Her mouth is long and her teeth are crooked,
The features are sharp and ugly.
To two boys her age,
"Their fathers bought them bicycles.
Today the boys, taking their time for dinner,
They're racing around the yard, forgetting all about her,
And she's on the trail behind them.
"She's as happy as she is happy as she is happy.
"She's as tired and torn from her heart.
And the girl rejoices and laughs,
"and she is seized with the happiness of her life.

"No shadow of jealousy, no evil intent.
"This creature knows not yet.
Everything is so immensely new to her,
So alive is all that is dead to others!
And I do not want to think, as I watch,
That the day will come when she, weeping,
And she'll see with horror that in the midst of her friends
She's nothing but a poor, bad girl!
I want to believe that the heart is not a toy,
That can hardly be broken all of a sudden!
I want to believe that this flame is pure
That burns in her depths,
Will outlive all her pain alone
And drown the hardest stone!
Though her features be not good.
And though she has nothing to tempt the imagination, -
The infantile grace of her soul
The childish grace of her soul is in her every movement.
And if so, what is beauty?
And why do men deify her?
A vessel in which there is nothing,
Or fire flickering in a vessel?