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15. Jun 2007
There is no Seeker other than Him
THERE IS NO SEEKER OTHER THAN HIM
For the lovers, there is no seeking done by themselves,
there is no other seeker in the world than Him.
This world and the next are a single substance; in reality,
there is no unbelief, religion or faith.
O you whose breath is like that of Jesus! Don't breathe from
such a distance! I am the admirer of the one who is not
far-thinking.
If you say, "I'll go behind," Don't go! There's no behind.
If you say, "I'll go ahead," No! There's no way ahead.
Open your hand and be generous, grab the hem of
your own robe and be merciful. there is no bandage for
this wound except this garment.
All good and bad qualities are parts of the dervishes; whoever is
not like this, is not a dervish.
Whoever has gone beyond "place," his only place is the heart --
such a heart for which there is no place in the world!
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi (1207-1273)
En annoteret udgave af digtet kan findes her.
Billedet forestiller en tænksom Rumi og hans højere selv og er © 1998 Shahriar Shahriari.
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08. Jun 2007
A dream
In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed--
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.
Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?
That holy dream--that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.
What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar--
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)
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06. Jun 2007
Brahma
IF the red slayer think he slays,
Or if the slain think he is slain,
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep, and pass, and turn again.
Far or forgot to me is near;
Shadow and sunlight are the same;
The vanished gods to me appear;
And one to me are shame and fame.
They reckon ill who leave me out;
When me they fly, I am the wings;
I am the doubter and the doubt,
And I the hymn the Brahmin sings
The strong gods pine for my abode,
And pine in vain the sacred Seven;
But thou, meek lover of the good!
Find me, and turn thy back on heaven.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
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26. May 2007
Jeg lægges i jorden i hvide lin
Jeg lægges i jorden i hvide lin
Og gemmes i graven i sorte skrin,
Mit øje er brustent, min læbe er blå,
I mærke det alle, som se derpå.
Jeg tænkte langt, kom stakket afsted,
Se, hvor nu døden har slaget mig ned!
I verdens lyst gjorde jeg mig glad,
I jorden gives jeg orme til mad.
Dine synder er mange og store for Gud,
Så ofte haver du brudt hans bud.
Det må vel være en hjertens nød,
Du har ej venner, når du er død.
Til dommen skulle vi alle opstå,
For dommerens stol skulle vi fremgå,
Da må det frem, hvad du haver gjort,
Hvad du har brudt, både lidt og stort.
Hej hjælper ej gave, ej herre-bøn,
Men du får da den rette løn,
Dig skjuler ej hule, ej tårn, ej mur,
Du arme usselig kreatur.
Af Michael Nicolai, præst i Odense omkring år 1500 , jfr. P. Hansens Illustreret Dansk Litteraturhistorie, 1. bind s. 60ff.
Citeret i Hans Scherfigs Frydenholm, hvor den opgives som "nr. 635 i salmebogen" - hvilket må have passet med datidens salmebog.
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09. May 2007
Relapse
O turn away those cruel eyes,
The stars of my undoing!
Or death, in such a bright disguise,
May tempt a second wooing.
Punish their blind and impious pride,
Who dare contemn thy glory;
It was my fall that deified
Thy name, and seal'd thy story.
Yet no new sufferings can prepare
A higher praise to crown thee;
Though my first death proclaim thee fair,
My second will unthrone thee.
Lovers will doubt thou canst entice
No other for thy fuel,
And if thou burn one victim twice,
Both think thee poor and cruel.
Thomas Stanley (1625-1678)
Omnia vincit amor
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02. May 2007
The Eagle and the Serpent
In the air do I behold indeed
An Eagle and a Serpent wreathed in fight:--
And now, relaxing its impetuous flight,
Before the aërial rock on which I stood,
The Eagle, hovering, wheeled to left and right,
And hung with lingering wings over the flood,
And startled with its yells the wide air's solitude.
A shaft of light upon its wings descended,
And every golden feather gleamed therein--
Feather and scale inextricably blended.
The Serpent's mailed and many-colored skin
Shone through the plumes its coils were twined within
By many a swollen and knotted fold, and high
And far, the neck receding lithe and thin,
Sustained a crested head, which warily
Shifted and glanced before the Eagle's steadfast eye.
Around, around, in ceaseless circles wheeling
With clang of wings and scream, the Eagle sailed
Incessantly--sometimes on high concealing
Its lessening orbs, sometimes as if it failed,
Drooped through the air; and still it shrieked and wailed,
And casting back its eager head, with beak
And talon unremittingly assailed
The wreathèd Serpent, who did ever seek
Upon his enemy's heart a mortal wound to wreak.
What life, what power, was kindled and arose
Within the sphere of that appalling fray!
For, from the encounter of those wondrous foes,
A vapor like the sea's suspended spray
Hung gathered; in the void air, far away,
Floated the shattered plumes; bright scales did leap,
Where'er the Eagle's talons made their way,
Like sparks into the darkness;--as they sweep,
Blood stains the snowy foam of the tumultuous deep.
Swift chances in that combat--many a check,
And many a change, a dark and wild turmoil!
Sometimes the Snake around his enemy's neck
Locked in stiff rings his adamantine coil,
Until the Eagle, faint with pain and toil,
Remitted his strong flight, and near the sea
Languidly fluttered, hopeless so to foil
His adversary, who then reared on high
His red and burning crest, radiant with victory.
Then on the white edge of the bursting surge,
Where they had sunk together, would the Snake
Relax his suffocating grasp, and scourge
The wind with his wild writhings; for, to break
That chain of torment, the vast bird would shake
The strength of his unconquerable wings
As in despair, and with his sinewy neck
Dissolve in sudden shock those linkèd rings--
Then soar, as swift as smoke from a volcano springs.
Wile baffled wile, and strength encountered strength,
Thus long, but unprevailing. The event
Of that portentous fight appeared at length.
Until the lamp of day was almost spent
It had endured, when lifeless, stark and rent,
Hung high that mighty Serpent, and at last
Fell to the sea, while o'er the continent
With clang of wings and scream the Eagle passed,
Heavily borne away on the exhausted blast.
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822), fra The Revolt of Islam I, v. 66-126. -
billede fra Punch vol. 99, 13. september 1890.
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16. Apr 2007
When I have fears that I may cease to be
WHEN I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high piled books, in charact'ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love!--then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.
John Keats (1795-1821)
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11. Apr 2007
Fyrsten og forbryderen
FYRSTEN OG FORBRYDEREN
Din strenge Dom frygt ikke meer,
Naar han, som den afsagde, leer.
Den kolde Statsmand troer,
Straf for Forbrydelser bør aldrig eftergives,
Og at, hvo Liv forbrød, han bør aflives,
At paa Retfærdighed det Heles Vel beroer.
Jeg er ei Statsmand, skiønt lidt kold;
Men troer, det staaer i Fyrstens Vold,
I sieldent Fald, lidt Straffen at formilde.
Exempel læse skal De, som det læse vilde.
Det i en gammel Krønik stod
(Jeg troer, det staaer endnu), hvad jeg fortæller;
Men den omstændelig sig ei udlod,
Jeg derfor ikke heller.
Franciscus af Urbain (Gud kiender ham for Resten),
Regent i Syd, i Nord, i Østen eller Vesten —
Jeg fik ei vide, hvor;
Men nok, at han var from og stoer.
Franciscus af Urbain en Dødsdom underskrev,
Han nødig underskrev, men Loven han adlyder;
Thi Folkets Sikkerhed og hans det byder.
Regenten dømte Døe, men Manden ønsked' Lev!
Den Dom, den Synder fik,
Ham meget nær til Hierte gik;
Just ei, fordi han Livet skulde miste,
Men kun, fordi han vidste,
At hans Familie til Skiendsel regnes vilde,
Om hængt han blev,
Og dette var hans Dom.
Han ind med en Ansøgning kom,
Hvori han Fyrsten bad, han maatte dog formilde
En Dom, som efter ham
Hans Slægt, skiønt uforskyldt, forvolde vilde Skam.
Et Taarn der fandtes der,
Som vores runde Taarn, paa Gitterværket nær.
Han underdanigst bad, ham Vagt der maatte bringe,
Og derfra ned han vilde springe;
Han var til Døden vel bereed,
Kun ved hans Dødsfaçon uskyldig Slægt ei leed.
Den Fyrste eiegod,
Den Naade ham tilstod.
Nu af en Hændelse Franciscus reed forbi
Det Sted, hvor Synderen fra Infamie
Stod netop i Begreb med arme Slægt at rædde.
Han tog et Løb, tog to, og tog det tredde.
Den Fyrste sagde saa: „Tre gange Løb at tage!
Hvi sprang du ei med eet? hvi dig omsonst umage?“
Den Synder derimod han sagde saa:
„Min Hals jeg gier derpaa,
At ei i fire Løb, ja ei i fem,
Det Spring vil lykkes Dem.
Kom, naadig Herre og probeer.“
Den gode Fyrste leer,
Og midt i paanødt Latter
Sig for lyksalig skatter,
Ved denne Leilighed at kunde Paaskud faae
Til Synderen at lade gaae.
Moral
Den Fyrste, siger man, giør Vold mod Folkets Ret,
Som nogensinde Straf vil eftergive!
Det veed jeg ikke just: men dette tør jeg skrive!
Den Tigers Hierte har, som ei undskylder det.
Johan Herman Wessel (1742-85)
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28. Mar 2007
The high ambition of the drop of rain
The high ambition of the drop of rain
Is to be merged in the unfettered sea;
My sorrow when it passed all bounds of pain,
Changing, became itself the remedy.
Behold how great is my humility!
Under your cruel yoke I suffered sore;
Now I no longer feel thy tyranny
I hunger for the pain that then I bore.
Why did the fragrance of the flowers outflow
If not to breathe with benediction sweet
Across her path? Why did the soft wind blow
If not to kiss the ground before her feet?
Mirza Ghalib (1797 — 1869)
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21. Mar 2007
Cold eyelids that hide like a jewel
DOLORES
Cold eyelids that hide like a jewel
Hard eyes that grow soft for an hour;
The heavy white limbs, and the cruel
Red mouth like a venomous flower;
When these are gone by with their glories,
What shall rest of thee then, what remain,
O mystic and sombre Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain?
Seven sorrows the priests give their Virgin;
But thy sins, which are seventy times seven,
Seven ages would fail thee to purge in,
And then they would haunt thee in heaven:
Fierce midnights and famishing morrows,
And the loves that complete and control
All the joys of the flesh, all the sorrows
That wear out the soul.
O garment not golden but gilded,
O garden where all men may dwell,
O tower not of ivory, but builded
By hands that reach heaven from hell;
O mystical rose of the mire,
O house not of gold but of gain,
O house of unquenchable fire,
Our Lady of Pain!
O lips full of lust and of laughter,
Curled snakes that are fed from my breast,
Bite hard, lest remembrance come after
And press with new lips where you pressed.
For my heart too springs up at the pressure,
Mine eyelids too moisten and burn;
Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure,
Ere pain come in turn.
In yesterday's reach and to-morrow's,
Out of sight though they lie of to-day,
There have been and there yet shall be sorrows
That smite not and bite not in play.
The life and the love thou despisest,
These hurt us indeed, and in vain,
O wise among women, and wisest,
Our Lady of Pain.
Who gave thee thy wisdom? what stories
That stung thee, what visions that smote?
Wert thou pure and a maiden, Dolores,
When desire took thee first by the throat?
What bud was the shell of the blossom
That all men may smell to and pluck?
What milk fed thee first at what bosom?
What sins gave thee suck?
We shift and bedeck and bedrape us,
Thou art noble and nude and antique;
Libitina thy mother, Priapus
Thy father, a Tuscan and Greek.
We play with light loves in the portal,
And wince and relent and refrain;
Loves die, and we know thee immortal,
Our Lady of Pain.
Fruits fail and love dies and time ranges;
Thou art fed with perpetual breath,
And alive after infinite changes,
And fresh from the kisses of death;
Of languours rekindled and rallied,
Of barren delights and unclean,
Things monstrous and fruitless, a pallid
And poisonous queen.
Could you hurt me, sweet lips, though I hurt you?
Men touch them, and change in a trice
The lilies and languours of virtue
For the raptures and roses of vice;
Those lie where thy foot on the floor is,
These crown and caress thee and chain,
O splendid and sterile Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain.
There are sins it may be to discover,
There are deeds it may be to delight.
What new work wilt thou find for thy lover,
What new passions for daytime or night?
What spells that they know not a word of
Whose lives are as leaves overblown?
What tortures undreamt of, unheard of,
Unwritten, unknown?
Ah beautiful passionate body
That never has ached with a heart!
On thy mouth though the kisses are bloody,
Though they sting till it shudder and smart,
More kind than the love we adore is,
They hurt not the heart or the brain,
O bitter and tender Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain.
As our kisses relax and redouble,
From the lips and the foam and the fangs
Shall no new sin be born for men's trouble,
No dream of impossible pangs?
With the sweet of the sins of old ages
Wilt thou satiate thy soul as of yore?
Too sweet is the rind, say the sages,
Too bitter the core.
Hast thou told all thy secrets the last time,
And bared all thy beauties to one?
Ah, where shall we go then for pastime,
If the worst that can be has been done?
But sweet as the rind was the core is;
We are fain of thee still, we are fain,
O sanguine and subtle Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain.
By the hunger of change and emotion
By the thirst of unbearable things,
By despair, the twin-born of devotion
By the pleasure that winces and stings,
The delight that consumes the desire,
The desire that outruns the delight,
By the cruelty deaf as a fire
And blind as the night,
By the ravenous teeth that have smitten
Through the kisses that blossom and bud,
By the lips intertwisted and bitten
Till the foam has a savour of blood,
By the pulse as it rises and falters,
By the hands as they slacken and strain,
I adjure thee, respond from thine altars,
Our Lady of Pain.
Wilt thou smile as a woman disdaining
The light fire in the veins of a boy?
But he comes to thee sad, without feigning,
Who has wearied of sorrow and joy;
Less careful of labour and glory
Than the elders whose hair has uncurled;
And young, but with fancies as hoary
And grey as the world.
I have passed from the outermost portal
To the shrine where a sin is a prayer;
What care though the service be mortal?
O our Lady of Torture, what care?
All thine the last wine that I pour is,
The last in the chalice we drain,
O fierce and luxurious Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain.
All thine the new wine of desire,
The fruit of four lips as they clung
Till the hair and the eyelids took fire,
The foam of a serpentine tongue,
The froth of the serpents of pleasure,
More salt than the foam of the sea,
Now felt as a flame, now at leisure
As wine shed for me.
Ah thy people, thy children, thy chosen,
Marked cross from the womb and perverse!
They have found out the secret to cozen
The gods that constrain us and curse;
They alone, they are wise, and no other;
Give me place, even me, in their train,
O my sister, my spouse, and my mother,
Our Lady of Pain.
For the crown of our life as it closes
Is darkness, the fruit thereof dust;
No thorns go as deep as a rose's,
And love is more cruel than lust.
Time turns the old days to derision,
Our loves into corpses or wives;
And marriage and death and division
Make barren our lives.
And pale from the past we draw nigh thee,
And satiate with comfortless hours;
And we know thee, how all men belie thee,
And we gather the fruit of thy flowers;
The passion that slays and recovers,
The pangs and the kisses that rain
On the lips and the limbs of thy lovers,
Our Lady of Pain.
The desire of thy furious embraces
Is more than the wisdom of years,
On the blossom though blood lie in traces,
Though the foliage be sodden with tears.
For the lords in whose keeping the door is
That opens to all who draw breath
Gave the cypress to love, my Dolores,
The myrtle to death.
And they laughed, changing hands in the measure,
And they mixed and made peace after strife;
Pain melted in tears, and was pleasure;
Death mingled with blood, and was life.
Like lovers they melted and tingled,
In the dusk of thine innermost fane;
In the darkness they murmured and mingled,
Our Lady of Pain.
In a twilight where virtues are vices,
In thy chapels, unknown of the sun,
To a tune that enthralls and entices,
They were wed, and the twain were as one.
For the tune from thine altar hath sounded
Since God bade the world's work begin,
And the fume of thine incense abounded,
To sweeten the sin.
Love listens, and paler than ashes,
Through his curls as the crown on them slips,
Lifts languid wet eyelids and lashes,
And laughs with insatiable lips.
Thou shalt hush him with heavy caresses,
With music that scares the profane;
Thou shalt darken his eyes with thy tresses,
Our Lady of Pain.
Thou shalt bind his bright eyes though he wrestle,
Thou shalt chain his light limbs though he strive;
In his lips all thy serpents shall nestle,
In his hands all thy cruelties thrive.
In the daytime thy voice shall go through him,
In his dreams he shall feel thee and ache;
Thou shalt kindle by night and subdue him
Asleep and awake.
Thou shalt touch and make redder his roses
With juice not of fruit nor of bud;
When the sense in the spirit reposes,
Thou shalt quicken the soul through the blood.
Thine, thine the one grace we implore is,
Who would live and not languish or feign,
O sleepless and deadly Dolores,
Our Lady of Pain.
Dost thou dream, in a respite of slumber,
In a lull of the fires of thy life,
Of the days without name, without number,
When thy will stung the world into strife;
When, a goddess, the pulse of thy passion
Smote kings as they revelled in Rome;
And they hailed thee re-risen, O Thalassian,
Foam-white, from the foam?
When thy lips had such lovers to flatter;
When the city lay red from thy rods,
And thine hands were as arrows to scatter
The children of change and their gods;
When the blood of thy foemen made fervent
A sand never moist from the main,
As one smote thm, their lord and thy servant,
Our Lady of Pain.
On sands by the storm never shaken,
Nor wet from the washing of tides;
Nor by foam of the waves overtaken,
Nor winds that the thunder bestrides;
But red from the print of thy paces,
Made smooth for the world and its lords,
Ringed round with a flame of fair faces,
And splendid with swords.
There the gladiator, pale for thy pleasure,
Drew bitter and perilous breath;
There torments laid hold on the treasure
Of limbs too delicious for death;
When the gardens were lit with live torches;
When the world was a steed for thy rein;
When the nations lay prone in thy porches,
Our Lady of Pain.
When, with flame all around him aspirant,
Stood flushed, as a harp-player stands,
The implacable beautiful tyrant,
Rose-crowned, having death in his hands;
And a sound as the sound of loud water
Smote far through the flight of the fires,
And mixed with the lightning of slaughter
A thunder of lyres.
Dost thou dream of what was and no more is,
The old kingdoms of earth and the kings?
Dost thou hunger for these things, Dolores,
For these, in a new world of things?
But thy bosom no fasts could emaciate,
No hunger compel to complain
Those lips that no bloodshed could satiate,
Our Lady of Pain.
As of old when the world's heart was lighter,
Through thy garments the grace of thee glows,
The white wealth of thy body made whiter
By the blushes of amorous blows,
And seamed with sharp lips and fierce fingers,
And branded by kisses that bruise;
When all shall be gone that now lingers,
Ah, what shall we lose?
Thou wert fair in the fearless old fashion,
And thy limbs are as melodies yet,
And move to the music of passion,
With lithe and lascivious regret.
What ailed us, O gods, to desert you
For creeds that refuse and restrain?
Come down and redeem us from virtue,
Our Lady of Pain.
All shrines that were Vestal are flameless,
But the flame has not fallen from this;
Though obscure be the god, and though nameless
The eyes and the hair that we kiss;
Low fires that love sits by and forges
Fresh heads for his arrows and thine;
Hair loosened and soiled in mid orgies
With kisses and wine.
Thy skin changes country and colour,
And shrivels or swells to a snake's.
Let it brighten and bloat and grow duller,
We know it, the flames and the flakes,
Red brands on it smitten and bitten,
Round skies where a star is a stain,
And the leaves with thy litanies written,
Our Lady of Pain.
On thy bosom though many a kiss be,
There are none such as knew it of old.
Was it Alciphron once or Arisbe,
Male ringlets or feminine gold,
That thy lips met with under the statue,
Whence a look shot out sharp after thieves
From the eyes of the garden-god at you
Across the fig-leaves?
Then still, through dry seasons and moister,
One god had a wreath to his shrine;
Then love was the pearl of his oyster,
And Venus rose red out of wine,
We have all done amiss, choosing rather
Such loves as the wise gods disdain;
Intercede for us thou with thy father,
Our Lady of Pain.
In spring he had crowns of his garden,
Red corn in the heat of the year,
Then hoary green olives that harden
When the grape-blossom freezes with fear;
And milk-budded myrtles with Venus
And vine-leaves with Bacchus he trod;
And ye said, "We have seen, he hath seen us,
A visible God."
What broke off the garlands that girt you?
What sundered you spirit and clay?
Weak sins yet alive are as virtue
To the strength of the sins of that day.
For dried is the blood of thy lover,
Ipsithilla, contracted the vein;
Cry aloud, "Will he rise and recover,
Our Lady of Pain?"
Cry aloud; for the old world is broken;
Cry out; for the Phrygian is priest,
And rears not the bountiful token
And spreads not the fatherly feast.
From the midmost of Ida, from shady
Recesses that murmur at morn,
They have brought and baptized her, Our Lady,
A goddess new-born.
And the chaplets of old are above us,
And the oyster-bed teems out of reach;
Old poets outsing and outlove us,
And Catullus makes mouths at our speech.
Who shall kiss, in thy father's own city,
With such lips as he sang with, again?
Intercede for us all of thy pity,
Our Lady of Pain.
Out of Dindymus heavily laden
Her lions draw bound and unfed
A mother, a mortal, a maiden,
A queen over death and the dead.
She is cold, and her habit is lowly,
Her temple of branches and sods;
Most fruitful and virginal, holy,
A mother of gods.
She hath wasted with fire thine high places,
She hath hidden and marred and made sad
The fair limbs of the Loves, the fair faces
Of gods that were goodly and glad.
She slays, and her hands are not bloody;
She moves as a moon in the wane,
White-robed, and thy raiment is ruddy,
Our Lady of Pain.
They shall pass and their places be taken,
The gods and the priests that are pure,
They shall pass, and shalt thou not be shaken?
They shall perish, and shalt thou endure?
Death laughs, breathing close and relentless
In the nostrils and eyelids of lust,
With a pinch in his fingers of scentless
And delicate dust.
But the worm shall revive thee with kisses;
Thou shalt change and transmute as a god,
As the rod to a serpent that hisses,
And the serpent again to a rod.
Thy life shall not cease though thou doff it;
Thou shalt live until evil be slain,
And the good shall die first, said thy prophet,
Our Lady of Pain.
Did he lie? did he laugh? does he know it,
Now he lies out of reach, out of breath,
Thy prophet, thy preacher, thy poet,
Sin's child by incestuous Death?
Did he find out in fire at his waking,
Or discern as his eyelids lost light,#
When the bands of his body were breaking
And all came in sight?
Who has known all the evil before us,
Or the tyrannous secrets of time?
Though we match not the dead men that bore us
At a song, at a kiss, at a crime -
Though the heathen outface and outlive us,
And our lives and our longings are twain -
Ah, forgive us our virtues, forgive us,
Our Lady of Pain.
Who are we that embalm and embrace thee
With spices and savours of song?
What is time, that his children should face thee?
What am I, that my lips do thee wrong?
I could hurt thee - but pain would delight thee;
Or caress thee - but love would repel;
And the lovers whose lips would excite thee
Are serpents in hell.
Who now shall content thee as they did,
Thy lovers, when temples were built
And the hair of the sacrifice braided
And the blood of the sacrifice spilt,
In Lampsacus fervent with faces,
In Aphaca red from thy reign,
Who embraced thee with awful embraces,
Our Lady of Pain?
Where are they, Cotytto or Venus,
Astarte or Ashtaroth, where?
Do their hands as we touch come between us?
Is the breath of them hot in thy hair?
From their lips have thy lips taken fever,
With the blood of their bodies grown red?
Hast thou left upon earth a believer
If these men are dead?
They were purple of raiment and golden,
Filled full of thee, fiery with wine,
Thy lovers, in haunts unbeholden,
In marvellous chambers of thine.
They are fled, and their footprints escape us,
Who appraise thee, adore, and abstain,
O daughter of Death and Priapus,
Our Lady of Pain.
What ails us to fear overmeasure,
To praise thee with timorous breath,
O mistress and mother of pleasure,
The one thing as certain as death?
We shall change as the things that we cherish,
Shall fade as they faded before,
As foam upon water shall perish,
As sand upon shore.
We shall know what the darkness discovers,
If the grave-pit be shallow or deep;
And our fathers of old, and our lovers,
We shall know if they sleep not or sleep.
We shall see whether hell be not heaven,
Find out whether tares be not grain,
And the joys of the seventy times seven,
Our Lady of Pain.
Charles Algernon Swinburne (1837-1909)
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