White Stains

ALL NIGHT 55 Kissing the gates of hell, the sword of God, Each unto each a serpent or a rod, A well of wine and fire, each unto each, Whose lips are fain convulsively to reach A higher heaven, a deeper hell. Ah ! Day So soon to dawn, delight to snatch away ! Damned day, whose sunlight finds us as with wine Drunken, with lust made manifest divine Devils of darkness, servants unto hell— Yea, king and queen of Sheol, terrible Above all fiends and furies, hating more The high Jehovah, loving Baal Peor, Our father and our lover and our god ! Yea, though he lift his adamantine rod And pierce us through, how shall his anger tame Fire that glows fiercer for the brand of shame Thrust in it ; so, we who are all of fire, One dull red flare of devilish desire, The God of Israel shall not quench with tears, Nor blood of martyrs drawn from myriad spheres, Nor watery blood of Christ ; that blood shall boil With all the fury of our hellish toil ; His veins shall dry with heat ; his bones shall bleach Cold and detested, picked of dogs, on each