85
Can bear and not lose consciousness,
The torture-trap’s adjustments, lingering
With fond, sweet, child-like tenderness,
Upon the knobs and springs mechanic
On which depend those joys Titanic;
“He’s fainting! Curse! The springs reverse!”
Back fly the walls: with starting eyes
And lolling tongue, his agonies
Prolonged, the shrivelling victim trails
His blackening carcase from the pit,
His smouldering raiment gashed and split.
By the wild work of blistering nails;
Hark! what a world of piteous wails,
“Not husky, though. Oh! he can bear!,”
Once more the sickening furnace flails,
Fiends vomit fire and monsters glare.
“Joy! what a scream!” “He’s gone:” “No, slacken
The walls, and let them cool and blacken
An hour. He’ll bear another bout.”
Now one by one again flash out
The demons, inch by inch the sheet
Of flame contracts; his tabid feet
Stick viscid to the flesh-strewn stones;
Glued to the fiery walls that eat
Into his back and singe the bones
And bubbling muscles—ah! what moans
As slowly thrust on toward the brink—
He writhes upon the demon-claws.
“He’s almost in.” “There: now, a pause
That he may smell the sickening stink
That steams up from th’ obscene abyss.
