The Star in the West

THE VIRGIN 83 Yet Alice is full of fear ; they question their love , and Love conquers . The still horror creeps silently on , enveloping them in the shroud that man has woven as the garment of love : Since our pure shame unworthily destroys The love of all she had , her girls and boys , Her home , their lives : and yet my whisper stirs Into live flame her passion , and deters Her fear from spurning all the day's due joys ." The pudibonderie of the English would call this lust . Indeed , drunken on their own crapulous imagination , choked by their venomous vomit , they cannot see the divine form of Love through the mist of their steam ing sensuality . For what reason did man tie woman to him ? For what reason did he devise the horrors of indissoluble marriage ? And the answer is : that he might ever have at least one poor victim to sate his vile carnalities on . Lust and Indolence are the parents of Marriage and Law , but not even the menials of Freedom and Free Love . We clung still closer , till the soul ran through Body to body , twined like sunny snakes , Sinlessly knowing we were man and wife.2 Alice , still fearful , foresees the end ; such love as theirs is too supernal to be platonic ; she flies in vain ; for she has to console her sad lover with the truth . The storm - clouds gather on the twenty - fifth day : Mouth unto mouth ! O fairest ! mutely lying , Fire lambent laid on water , -0 ! the pain ! Kiss me , O heart , as if we both were dying ! | Alice , an Adultery , vol . ii, p . 73 . 2 lbid .