quick and tell me,
What have you in your heart.
Speak now, and I will answer;
How shall I help you, say;
Ere to the wind's twelve quarters
I take my endless way.
— “XXXII”, A Shropshire Lad, A.E.
Housman.