Euclid alone
Has looked on Beauty bare. Fortunate they
Who, though once only and then but far away,
Have heard her massive sandal set on stone.

Millay juxtaposes mathematical clarity with aesthetic revelation. By invoking Euclid—the emblem of rigorous, impersonal proof—she suggests that pure geometry offers a uniquely “bare” encounter with Beauty: stripped of sentiment, contingency, and human desire. The speaker then widens the claim to others who have only briefly, distantly perceived Beauty’s presence, figured as a powerful, almost divine figure whose “massive sandal” strikes stone with audible finality. The tone is reverent and slightly wistful: most people glimpse beauty only fleetingly, but even that remote contact is a kind of fortune, leaving a lasting impression of something absolute and monumental.