FLASHES OF MADNESS — IV

When thou didst speak but now I felt

      A terror mad and strange.

Conceive it thou. I could have knelt

To thy lips, to their curve, to its change.

      The talking curve of thy lips

      And thy teeth but slightly shown

Were my delirium's waking whips.

      I felt my reason overthrown.

A super-sensual fetichism

      Haunts my deep-raving brain.

Greater than ever grows the abysm

Of my reason's and feeling's schism,

      Cut with the pickaxe of pain.

More than they show all things contain.

Something not of this world doth lie

      In thy smile, in thy lips live turn;

A figure, a form I know not why

That wakes in me — without a sigh

      But with terror I cannot spurn

      With terror wild and mute —

Is it remembrances, is it

      Desires so vague half-known they flit

And not in thought nor sentiment take root?

      My mind grows madder and more fit

      In everything to catch and find

      Meanings, resemblances defined

      By not a form that thought can hit.

Smile not. Thou canst not comprehend!

      What is this? What truth doth sleep

      In these ravings without end

            And beyond notion deep?

Laugh not. Know'st thou what madness is?

Wonder not. All is mysteries.

      Ask not. For who can reply?

Weep for me, child, but do not love me

Who have in me too much that is above me,

      Too much I cannot call «I».

      Weep for the ruin of my mind

Weep rather, child, that things so deep should move me

      To lose the clear thoughts that could prove me

            One worthy of mankind.