212 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
LE VIN DE L’ASSASSIN 
 
MY wife is dead, and I am free !   
 Now I can drink my whole week’s wage. 
I used to come home stony—she 
 Tore my nerves with her cries of rage. 
 
I am as happy as a king :   
 The air is pure ;  the lark’s astir— 
We had just such another spring 
 The year I fell in love with her. 
 
The dreadful thirst that parches me 
 Craves wine, wine, wine to loose its clutch :   
Wine, wine enough to brim with glee 
 Her grave—and that is saying much. 
 
I threw her body down the well !   
 The little wall around that ran 
I pushed upon her as she fell. 
 —I will forget her if I can !   
 
By all the oaths of tenderness 
 Whose tendrils nothing may unbind, 
And to bring back the enchanteress 
 Love to the days when she was kind.