THE PALACE OF DESIRES
I entered, through a pillared portico,
A stately hall with walls of burnished bronze,
Where twenty different coloured lambent flames
In separate, slender spirals hung aloft,
Shedding a subdued, stellar brilliancy,
Kind, as a discreet caress, to the eyes.
Here maidens danced; while other maidens sang,
Or stirred to sensuous music golden strings
Caught, like a fairy web, ’tween ivory bows.
The graceful cadence of their waving arms
Invited me to follow them. Indeed
’Twas no unpleasant bidding. Thus I reached,
With careless dalliance, a marble court
Ablaze with violet fire; where flowers shone
Like jewels, where perfume-laden fountains played
And birds with human voices sang—each note
A charm-born breath of passionate suggestion.
I halted wondering, for this marvellous place
Was paved with sharp-edged rubies. Yet the birds
Gave forth such dulcet notes, the maidens smiled
So winningly.... I bruised and cut my feet....
Surely the promised joy must be supreme.
Teeth set, hands clenched, I dragged my steps along,
An icy sweat oozed out of every pore
And clogged my hair; but still I struggled on.
What goal, once won, was ever worth the winning
That has not wrung the life-blood from our being.
At last! At last! The farther end was reached.
Then some mysterious force asunder drew
Two heavy purple curtains. I beheld
A lofty chamber white as virgin snow
And bathed in soft and even whiter light.
Here, on a silk-draped throne of sapphire, lay
Two women naked. Ah! such loveliness
Once to behold were worth a thousand pangs.
Their faces and their figures visions were,
Such as dear youth alone can conjure up
In solitary secrecy of thought.
Their eyes had hues unknown to human sight,
The hues of everlasting rainbows spanning
The far off interspaces of the worlds.
And one was fair, with wondrous woven hair
By godlike fingers spun from that first gleam
Of perfect light, which shooting through the spheres,
Rended of old the primal darkness, changed
The cold revolving orbs to living worlds.
But no less proudly did her sister bear
The regal mantle of her sable tresses,
Which fell about her perfect shoulders, o’er
The curving, marble splendour of her hips.
Again the guiding maidens urged me on,
Who little wanted urging. Now the ground
Was soothing in its softness. Had there been
Iron flags red hot I would have ventured still:
For they had seen me, and awaiting lay
Upon their throne in rosy nakedness.
Their glorious eyes were heavy-veiled with love;
Their lips were parted, waiting for my lips
To close them with a kiss; their arms outstretched
Offered the havens of their breasts to me.
So I had won, not laboured all in vain.
This was my minute wherein life is crowded.
The wild triumphal ebbing of my blood
Elated me. The magic of success
Gave me back youth with all its strength and dreams.
But then a something quivered ’neath my feet,
So cold and loathsome that I started back
And with misgiving eyes explored the ground.
Ah! me, the soothing softness I had felt,
After the torture of the jewelled pavement,
Was made of human bodies interlaced....
Dead men and women strong, and young, and white
With the weird whiteness of this common grave!
And then I knew I stood at last within
The secret chamber of that fatal palace,
Wrought of the mad desires of men, and paved
With mad despairs, the dread Gehenna where
The two arch-harlots Fame and Fortune dwell.