ROSA DECIDUA 
3 
My soul to say it—all a man’s  
Delight.  Come, look at it !  This leaden skin 
With ochre staining its amorphous grey ;   
All that elastic brilliance passed away ;   
Minute invading wrinkles where the flesh 
Is soaked away by the foul thing within 
Her soul ;  the bloom so faint and fresh 
Smudged to a smoky glow as one may see 
At sunset in the Factory lands ;  the lips 
Thinned and their colour sickened into slate ;   
The eyes like common glass ;  the hair’s gloss dull ;   
The muscles gone, all pendulous with fat ;   
The breath that was more sweet than Lebanon 
And all the flowers and honey and spice thereof 
Ripe for my soul’s kiss, eagerly to cull, 
Now like a corpse three weeks drowned, swollen by 
sun 
And water and vermin.  There she sways and stares,  
And with the jaw dropped all awry—first swears, 
Then lurches ;  then she slobbers unctuously :   
“ I am not old :  I am quite beautiful ;   
How have I lost your love ? ”  
Pitiful !  Pitiful !  Pitiful !   
 
This is no tragedy of little tears. 
This worm was in her blood 
Lurking for thrice five years, 
And now I see him—that old slime that leers 
Where Bacchus smiles, that evil and averse 
God that is wholly curse,