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Page 1 of 21901 · PDF PAGE 64
…, he perisheth By the secret sibilant word that is spoken unto death. RATOUM. The hour is given unto death. Bring in Dead Horus, for the night is shed above. [Coffin brought in. CHORUS. The noise of the wind of the winter; the sound Of the wings of the charioted night ; The song of the sons of the seas profound ; The thunder of death; the might Of the eloquent silence of black light ! RATOUM. The noise of many planets fallen far! CHORUS. Death listens for the voice of life; night waits The dawn of wisdom: winter seeks the spring! RATOUM. The mu…
1901 · PDF PAGE 112
( 98) THE GROWTH OF GOD (AS DEVELOPED ON A MOONLESS NIGHT IN THE TROPICS) VEN as beasts, where the sepulchral ocean Sobs, and their fins and feet keep Runic pace, Treading in water mysteries of motion, Witch-dances: where the ghastly carapace Of the blind sky hangs on the monstrous verge: Even as serpents, wallowing in the slime; So my thoughts raise misshapen heads, and urge Horrible visions of decaying Time. For in the fiery dusk arise distorted Grey shapes in moonless phosphorus glow of death; The keen light of the eyes thrust back and thwar…
1901 · PDF PAGE 81
THE MOTHER AT THE SABBATH OME, child of wonder! it is Sabbath Night, The speckled twilight and the sombre singing! Listen and come: the owl’s disastrous flight Points out the road! Hail, O propitious sight! see! the black gibbet and the murderer swinging! Come, child of wonder and the innocent eyes! Come where the toad his stealthy way is taking. Flaps the bat’s wing upon thy cheek? How wise, How wicked are those faces! And the skies Are muffled, and the firmament is quaking. Spectres of cats misshapen nestle close, And rub their phantom sides …
1901 · PDF PAGE 83
…e the fruit of me! —Shrieks every soul and every demon hisses ! Out! out! the ghastly torches of the feast! Let darkness hide us and the night discover The shameless mysteries of God grown beast, The nameless blasphemy, the sliméd East— Sin incarnated with a leprous lover! “Hoc est enim ”’—the victim! ah! my womb, My womb has borne the victim! Now I queen it To-night upon the damned—thy love makes room, My goat-head godhead, for my hecatomb ! I am thy mistress, and thy slaves have seen it ! Even as thy cold devouring kisses roll Over my corpse;…
1901 · PDF PAGE 113
THE GROWTH OF GOD 99 The earth grins open, as it were a tomb, And struggling earthquakes gnash their teeth be- neath her. The night is monstrous: in the flickering fire Strange faces gibber as the brands burn low; Old shapes of hate, young phantoms of desire More hateful yet, shatter and change and grow. There is a sense of terror in the air, And dreadful stories catch my breath and bind me, Soft noises as of breathing: unaware What devils or what ghosts may lurk behind me! Even my horse is troubled: vain it is Invoking memory for sweet sound o…
1901 · PDF PAGE 55
THE FATAL FORCE 41 A holy habitation for the shrine Solitary, ’mid the night of broken brine That foamed like starlight round the desolate shore. So to the mine of that crystalline ore Golden, the electric spark of man is drawn Deep in the bosom of the world, to soar New-fledged, an eagle to the dazzling dawn With lidless eyes undazzled, to arise, Son of the morning, to the Southern skies; And fling its wild chant higher at the fall Of even, and of bright Hyperion; To mix its fire with dew, to call The spirit of the limitless air, made one In t…
1901 · PDF PAGE 117
…The happy head ; all faith and hope immense Fly, for possession dwells supreme, intense ; And to possess is only—to possess. But, as the night draws snailwise to its end, And sleep invades the obstinate desire, And lovers sigh—but not for kisses’ sake— There comes this misery, as half awake I watch the embers of my passion-fire, And see love dwindled in my—call her friend.
1901 · PDF PAGE 116
…, half mournful and half blythe. But there’s another, when the body dieth— Hast thou no knowledge what the carcass saith ? I watched all night by my dead lover’s bed. I saw the spirit; heard the motionless Lips part in uttering a supreme caress: “T care not nor for life nor death;” they said, ‘““Only for love.” ‘What difference?” said I, ‘“‘ Dead or alive, I love thee utterly.”
1901 · PDF PAGE 111
…e and jobber sit and gloom, grown grey For hating of each other; the hours hang. But where cliffs tremble, and the wind and sea Clamour, night thunders from the roaring West; I worship in the storm, and fires flee From my gripped lightnings and my burning crest ; And when my voice rolls, master of the weather, A thousand mighty angels cry together! BRIGHTON, January 1899.
1901 · PDF PAGE 94
( 80) MORS JANUA AMORIS N the night my passion fancies That an incense vapour whirls, That a cloud of perfume trances With its dreamy vapour-curls All my soul, with whom there dances The one girl of mortal girls. The one girl whose wanton glances Soften into living pearls Comes, a fatal, fleeting vision, Turns my kisses to derision, Smiles upon my breast, and sighs, Flits, and laughs, and fades, and dies. By the potent starry speeches; By the spells of mystic kings; By the magic passion teaches; By the strange and sacred things By whose power t…
1901 · PDF PAGE 104
…ung in vain. Pale women fleet around, whose infinite Long sorrow and desire have torn their wombs, Whose empty fruitlessness assails the night With hollow repercussion, like dim tombs Wherein some vampire glooms. Pale women sickening for some sister breast; Lone sisterhood of voiceless melancholy That wanders in this Hell, desiring rest From that desire that dwells for ever free, Monstrous, a storm, a sea. In that desire their hands are strained and wrung; In that most infinite passion beats the blood, And bursting chants of amorous agony flung…
1901 · PDF PAGE 120
… 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.
1901 · PDF PAGE 14
…eep vigil of thine eremite! So let the sighing breath Draw on the Hour of Death, Whence wakeneth The Spirit of the Dawn, begotten of the night.
1901 · PDF PAGE 53
…y, When the storm sweeps triumphantly home From the bed of the violate day, In the furious waves of the sea, wild world of tem- pestuous night, Our song is as light! In the tumult of manifold fire, Multitudinous mutable feet That dance to an infinite lyre On the heart of the world as they beat, In the flowers of the bride of the flame, in the warrior Lord of the Fire, There burns our desire! AMENHATEP. Cry now, bewail the broken house, bewail The ruin of the land; cry out on Fate! CHORUS. Slow wheels of unbegotten hate And changeless circles of…
1901 · PDF PAGE 11
…d Sprang in the thunder-wind ! The strong words bind ~ For evermore, Amen! the keys of Hell and Death. Central, supreme, most formidable Night, Gathered its garments, drew itself apart, Gaunt limbs appear athwart the coprolite Veil of deep agony, display the heart; Even as a gloomy sea, Wherein dead fishes be, Poisonous things, nameless; the eightfold Fear, Misshapen crab and worm, The intolerable sperm, Lewd dragons slime-built stagnant, the foul mere Crawled, moved, gave tongue, The essential soul of dung That lived and stung; That spoke: no …
1901 · PDF PAGE 15
…, in the home of a friend, Here, in the mist of a lie, The pageant moves on to the desolate end Under a sultry sky. Noon is upon us, and Night, Spreading her wings unto flight, Visits the lands that lie far in the West, Where the bright East is at peace on her breast: Opposite quarters unite. Soon is the nightfall of Destiny here; Nature’s must pass as her hour is gone by. Only another than she is too near, Gloom in the sky. One who can never pass over shall sever Links that were forged of Love’s hand; A
1901 · PDF PAGE 62
…itigable, intelligible one, Reality beyond realities! This hour the foolish ones shall see their souls Shrink at my manifest deity. This night My spirit on my spirit shall beget Myself for my own child. Behold! they come, Fantastically moving through the dance, The many mourners, and the fatal bier Looms in the dimness of the anteroom. It is enough. My hour is at hand! CHORUS enter and circumambulate. Even as the traitor’s breath Goeth forth, he perisheth By the secret sibilant word that is spoken unto death. Even as the profane hand Reacheth t…
1901 · PDF PAGE 57
THE FATAL FORCE 43 And worship, seeing justice as a spouse Lean on thine iron hand. For Murder walks by night, and hides her face, But righteous Wrath in the light, and knows his place; For hate of a mother is ill, and the lightning flashes, But foil a harlot’s will, burn the earth to ashes, Cleanse the incestuous sty of a whore’s desire, Scatter the dung to the sky, and burn her with fire! So the avenging master shall cleanse his fate of shame, Set his seal of disaster, a royal seal to his name. [Exeunt. PACHAD. I am not Horus, but I shall be …
1901 · PDF PAGE 13
… The foam, incarnate Love, Maiden, as light leaps the dawn-gardens in, So in the Love and Light, Life slain, yet infinite, The God-Man’s night, Leaps pure the Soul rearisen from the embrace of Sin. | Yet, in the terror of that Breast, abides So sweet and deadly a device, a lure Deep in the blood and poison of her sides, Swart, lean, and leprous, that her stings endure. Even the soul of grace Abideth not her face Without vague longing, infinite desire, Stronger because suppressed, Unto the wide black breast, The lips incarnate of blood, flesh, a…
1901 · PDF PAGE 122
108 EPILOGUE Thus may no moon tell Earth my story after, No virgin sing my fame as virginal. Yet some night-leaves the southern stream may waft her, Some amorous nymph across the wood may call A loud mad chant; love, tears, harsh sombre laughter. No more at all. Oh, mother, Oh, Demeter, in my burthen Let me assume thy sorrow singular; A branching temple and an altar earthen, A fire of herbs, a clayen water-jar; An olive grove to bind the sacred girth in Lone woods afar. Let life burn gently thence, as when the ember In one faint incense-puff to…