Song Of Renunciation, A

(AFTER A. C. S.)

In the days of my season of salad,
    When the down was as dew on my cheek,
And for French I was bred on the ballad,
    For Greek on the writers of Greek,
Then I sang of the rose that is ruddy,
    Of 'pleasure that winces and stings,'
Of white women and wine that is bloody,
    And similar things.

Of Delight that is dear as Desi-er,
    And Desire that is dear as Delight;
Of the fangs of the flame that is fi-er,
    Of the bruises of kisses that bite;
Of embraces that clasp and that sever,
    Of blushes that flutter and flee
Round the limbs of Dolores, whoever
    Dolores may be.

I sang of false faith that is fleeting
    As froth of the swallowing seas,
Time's curse that is fatal as Keating
    Is fatal to amorous fleas;
Of the wanness of woe that is whelp of
    The lust that is blind as a bat,
By the help of my Muse and the help of
    The relative THAT.

Panatheist, bruiser and breaker
    Of kings and the creatures of kings,
I shouted on Freedom to shake her
    Feet loose of the fetter that clings;
Far rolling my ravenous red eye,
    And lifting a mutinous lid,
To all monarchs and matrons I said I
    Would shock them, and did.

Thee I sang, and thy loves, O Thalassian,
    O 'noble and nude and antique!'
Unashamed in the 'fearless old fashion'
    Ere washing was done by the week;
When the 'roses and rapture' that girt you
    Were visions of delicate vice,
And the 'lilies and languors of virtue'
    Not nearly so nice.

O delights of the time of my teething,
    Felise, Fragoletta, Yolande!
Foam-yeast of a youth in its seething
    On blasted and blithering sand!
Snake-crowned on your tresses and belted
    With blossoms that coil and decay,
Ye are gone; ye are lost; ye are melted
    Like ices in May.

Hushed now is the bibulous bubble
    Of 'lithe and lascivious' throats;
Long stript and extinct is the stubble
    Of hoary and harvested oats;
From the sweets that are sour as the sorrel's
    The bees have abortively swarmed;
And Algernon's earlier morals
    Are fairly reformed.

I have written a loyal Armada,
    And posed in a Jubilee pose;
I have babbled of babies and played a
    New tune on the turn of their toes;
Washed white from the stain of Astarte,
    My books any virgin may buy;
And I hear I am praised by a party
    Called Something Mackay!

When erased are the records, and rotten
    The meshes of memory's net;
When the grace that forgives has forgotten
    The things that are good to forget;
When the trill of my juvenile trumpet
    Is dead and its echoes are dead;
Then the laurel shall lie on the crumpet
    And crown of my head!