3 Struggling through Earth's Melancholy. 4 Naked in Air, in Shame and Fear, 5 Blind in Fire, with Shield and Spear,
Two Horrid Reasoning Cloven Fictions,
In Doubt which is Self Contradiction,
A dark Hermaphrodite I stood,—
Rational Truth, Root of Evil and Good.
Round me, flew the flaming sword;
Round her, snowy Whirlwinds roar'd,
Freezing her Veil, the mundane shell. 6I rent the veil where the Dead dwell:
When weary Man enters his Cave,
He meets his Saviour in the Grave.
Some find a Female Garment there.
And some a Male, woven with care,
Lest the Sexual Garments sweet
Should grow a devouring Winding-sheet. 7One Dies! Alas! the living and dead!
One is slain! and one is fled! 8In vainglory hatch'd and nurs'd
By double spectres, self accurs'd
My Son! my Son! thou treatest me
But as I have instructed thee. 9On the shadows of the Moon,
Climbing thro' night's highest noon: 10In Time's Ocean falling, drown'd: 11In Aged Ignorance profound,
Holy and cold, I clipp'd the Wings
Of all Sublunary Things: 12And in depths of icy Dungeons
Closed the Father and the Sons. 13But when once I did descry
The Immortal man that cannot Die, 14Thro' evening shades I haste away
To close the labours of my Day. 15The Door of Death I open found,
And the Worm weaving in the Ground; 16Thou'rt my Mother, from the Womb;
Wife, Sister, Daughter, to the Tomb:
Weaving to Dreams the Sexual Strife,
And weeping over the Web of Life.
