I'm Looking For The Face I Had

If I make the lashes dark
And the eyes more bright
And the lips more scarlet,
Or ask if all be right
From mirror after mirror,
No vanity's displayed:
I'm looking for the face I had
Before the world was made.

What if I look upon a man
As though upon my beloved,
And my blood be cold the while
And my heart unmoved?
Why should he think me cruel
Or that he is betrayed?
I'd have him love the thing that was
Before the world was made.

Van Morrison, "Before the World was Made", from Too Long in Exile.
After the Yeats poem entitled "A Woman Young and Old" (originally published in The Winding Stair and Other Poems, 1933).