Pere-La-Chaise. {45} (Paris.)

I stood in Pere-la-Chaise. The putrid city,
    Paris, the harlot of the nations, lay,
The bug-bright thing that knows not love nor pity,
    Flashing her bare shame to the summer's day.

Here where I stand, they slew you, brothers, whom
    Hell's wrongs unutterable had made as mad.
The rifle-shots re-echoed in his tomb,
    The gilded scoundrel's who had been so glad.

O Morny, O blood-sucker of thy race!
    O brain, O hand that wrought out empire that
The lust in one for power, for tinsel place,
    Might rest; one lecher's hungry heart grow fat, -

Is it for nothing, now and evermore,
    O you whose sin in life had death in ease,
The murder of your victims beats the door
    Wherein your careless carrion lies at peace?

Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Francis William Lauderdale Adams (27 September 1862 – 4 September 1893) was an English writer, poet, dramatist, and social reformer. His literary work often reflected his radical socialist views. Adams lived a life marred by poverty and struggles with his health, eventually committing suicide at the age of 30. Despite his brief life, his contributions to literature and social thought remain significant.

Francis William Lauderdale Adams

A Death At Sea. (Coral Sea, Australia.)

Francis William Lauderdale Adams, Simple Poetry

To Queen Victoria In England. An Address On Her Jubilee Year.

Francis William Lauderdale Adams, Simple Poetry

Mount Rennie." {95}

Francis William Lauderdale Adams, Simple Poetry

A Fool. (Brisbane).

Francis William Lauderdale Adams, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Aux Ternes. {46} (Paris.)

SHE. - "Up and down, up and down,
            From early eve to early day.
        Life is quicker in the town;
            When you've leisure, anyway!

        "Down and up, down and up!
            O will no one stop and speak?
        I would really like to sup,
            And my limbs are heavy and weak.

        "What's my price, sir? I'm no Jew.
            If with me you wish to sleep,
        'Tis five francs, sir. Surely you
            Will admit that that is cheap?"

HE. - "Christ, if you are not stone blind,
        Stone deaf also, you know it is
    Christian towns leave far behind
        Sodom and thos...

Francis William Lauderdale Adams

To Japan.

Simple you were, and good. No kindlier heart
    Beat than the heart within your gentle breast.
    Labour you had, and happiness, and rest,
And were the maid of nations. Now you start
To feverish life, feeling the poisonous smart
    Upon your lips of harlot lips close-pressed,
    The lips of her who stands among the rest
With greasy righteous soul and rotten heart.
O sunrise land, O land of gentleness,
    What madness drives you to lust's dreadful bed?
O thrice accursed England, wretchedness
    For ever be on you, of whom 'tis said,
Prostitute plague-struck, that you catch and kiss
    Innocent lives to make them foully dead!

Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Parallels For The Pious.

"He holds a pistol to my head,
Swearing that he will shoot me dead,
If he have not my purse instead,
            The robber!"

"He, with the lash of wealth and power,
Flogs out my heart and flings the dower,
The plundered pittance of his hour,
            The robber!"

"He shakes his serpent tongue that lies,
Wins trust for poisoned sophistries
And stabs me in the dark, and flies,
            The assassin!"

"He pits me in the dreadful fight
Against my fellow. Then he quite
Strips both his victims in the night,
            The assassin!"

Francis William Lauderdale Adams

On Reading The Poem Of "Paris." By The Rev George Croly, A.M.

By the trim taper, and the blazing hearth,
(While loud without the blast of winter sung),
Now thrill'd with awe, and now relax'd with mirth,
Paris, I've roam'd thy varied haunts among,
Loitering where Fashion's insect myriads spread
Their painted wings, and sport their little day;
Anon, by beckoning recollection led
To the dark shadow of the stern ABBAYE,
Pale Fancy heard the petrifying shriek
Of midnight Murder from its turrets bleak,
And to her horrent eye came passing on
Phantoms of those dark times, elapsed and gone,
When Rapine yell'd o'er his defenceless prey,
As unchain'd Anarchy her tocsin rung,
And France! in dust and blood thy throne and altars lay!

Oh! thou, thus skill'd with absolute controul,
Where'er thou wilt to lead th' admiring soul,

Thomas Gent

Apparent Failure

We shall soon lose a celebrated building.
- Paris Newspaper.



I.

No, for I ll save it! Seven years since,
I passed through Paris, stopped a day
To see the baptism of your Prince;
Saw, made my bow, and went my way
Walking the heat and headache off,
I took the Seine-side, you surmise,
Thought of the Congress, Gortschakoff,
Cavours appeal and Buols replies,
So sauntered till what met my eyes?

II.

Only the Doric little Morgue!
The dead-house where you show your drowned
Petrarchs Vaucluse makes proud the Sorgue,
Your Morgue has made the Seine renowned.
One pays ones debt in such a case;
I plucked up heart and entered, stalked,
Keeping a tolerable face
Compared with some whose cheeks were chalked

Robert Browning

Epilogue

With quiet heart, I climbed the hill,
from which one can see, the city, complete,
hospitals, brothels, purgatory, hell,

prison, where every sin flowers, at our feet.
You know well, Satan, patron of my distress,
I did not trudge up there to vainly weep,

but like an old man with an old mistress,
I longed to intoxicate myself, with the infernal delight
of the vast procuress, who can always make things fresh.

Whether you still sleep in the morning light,
heavy, dark, rheumatic, or whether your hands
flutter, in your pure, gold-edged veils of night,

I love you, infamous capital! Courtesans
and pimps, you often offer pleasures
the vulgar mob will never understand.

Charles Baudelaire