Heautontimoroumenos

for J.G.F.     I'll strike you without rage or hate     The way a butcher strikes his block,     The way that Moses smote the rock!     So that your eyes may irrigate     My dry Sahara, I'll allow     The tears to flow of your distress.     Desire, that hope embellishes,     Will swim along the overflow     As ships set out for voyaging,     And like a drum that beats the charge     In my infatuated heart     The echoes of your sobs will ring!     But am I not a false accord     Within the holy symphony,     Thanks to voracious Irony     Who gnaws on me and shakes me hard?     She's in my voice, in all I do!     Her poison flows in all my veins!     I am the looking-glass of pain     Where she regards herself, the shrew!     I am the wound, and rapier!     I am the cheek, I am the slap!     I am the limbs, I am the rack,     The prisoner, the torturer!     I am my own blood's epicure     - One of those great abandoned men     Who are eternally condemned     To laugh, but who can smile no more!