< Mandragora

THE BASSARID


DANCE with the Maenad crowd;
   Follow your pulses' beat.
Toss back your hair from your forehead proud;
Crush in the madness of cymbals loud
   The hyacinths at your feet.

Deep in the dewy dawn,
   Where the serpent of passion hisses,
Pan and Sylvan and Satyr and Faun,
Let them whirl you on through the branches torn,
   And stain your mouth with kisses.

With parted lips and with eyes
   Brimming and drugged and bright,
Cry aloud your wild Thessalian cries,
Cry aloud your Phrygian ecstasies,
   In the hot perfumed night.

Let the wood-spurge cling to your waist,
   Let the woodbine tangle your hair,
Let your breast by hazels be embraced
And from oozing green-wood sap be a taste
   Of pungent ivy there.

With wild-flung arms and with limbs
   Shuddering and wounded lips,
Cry aloud as your brain in frenzy swims,
And loosed by the sweetness of Bacchic hymns,
   Your vine-wreathed girdle slips.

As the torches flicker and fall,
   Flame on through the dew-dark wood;
Answer the thrill of the mad god's call
To the bitter end of the festival
   With every drop of your blood.

Fear not. When back you steal,
   Broken and weary, to me,
With oil and wine I will surely heal
Each bruise and hurt that your senses feel,
   As I take you on my knee.

I will heal each hurt of your outraged soul,
   Each mark of the wood-god's force.
I will cause the eternal sea to roll
With waves more pure than the boreal pole
   Over your least remorse!


This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1924.


The author died in 1963, so this work is also in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 50 years or less. This work may also be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.

 
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