Algernon Charles Swinburne

“ White cursed hills, like outer skirts of hell
⁠Seen where men's eyes look through the day to night,
Like a jagged shell's lips, harsh, untunable,
Blown in between by devils' wrangling breath;
Nathless we won well past that hell and death,
⁠Down to the sweet land where all airs are good,
Even unto Rome where God's grace tarrieth.
Then came each man and worshipped at his knees
Who in the Lord God's likeness bears the keys
⁠To bind or loose, and called on Christ's shed blood,
And so the sweet-souled father gave him ease. ”

“ But though my lips shut sucking on the place,
There is no vein at work upon her face;
⁠Her eyelids are so peaceable, no doubt
Deep sleep has warmed her blood through all its ways.
Lo, this is she that was the world's delight;
The old grey years were parcels of her might;
⁠The strewings of the ways wherein she trod
Were the twain seasons of the day and night.
Lo, she was thus when her clear limbs enticed
All lips that now grow sad with kissing Christ,
⁠Stained with blood fallen from the feet of God,
The feet and hands whereat our souls were priced. ”

“ Smells the rare scent made where a panther feeds,
⁠And tracking ever slotwise the warm smell
Is snapped upon by the sweet mouth and bleeds,
His head far down the hot sweet throat of her—
So one tracks love, whose breath is deadlier,
⁠And lo, one springe and you are fast in hell,
Fast as the gin's grip of a wayfarer. ”

“ Ah God, that I were as all souls that be,
As any herb or leaf of any tree,
⁠As men that toil through hours of labouring night,
As bones of men under the deep sharp sea.
Outside it must be winter among men ”

“ Thou knowest how sweet a thing it is to me.
Inside the Horsel here the air is hot;
Right little peace one hath for it, God wot;
⁠The scented dusty daylight burns the air,
And my heart chokes me till I hear it not. ”

“ With loves burnt out and unassuaged desires;
⁠Between her lips the steam of them is sweet,
The languor in her ears of many lyres.
Her beds are full of perfume and sad sound,
Her doors are made with music, and barred round
⁠With sighing and with laughter and with tears,
With tears whereby strong souls of men are bound.
There is the knight Adonis that was slain;
With flesh and blood she chains him for a chain;
⁠The body and the spirit in her ears
Cry, for her lips divide him vein by vein.
Yea, all she slayeth; yea, every man save me ”

“ With heavy kisses and with happy breath;
⁠Not as man lies by woman, when the bride
Laughs low for love's sake and the words he saith.
For she lies, laughing low with love; she lies
And turns his kisses on her lips to sighs,
⁠To sighing sound of lips unsatisfied,
And the sweet tears are tender with her eyes.
Ah, not as they, but as the souls that were
Slain in the old time, having found her fair;
⁠Who, sleeping with her lips upon their eyes,
Heard sudden serpents hiss across her hair.
Their blood runs round the roots of time like rain:
She casts them forth and gathers them again ”

“ Hélas trop malheureux homme et mauldict pescheur, oncques ne verrai-je clémence et miséricorde de Dieu. Ores m'en irai-je d'icy et me cacherai dedans le mont Horsel, en requérant de faveur et d'amoureuse merci ma doulce dame Vénus, car pour son amour serai-je bien à tout jamais damné en enfer. ”