Adolf Wolff

“ A woman loves me!
’Tis not of her I sing whose womb has been
The primal cradle of my tender self;
I mean not mother-love.
A woman loves me!
’Tis not of her I sing who also sprang
From that same source whence also I have sprung;
I mean not sister-love.
A woman loves me!
I sing of her who “from the mobs of life”
Has chosen me as him to whom alone
She will unlock her body and her soul
To welcome all my love.
ELIZABETH GURLEY FLYNN
(The Workers’ Jeanne d’Arc)
She too a vision had and voices heard:
She heard the groans of slaving, starving workers:
She had a vision of their liberation. ”

“ I strolled through lonely by-paths in the park,
It was the hour, it was the mystic hour,
When ’tis no longer day, nor yet is night.
When o’er all nature hangs a solemn hush,
And everything is peaceful and serene. ”

“ Such are the statues man, the sculptor, moulds
Of woman—clay.
CONTEMPT
I spit upon the laws that thieves have made
To give the crooked strength to rob the weak.
I spit upon a country full of wealth
Where millions live in squalor and in want.
I spit upon a flag that waves above
A nation made of masters and of slaves.
I spit upon religions that defend
A hell on earth, and preach a life to come.
I spit upon all morals that contend
That joy of life is not life’s highest end. ”

“ Was carved in Greece, when ancient Greece was young.
In deepest reverence I stood and gazed
Upon this relic of an absent god.
And as I stood I wondered if perchance
Idolatry is not this very act,
That thus enshrines an ancient piece of stone,
Whilst living sculptors are compelled to waste
In fruitless idleness that precious power
Which carves the Victories of Samothrace.
Idolators, ye worship graven stones
But are indifferent to the gods that carve them. ”

“ Compared to whom, all poems are as dust
Besides a sweetly smelling, blooming flower.”
So I lay down my pen and gazed at her.
BYRON
The thought of Byron wakens in my mind
The vision of a solitary tree
Titanic and contorted on a cliff
That overhangs a wild abysmal sea.
Its mighty root, a maze of tentacles,
Has put a lasting clutch-hold on the rock,
Much like the miser’s fingers on his gold.
Within its arteries the sap of life,
The procreative juice in torrents flows,
And gushes forth luxurious vegetation.
The foliage-covered head is always raised
In bold defiance of the elements. ”

“ Or lovely women smile.
They have to crouch and cling and sweat and scrape
But for a little dust—their sustenance.
PANEROTICISM
I love all women’s smiling eyes,
I love all women’s tempting lips,
I love all women’s loving hearts,
I love all women’s tender skin,
I love all women’s glowing flesh,
I love all women’s weakness,
I love all women’s strength.
I love! I love! I love!
APHRODITE
I’ve seen a Venus not of marble carved
By some great sculptor’s hand in ancient Greece,
Unearthed in a mutilated state
By archaeologists in quest of ruins
And pedestaled in temple of fine art. ”

“ Hosannahs would they sing.
Strength superceding faith,
Joy superceding fear:
The Super-Christ has come;
The Superman is near....
TO A NEGRO BELLE
You make me dream of distant tropic climes,
Luxurious vegetation; nights serene
By burning passion made tempestuous,
The witching scent of rare exotic flowers
That sooth and render sweetly languorous,
Of music soft and weird, whose savage rhythm
Compels each fibre of the frame to dance. ”

“ In churches and cathedrals Christians sing
Their gladness of the coming of the Lord.
The organ’s thunder glorifies the Lord,
The priests and ministers exalt the Lord,
The infant Lord the virgin Mary bore;
On Christmas eve it was in Bethlehem:
And whilst they fete the babe of Bethlehem,
Ten thousand babes on earth die painful deaths
And millions live to live lives worse than death
And still the massacre of innocents
Goes on relentlessly. Poor innocents! ”

“ Replete and radiant with rarest gems,
Perplexing, exciting, soothing, betwitching.
Lucifer! Prometheus! Dionysos! Shelley!
THE SCULPTOR AND THE CLAY
The sculptor, man, in woman mostly sees
The clay of which to model gods of love. ”

“ With great strokes paints the sun-illumined Hudson.
A fair young woman enters on the scene,
Absorbed in picking many kinds of flowers.
The youthful artist, catching sight of her,
Stands up and drops his palette and his brushes.
And when she sees the youth she drops the flowers. ”

“ Most helpless being, despotic as a king.
Third cousin to the gold-fish, the kitten and the chick,
As free from care as they are, as shame-free and as quick
To feel that life means living and living must be joy,
That nothing is of value unless it be a toy.
A SCENARIO Scene I.
The time—a glorious summer afternoon. ”

“ And be allowed as wages for his hire
To breathe within the shadow of her charms.
But though my princess be reality,
My hopes, my aspirations, my desires,
Alas, are dreams, mere dreams, alas, mere dreams. ”

“ Her tender, warm and angel-tinted flesh.
I love the angel and the beast in women.
That’s why I like a woman wearing furs.
EXCUSE ME, MUSE
’Tis not the hour to sing of pink-hued vapors
So softly sailing under azure skies ”