d mist,
And to its vinewed dell haste I,
To catch the fleeting whispers told
To marble-lamps and head-stones, said,
By demon-husbands as I list,
To hold each mongrel harlot's sigh.
There, then, in tatter'd rags and hair,
Coarse-grained of features once so fine,
She spews her 'evil wrath and rage
Into the wriggling hands and face
Of him who lifts his voice to swear
A curse that stirs the air, whose time
(Tho' to king Satan speeds a page)
Hath come as Vengeance wins the race.
When crimson skies and stellor eyes
Swathed palace domes and turrets strong,
Her lips kiss'd mine, and mine did hers,
Ere evil smote her virgin soul.
And livid lights of bleeding dyes
(Whenas she prods him with her prong)
Make terrible her words so terse
That brands this scoundrel on this shoal.
And mutt'ring quick a ghastly oath
As turgid mists veil shadows vague,
She plucks his lying tongue that stole
Her husband's love and honour old,
And smites him stark and cold, tho' loath,
It peers to me her demon-ague
That binds her to this perjured soul,
She drinks his gore from carvels cold
And leers with fiendish lips at him,
Now tossed in phosphorescent holes.
And as I list to aspen cries,
Veiled augueries in vapours hie
And spell these tokens to each Inn:
Kingdoms, empires, nations, souls,
Shall miss the haunts of Paradise,
And in Subjection, crumbling, lie.
And when the regions, wrapped in light
By pillared dreams and pomps supreme
As curses stir the charnel air
That hide dank caverns deep and bold,
A battling monster smites the night
As lepers wink their orbs and dream
Of maidens that the men forswear,
Of templed vaults now stiff in cold.
And when a dim, unholy tomb,
Wreathes odours damp and vapours strong--
Heirs of the Doomed! as savage domes
Drip palsied sweat and carnal howls
Assail the stationed halls of gloom,
Where imps and devils march along
Beside a monarch's crumbling bones
As witches don their filthy cowls
And rant their sins thro' whistling halls,
Shake women fists at fleeing souls
And wail for batard children dead;
Whilst quickly from the burning dust
Ascends an oath that storms the walls
And rasps the distant mounts and shoals
Until each pyre glows scarlet red,
Each idol leers with wicked lust.
Forth from rubies flare scented fumes
As beacons glare and bubbles hiss
To crimson strands an