THE RITES OF ELEUSIS
As in the blood of murdered things
The afirighted augur shaking skries
Earthquakeand ruinous fate of kings,
Famine and desperate destinies,
So in the eyes of Pharaoh shone
The hate and loathing that compel
In death each damned minion
Of Set, the accursed lord of Hell.
Yea! in those globes of fire there sate
Some cruel knowledge closely curled
Like serpents in those halls of hate,
Palaces of the Underworld.
But in the hell-glow of those eyes
The ashen skull of Pharaoh shone
White as the moonrays that surprise
The invoking Druse on Lebanon.
Moreover pylon shouldered round
To pylon an unearthly tune,
Like phantom priests that strike and sound
Sinister sistrons at the moon,
And death’s insufferable perfume
Beat the black air with golden fans
As Turkis rip a Nubian's womb
With damascenéd yataghans.
Also the taste of dust long dead
Ofancient queens corrupt and fair
Struck through the temple, subtly sped
By demons dominant of the air.
Last, on the flesh there came a touch
Like sucking mouths and stroking hands
That laid their foul alluring smutch
Even to the blood’s mad sarabands.