This sonnet is inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s famous quote, “There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportion,” from his short story “Ligeia.” In Poe’s tale, the beauty of the mysterious woman Ligeia is entwined with an otherworldly, unsettling strangeness, thus highlighting the idea that beauty often thrives in imperfection.
The sonnet explores this concept, celebrating the beauty found in things that are off-center, crooked, and flawed. It suggests that it is the very strangeness of these things that makes them remarkable and worthy of our time and attention.
There is no beauty forged in flawless light—
It twists where shadows linger at the seam.
A crooked branch may catch the morning right
And cast the roots of wonder into dream.
A freckled rose, off-center in its bloom,
Will hold the gaze far longer than the best.
The stars are never silent in their room;
They flicker strange and waken eyes at rest.
The pearl was born from pressure, pain, and grit.
The sea’s rough hand gave shape to something rare.
So let the world tell tales of perfect wit—
I’ll choose the crooked with a bend that’s fair.
For beauty, true, is never fully tamed—
Its strangeness is the reason it is named.
© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2025
Necessary Whispers 