Choosing Poem by Nellie Isabelle Steward Cooper

All that exists is worthy of love
For all that exist is life
And life is worthy of love
If it be worthy of anything

But in love you do not choose,
ask for credentials or measure distances

To choose one thing among many is to reject more
than you choose

You must pity the poor connoisseur
who must weigh and measure, beauty
by the pound and the line
and the color

While life like quicksilver
runs out through their fingers:

Heart if you will listen
I can assure you that this is not the way
of the lover...

To love is not to choose;
art objects are chosen
furnishings for the house
as are appointments for the table,

such exotics gathered by rejection have not love but only an obscure
and ephemeral affection