Pansies (Lawrence)/Spiral Flame
SPIRAL FLAME
There have been so many gods
that now there are none.
When the One God made a monopoly of it
he wore us out, so now we are godless and unbelieving.
that now there are none.
When the One God made a monopoly of it
he wore us out, so now we are godless and unbelieving.
Yet, O my young men, there is a vivifier.
There is that which makes us eager.
While we are eager, we think nothing of it.
There is that which makes us eager.
While we are eager, we think nothing of it.
Sum ergo non cogito.
But when our eagerness leaves us, we are godless and full of thought.
But when our eagerness leaves us, we are godless and full of thought.
We have worn out the gods, and they us.
That pale one, filled with renunciation and pain and white love
has worn us weary of renunciation and love and even pain.
That strong one, ruling the universe with a rod of iron
has sickened us thoroughly with rods of iron and rulers and strong men.
The All-wise has tired us of wisdom.
The weeping mother of god, inconsolable over her son
makes us prefer to be womanless, rather than be wept over.
And that poor late makeshift, Aphrodite emerging in a bathing-suit from our modern sea-side foam
has successfully killed all desire in us whatsoever.
That pale one, filled with renunciation and pain and white love
has worn us weary of renunciation and love and even pain.
That strong one, ruling the universe with a rod of iron
has sickened us thoroughly with rods of iron and rulers and strong men.
The All-wise has tired us of wisdom.
The weeping mother of god, inconsolable over her son
makes us prefer to be womanless, rather than be wept over.
And that poor late makeshift, Aphrodite emerging in a bathing-suit from our modern sea-side foam
has successfully killed all desire in us whatsoever.
Yet, O my young men, there is a vivifier.
There is a swan-like flame that curls round the centre of space
and flutters at the core of the atom,
there is a spiral flame-tip that can lick our little atoms into fusion.
so we roar up like bonfires of vitality
and fuse in a broad hard flame of many men in a oneness.
There is a swan-like flame that curls round the centre of space
and flutters at the core of the atom,
there is a spiral flame-tip that can lick our little atoms into fusion.
so we roar up like bonfires of vitality
and fuse in a broad hard flame of many men in a oneness.
O pillars of flame by night, O my young men
spinning and dancing like flamey fire-spouts in the dark ahead of the multitude!
O ruddy god in our veins, O fiery god in our genitals!
O rippling hard fire of courage, O fusing of hot trust
when the fire reaches us, O my young men!
spinning and dancing like flamey fire-spouts in the dark ahead of the multitude!
O ruddy god in our veins, O fiery god in our genitals!
O rippling hard fire of courage, O fusing of hot trust
when the fire reaches us, O my young men!
And the same flame that fills us with life, it will dance and burn the house down,
all the fittings and elaborate furnishings
and all the people that go with the fittings and the furnishings,
the upholstered dead that sit in deep arm-chairs.
all the fittings and elaborate furnishings
and all the people that go with the fittings and the furnishings,
the upholstered dead that sit in deep arm-chairs.