JEZEBEL 
3 
Ah God !  the traps for fervent feet ! 
The morrow beaconed, and I came 
By where the golden groves of wheat 
In summer glories fiercely flame ; 
To those white courts, by princes trod, 
Where Ahab sat, and mocked at God. 
 
Where Ahab sat :—but lo !  I saw 
No king, no tyrant to be curst ; 
But she, who filled me with blind awe, 
She, for whose blood my thin veins thirst ; 
The blossom of a painted mouth 
And bare breasts tinctured with the south. 
 
For lo !  the harlot Jezebel ! 
Her hands dropped perfume, and her tongue 
(A flame from the dark heart of hell, 
The ivory-barred mouth, that stung 
With unimaginable pangs) 
Shot out at me, and Hell fixed gangs. 
 
Her purple robes, her royal crown, 
The jewelled girdle of her waist, 
Her feet with murder splashed, and brown 
With the sharp lips that fawn and taste, 
The crimson snakes that minister 
To those unwearying lust of her. 
 
And all her woman’s scent did drift 
A steam of poison through the air ; 
The haze of sunshine seems to lift 
And toil in tangles of black hair, 
The hair that waves, and winds, and bites, 
And glistens with unholy lights. 
 
For lo !  she saw me, and beheld 
My trembling lips curled back to curse, 
Laughed with strong scorn, whose music knelled 
The empire of God’s universe.