"your thorns are the best part of you." Roses Only [poem by Marianne Moore]

You do not seem to realize that beauty is a liability rather than
    an asset – that in view of the fact that spirit creates form we are
      justified in supposing
      that you must have brains. For you, a symbol of the unit, stiff
        and sharp,
    conscious of surpassing by dint of native superiority and liking
      for everything self-dependent,

on anything an ambitious civilization might produce: for you, unaided, to attempt
      through sheer
    reserve to confute presumptions resulting from observation is
      idle. You cannot make us
      think you a delightful happen-so. But rose, if you are brilliant,
      it
    is not because your petals are the without-which-nothing of pre-
      eminence. You would look, minus
thorns – like a what-is-this,

a mere peculiarity. They are not proof against a storm, the elements, or
      mildew
    but what about the predatory hand? What is brilliance without
      coordination? Guarding the
      infinitesimal pieces of your mind, compelling audience to
    the remark that it is better to be forgotten than to be
      remembered too violently,
your thorns are the best part of you.

Roses Only by Marianne Moore

Comments

[Alice Fulton]

One of my favorite Moore poems. Good to see it here. Thank you.

[David C. Lehman]

Thank you, Alice. I love Moore's early poems!