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40
V
A face like hers I had never seen:
The lips were leaden, the eyes were green;
Each bone declared itself, and thrust
Against the skin with the force of lust.
The teeth were such as the winter years
Yellow and slant in the mouth when nears
The thud of the graveyard spade; the hair
(Such as the ravening Furies wear
In many a golden master-strain
Sung by the fine Athenian brain),
Reeking of liniment, ether and smoke,
Was fit for only a devil to stroke.
Over the desert and famine of breast
The hands of a seeming corpse were pressed
Hard on a gown that was sticky with rum
And blood of the colour of rotten plum.
The lips were leaden, the eyes were green;
Each bone declared itself, and thrust
Against the skin with the force of lust.
The teeth were such as the winter years
Yellow and slant in the mouth when nears
The thud of the graveyard spade; the hair
(Such as the ravening Furies wear
In many a golden master-strain
Sung by the fine Athenian brain),
Reeking of liniment, ether and smoke,
Was fit for only a devil to stroke.
Over the desert and famine of breast
The hands of a seeming corpse were pressed
Hard on a gown that was sticky with rum
And blood of the colour of rotten plum.
How roughly had Passion worked to cake
The feet with poisonous mud, and make
Her daunting body a guy, to stand,
As a gift for God, in a Christian Land!
The feet with poisonous mud, and make
41
As a gift for God, in a Christian Land!
She begged a copper or two of me
By right of her name. She was Victory.
By right of her name. She was Victory.
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