Hair—braided chestnut, coiled like a lyncher’s rope, Eyes—fagots, Lips—old scars, or the first red blisters, Breath—the last sweet scent of cane, And her slim body, white as the ash of black flesh after flame.
Where this text comes from
First published in Cane (1923). First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established. [1]
Structure read from the source's markup; the words have not been compared against a page scan. Last checked 2026-08-12.
Taken from Standard Ebooks, standardebooks/jean-toomer_cane, portrait-in-georgia.xhtml. Rights: public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931).
Earlier sources (2)
This poem as JSON or plain text . Line anchors #L1–#L7.
Cite this poem
Jean Toomer (1894–1967).
“Portrait in Georgia.” First published in Cane (1923).
Text: Poem Index, https://poemindex.org/jean-toomer/portrait-in-georgia/.
Append #L14 to cite line 14, or #L4-L9 for lines 4–9.
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