How Can I Tell You How Beautiful You Are? Poem by Resten Swondo

I wish I could say how beautiful you are to me
But I could not taint the same lips that touch yours
With words that charlatans have well used
To raise them in favour for a time, wasted.
I wish I could find words, but demonstration
Alone is all that one could do to prove truth of heart.
But youth demands the daintiest of praises,
However untrue the speaking tongue,
and the vanity of the aged duchess demands
outrageous sustenance often
at the expense of respectful pride.
So in my gaze, see my words,
In my touch, sense the tone,
In my kisses, the meaning
Of words I should speak but have given to silence
And let age translate these unspoken words
Into the truth I carry in my heart,
The truth of the beauty I have found in you
That replies to how beautiful you are to me.