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 | The poems of Madison Cawein |  |
467
THE WOMAN SPEAKS
Why have you come?—To see me in my shame?A thing to spit upon, despise and scorn?—
You, you who ask me! You, by whom was torn,
Then cast aside, like some vile rag, my name!
What shelter could you give me, now, that blame
And loathing would not share? that wolves of vice
Would not besiege with eyes of glaring ice?
Wherein Sin sat not with her face of flame?
‘You love me”?—God!—If yours be love, for lust
Hell must invent another synonym!
If yours be love, then whoredom is the way
To Heaven and God! and not with soul but dust
Must burn the faces of the Cherubim,—
O beast of beasts, if yours be love, I say!
| The poems of Madison Cawein | |