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BETELGUESE
That holds the sultry, naked dead,
Who caught the eyes of waves forlorn,
Now bathed in blood in Hecate's home.
There garnet wrought and purple lights
Shine thro' poisoned vials of age
On churning pomps of casements old,
Where, when lofty aisles and halls
Ring rich with tenor runes in nights
Made solemn by a hoary sage
With darkling eyes that gleam like gold,
A prowling vandal storms the walls,
Nursed with dank venom broths and oils.
A blood-shot minx hunts for a man;
In stys and broken pyxs she peers
For him who ruined her honour, soul;
A harlot doomed in clinging coils
That now her longings curse and damn,
Squats on a skull and pulls her ears:
Or, just when she finds her life-goal,—
A cow'ring cur hid from the sight
