The Mother’s Tragedy

( 106) STYX (To M. M. M.) “The number nine is sacred, as the Oracles inform us, and attaineth the summits of philosophy.”—-ZOROASTER. INE times I kissed my lover in her sleep: The first time, to make sure that she was there ; The second, as a sleepy sort of prayer; The third, because I wished that she should weep; The fourth, to draw her kisses and to keep; The fifth, for love; the sixth, in sweet despair; The seventh, to destroy us unaware ; The eighth, to dive within the infernal deep. The last, to kill her—and myself as well! Ah! joy of sweet annihilation, The blackness that invades the burning sun, My swart limbs and her limbs adorable! So nine times dead before the night is done, Even as Styx nine times embraces Hell.