As long as I can remember, I have been a fan of the poetry of William Butler Yeats. So when I was presented, through Netgalley, with Orna Ross's book "Her Secret Rose," I jumped at the chance to delve a bit into the early part of his life and his complicated relationship with his muse, Maud Gonne. 
 The book is easy to read, absorbing, and very well researched. Inspired by the historical resources of private letters, journals, communications and published works, Orna Ross in effect writes of a love affair that never truly was, but which sparked passion and creativity. At first I was put off by how the story was being told, narrated from the point of view of domestic servant, Rosie. Through her eyes, we are lead on a fascinating journey behind these public personas into the private, real world of their human strengths and flaws. Maud is not a typical woman of her era. She is tall, outspoken, and political. She is a femme fatale and a passionate feminist. Her passion inspires Yeats to write some of his most beautiful words. 
 "Had I the heaven's embroidered cloths, 
 Enwrought with golden and silver light, 
 The blue and the dim and the dark cloths 
 Of night and light and the half-light; 
 I would spread the cloths under your feet: 
 But I, being poor, have only my dreams; 
 I have spread my dreams under your feet; 
 Tread softly because you tread on my dreams."