Classic Poem

Nailed to a cross, your beauty still aglow,
A fierce incarnate agony you seem;
Like purple wounds upon a field of snow
My scarring kisses on your body gleam.

How thin your fair young face, your limbs how spare,
How frail upon your breast the blossom lies!
But oh! the torch of lust is flaming there
Through darkness and in triumph from your eyes.

When you, a virgin sword unstained, yet fierce
To brook affront, came trusting unto me,
Your innocence was like a sword to pierce,
And I desired to stain your purity.

I gave you of the poison that was mine,
My sorrow and my passion—all I gave;
And now behold the depth of my design:
A tortured soul too late for tears to save.

That I might now re-fashion from the dust
My shattered altars, and redeem the loss!
Madonna, with the kindled eyes of lust,
'Twas I who nailed you naked to the cross.