Jephthah and Other Mysteries

LYRICAL AND DRAMATIC. 147 DE PROFUNDIS. LOOD, mist, and foam, then darkness. On my eyes | Sits heaviness, the poor worn body lies Devoid of nerve and muscle ; it were death Save for the heart that throbs, the breast that sighs. The brain reels drowsily, the mind is dulled, Deadened and drowned by noises that are lulled By the harsh poison of the hateful breath. All sense and sound and seeing is annulled. Within a body dead a deadened brain Beats with the burden of a shameful! pain, The sullen agony that dares to think, And think through sleep, and wake to think again. Fools! bitter fools! Our breaths and kisses seem Constrained in devilry, debauch, and dream : Lives logged in the morass of meat and drink, Loves dipped in Phlegethon, the perjured stream.