Bondage Or Freedom Poem by Nellie Isabelle Steward Cooper

The safety of uncaringness

The encrypted loneliness
The circumscribed movements
All within the known arena

The small perfections
Exacted as a ritual

The votive offerings
Of cakes and ale
So lavishly enjoyed

The obscure tenderness
That make the fingertips
Follow the shape of things

It twas a sort
Of frozen love

Not what she
Would have chosen
Had life been kind

But many more than one
Know but one freedom:

Bondage!

Or she be free to choose:
This was the freedom of bondage

Whose flavor is regret