Table of Contents

      Benediction

      Echoes

      The Sick Muse

      The Venal Muse

      The Evil Monk

      The Enemy

      Ill Luck

      Interior Life

      Man and the Sea

      Beauty

      The Ideal

      The Giantess

      Hymn to Beauty

      Exotic Perfume

      La Chevelure

      Sonnet xxviii

      Posthumous Remorse

      The Balcony

      The Possessed One

      Semper Eadem

      All Entire

      Sonnet xliii

      The Living Torch

      The Spiritual Dawn

      Evening Harmony

      Overcast Sky

      Invitation to a Journey

      “Causerie”

      Autumn Song

      Sisina

      To a Creolean Lady

      Moesta et Errabunda

      The Ghost

      Autumn Song

      Sadness of the Moon–Goddess

      Cats

      Owls

      Music

      The Joyous Defunct

      The Broken Bell

      Spleen

      Obsession

      Magnetic Horror

      The Lid

      Bertha’s Eyes

      The Set of the Romantic Sun

      Meditation

      To a Passer-by

      Illusionary Love

      Mists and Rains

      The Wine of Lovers

      Condemned Women

      The Death of the Lovers

      The Death of the Poor

      Benediction

      Table of Contents

      When by the changeless Power of a Supreme Decree

      The poet issues forth upon this sorry sphere,

      His mother, horrified, and full of blasphemy,

      Uplifts her voice to God, who takes compassion on her.

      “Ah, why did I not bear a serpent’s nest entire,

      Instead of bringing forth this hideous Child of Doom!

      Oh cursèd be that transient night of vain desire

      When I conceived my expiation in my womb!”

      “Yet since among all women thou hast chosen me

      To be the degradation of my jaded mate,

      And since I cannot like a love-leaf wantonly

      Consign this stunted monster to the glowing grate,”

      “I’ll cause thine overwhelming hatred to rebound

      Upon the cursèd tool of thy most wicked spite.

      Forsooth, the branches of this wretched tree I’ll wound

      And rob its pestilential blossoms of their might!”

      So thus, she giveth vent unto her foaming ire,

      And knowing not the changeless statutes of all times,

      Herself, amid the flames of hell, prepares the pyre;

      The consecrated penance of maternal crimes.

      Yet ‘neath th’ invisible shelter of an Angel’s wing

      This sunlight-loving infant disinherited,

      Exhales from all he eats and drinks, and everything

      The ever sweet ambrosia and the nectar red.

      He trifles with the winds and with the clouds that glide,

      About the way unto the Cross, he loves to sing,

      The spirit on his pilgrimage; that faithful guide,

      Oft weeps to see him joyful like a bird of Spring.

      All those that he would cherish shrink from him with fear,

      And some that waxen bold by his tranquility,

      Endeavour hard some grievance from his heart to tear,

      And make on him the trial of their ferocity.

      Within the bread and wine outspread for his repast

      To mingle dust and dirty spittle they essay,

      And everything he touches, forth they slyly cast,

      Or scourge themselves, if e’er their feet betrod his way.

      His wife goes round proclaiming in the crowded quads –

      “Since he can find my body beauteous to behold,

      Why not perform the office of those ancient gods

      And like unto them, redeck myself with shining gold?”

      “I’ll bathe myself with incense, spikenard and myrrh,

      With genuflexions, delicate viandes and wine,

      To see, in jest, if from a heart, that loves me dear,

      I cannot filch away the hommages divine.”

      “And when of these impious jokes at length I tire,

      My frail but mighty hands, around his breast entwined,

      With nails, like harpies’ nails, shall cunningly conspire

      The hidden path unto his feeble heart to find.”

      “And like a youngling bird that trembles in its nest,

      I’ll pluck his heart right out; within its own blood drowned,

      And finally to satiate my favourite beast,

      I’ll throw it with intense disdain upon the ground!”

      Towards the Heavens where he sees the sacred grail

      The poet