Veiled imagery is imagery that deliberately obscures, conceals, or presents its subject indirectly rather than through clear, direct description. The veil may operate through various means: symbolic displacement where images represent hidden subjects, suggestive description that implies rather than states, layered imagery where surface images conceal deeper ones, or deliberately blurred or incomplete presentation. Veiled imagery creates distance between sign and referent, requiring interpretive work to penetrate the veil and access underlying meaning. This technique serves various purposes: maintaining decorum about sensitive subjects, creating mystery and intrigue, protecting dangerous meanings, or exploring poetry's capacity for simultaneous revelation and concealment.

Veiled imagery suggests meaning indirectly through symbol, metaphor, or allusion—requires reader inference and is common in mystical, political, or coded poetry.