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… winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots ; raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. Clouds without Wa ter EDITED FROM A PRIVATE M. S. BY THE Rev. C. VEREY (ALEISTER CROWLEY) PRIVATELY PRINTED FOR CIRCULATION AMONG MINISTERS OF RELIGION 1909
…d may indeed use to His giory even this terrible and wicked book. It has cost me much to read it ; to meditate on it has been a terrible shame and trial; to issue it, much against my own poor human judgment, in obedience to His will, has been a still harder task; were it permitted me to ask a recompense, I would ask none but that of His divine blessing upon my fellow-labourers in His great field. The Manuscript
Love is sore wounded by the dragon shame, O maiden o' mine! its life in jets of blocd Languidly ebbs. I see the gathering flame Aspire — expire. I see the evil flood Of time roll even and steady over it, Bearing our God to the accurst ravines; Bearing our God to the abysmal pit Whence never a God may rise. The wolfish queens Of earth have set their faces stern and sour Against us ; we are bidden to cease — to cease! Ha ! how eternity laughs down their hour, Dragoons their malice with its dominant peace. We are forbidden to love — as one who tri…
…the wanton air. Why should we cast our crowns to gods unborn ? Why yield our bleeding garlands till the hour When to ourselves we seem a shame and scorn And seek some craft to span a statelier power? Not for a while evoke that sombre spell ! The present still exceeds the possible.
X Are not the poppy-fields one snowy flame ? Come, let us wander hand in hand therein, Staining with joyous juice our lips of shame, Draining their bitter draught of sterile sin! Are not the eyes of sleep already dull, The lashes drooping over their desire? Are not the gods awaiting to annul With Lethe the last flicker of the fire? Ay, let us kiss, my darling; let us twitch For the last time the flesh against the flesh, Before the coming of the lovely witch That shall excite our sleepy souls afresh, Anointing us with subtle drugs and suave, Vit…
… be For us, the chosen of so severe a god To act so high a tragedy, the elect To suffer so, and so rejoice, the rod And scourge ofourown shame, thegilt and decked Oxen that go to our own sacrifice At our own consecrated shrine of vice. Il Over the desert ocean of distress Wereach pale eager hands that quiver and bleed With life of these our hearts that surge and stress In agony of the meditated deed. For in the little coppice by the gate Wherein I drew you shy and sly, and kissed Yourlips, your hushed “TI love you” smooth and straight Sweeping …
II There is an alchemy to heal the hurt Done to our love by shame the dragon of ill With his allies the fear, that wars begirt With clouds, and that sad sceptic in the will That sneaks within our citadel, that steals The keys and opens stealthily the gates When we are sleeping, when the dawn conceals Its earliest glimmer and our blood abates Awhile its tide ! O mystic maiden o’ mine, Did I not warn you of the insulting foes? Blind worms that writhe for envy, pious swine~ That gnash their teeth to espy the gold and rose Out flaming like the dawn…
…harp gasps; you get nor sleep nor rest, The monster moving in you in his sport. Surely a monster! some unnatural thing, Some Minotaur of shame, no egg of pride To hatch the miniature of love and spring In your own image, subtly glorified. White swan you were! not Zeus but Cerberus Hath ravished you; you brood on harpy eggs — Sweet sister! is the wine too sour for us? Wehave drunk deep — nay! nay! but to the dregs! And ail their bitterness is braver brew Than the dull syrup of the pious crew.
…being) you must suffer as I, Hunger as I, rejoice as I, withdraw Into the same far transcendental sky Of this initiated rapture. Hurt Of shame for me is past, beholding Gods Only a little part of me, and dirt Such as men fling and women paste, no odds. Moreover, by the subtle and austere Vintage we drain, albeit we drain the lees, There is no headache for the morning drear, No fluctuant in our tideless ecstasies — Whereby, o maiden o’ mine, the runic rime Tells me we have ree’d the riddle of old Time. XIII Never, o never shall I call you bride!…
VIII Now J have told you all the ingredients That go to make the elixir for our shame. Already make the fumes their spired ascents ; The bubbles burst in tiny jets of flame, And you and J are half-intoxicated (I hid the heart of madness in my verse) Therewith, like Maenads ready to be mated Betfcre the Lord of bassara and thyrse. Yea ! we are lifted up! Crested Kithairon Shakes his black mane of pines, and roars for prey. Heave all his bristling flanks of barbéd iron! Fiesh thy red hunger on the bleeding day, O tanreéd night ! till from thy mot…
Strand, the one an unfortunate of the lowest order, the other a loafer and parasite upon the ghouls that traffic in human flesh and shame. Thus we see evil reproducing itself, spreading like an incurable cancer throughout society from one germ ofinfidelity and unhallowed lust. I may perhaps be blamed for publishing, even in this limited measure, such filthy and blas- phemous orgies of human speech (save the mark) but I am firmly resolved (and I believe that I have the blessing of God on my work) toawake my fellow-workers in the great vineyard t…