My Last Duke

There I am, on the wall, as found
Hidden and concealed without a sound.
I am the last duchess, what a sight to behold
Until my gracious Duke, to the strangers, I am told
And with a vivacious smirk, he pulls the curtain close
To reveal the women he finds most morose.
Because I love to love, and life be kind-
O the beauty I see, O the beauty I find
In the sunset I see the eyes of a dove,
Not the Duke that I see, but that of a love.

You can take your nine-hundred-years-old name
For I am not Neptune’s seahorse, I will not be tame,
And while you move from one duchess to another
All end the same, to die unkempt, onto the new you will now smother.
Not a murder to speak of, you spoke daggers but used none.
You grew mad and unwary, as I was whisked away by the sun
And the possessions you give, the presents deceive
And the commands you shout, there is something you can not conceive
For the cascading light and I, withering away; and with no fondle to bear,
The desolate mind of the royal, so vain without a care,
To the depressèd duchess, never to forgive his rouse:
‘Twas a death most unkind, unseen in my rouge