6
VI
1
Thou wast a priestess, O my God, among the Druids; and we knew the powers of the oak.
2
We made us a temple of stones in the shape of the Universe, even as thou didst wear openly and I concealed.
3
There we performed many wonderful things by midnight.
4
By the waning moon did we work.
5
Over the plain came the atrocious cry of wolves.
6
We answered; we hunted with the pack.
7
We came even unto the new Chapel and Thou didst bear away the Holy Graal beneath Thy Druid vestments.
8
Secretly and by stealth did we drink of the informing sacrament.
9
Then a terrible disease seized upon the folk of the grey land; and we rejoiced.
10
O my God, disguise Thy glory!
11
Come as a thief, and let us steal away the Sacraments!
12
In our groves, in our cloistral cells, in our honeycomb of happiness, let us drink, let us drink!
13
It is the wine that tinges everything with the true tincture of infallible gold.
14
There are deep secrets in these songs. It is not enough to hear the bird; to enjoy song he must be the bird.
15
I am the bird, and Thou art my song, O my glorious galloping God!
16
Thou reinest in the stars; thou drivest the constellations seven abreast through the circus of Nothingness.
17
Thou Gladiator God!
18
I play upon mine harp; Thou fightest the beasts and the flames.
19
Thou takest Thy joy in the music, and I in the fighting.
20
Thou and I are beloved of the Emperor.
21
See! he has summoned us to the Imperial dais. The night falls; it is a great orgy of worship and bliss.
22
The night falls like a spangled cloak from the shoulders of a prince upon a slave.
23
He rises a free man!
24
Cast thou, O prophet, the cloak upon these slaves!
25
A great night, and scarce fires therein; but freedom for the slave that its glory shall encompass.
26
So also I went down into the great sad city.
27
There dead Messalina bartered her crown for poison from the dead Locusta; there stood Caligula, and smote the seas of forgetfulness.
28
Who wast Thou, O Caesar, that Thou knewest God in an horse?
29
For lo! we beheld the White Horse of the Saxon engraven upon the earth; and we beheld the Horses of the Sea that flame about the old grey land, and the foam from their nostrils enlightens us!
30
Ah! but I love thee, God!
31
Thou art like a moon upon the ice-world.
32
Thou art like the dawn of the utmost snows upon the burnt-up flats of the tiger's land.
33
By silence and by speech do I worship Thee.
34
But all is in vain.
35
Only Thy silence and Thy speech that worship me avail.
36
Wail, O ye folk of the grey land, for we have drunk your wine, and left ye but the bitter dregs.
37
Yet from these we will distil ye a liquor beyond the nectar of the Gods.
38
There is value in our tincture for a world of Spice and gold.
39
For our red powder of projection is beyond all possibilities.
40
There are few men; there are enough.
41
We shall be full of cup-bearers, and the wine is not stinted.
42
O dear my God! what a feast Thou hast provided.
43
Behold the lights and the flowers and the maidens!
44
Taste of the wines and the cakes and the splendid meats!
45
Breathe in the perfumes and the clouds of little gods like wood-nymphs that inhabit the nostrils!
46
Feel with your whole body the glorious smoothness of the marble coolth and the generous warmth of the sun and the slaves!
47
Let the Invisible inform all the devouring Light of its disruptive vigour!
48
Yea! all the world is split apart, as an old grey tree by the lightning!
49
Come, O ye gods, and let us feast.
50
Thou, O my darling, O my ceaseless Sparrow-God, my delight, my desire, my deceiver, come Thou and chirp at my right hand!
51
This was the tale of the memory of Al A'in the priest; yea, of Al A'in the priest.
