Or let Kailasha’s godded peak
Summon the oread and the gnome
To leave their toils, the word to speak
That shakes its azure-splitting dome
With the reverberation—listen !—Aum !
Let olive fail, and mangostin!
O’erturn the dark forbidden draught!
Give me the taste, the taste unclean
Of human flesh and blood that mean
Some infinite horror to the light that laughed !
So let the scent of lily and rose,
Of jasmine, taggara, pass away!
Let patchouli, patchouli, repose
My nostrils with your odour gray,
Dead darlings exquisite in your decay!
So, silk and velvet, fur and skin,
Your sensuous touch shall quit me quite:
I am at swiving strain with sin—
I'll touch the stars, the blood run thin
From the torn breast of Night, my mother Night.
65 F