For Beauty I am not a Star

For Beauty I am not a Star

Original Text
The Papers of Woodrow Wilson, ed. Arthur S. Link and others, Vol. 56: March 17-April 4, 1919 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987): 440.
2There are others more perfect by far,
3    But my face I don't mind it,
4    For I am behind it,
5It is those in front that I jar.

Notes

1] Dr. Grayson wrote in his diary on Monday, March 31, 1919, when he and Wilson were together in France:
The President and Mrs. Wilson and I had dinner alone. No reference whatever was made to the business of the day at the table. After dinner we had a small cup of coffee in the sitting-room. The President repeated a number of limericks, saying that some medals had been sent to him from which to select one for the French Academy. One copy is to be presented to the President and the other deposited in the archives of the Academy as a memorial of the conferring of the Academy degree upon the President. He then repeated the limerick:
For beauty I am not a star,
There are others more perfect by far,
But my face I don't mind it,
For I am behind it,
It is those in front that I jar.
(Papers, vol. 56, p. 440).
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RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2001
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